Building a multiple enclosure cabinet questions

New person question. Over the past 6 months my family has now 2 ball pythons and a red tale boa. We have them each in their own glass enclosure. My spring/summer project is that I want to build a 3 enclosure cabinet for in our living room. My question is that is there any guide or how to build this from start to finish? Including supplies for keeping the environment where it needs to be inside the enclosures. I apologize for for asking but I have really felt lost in looking through the forums. There is so much advice I feel very overwhelmed. As far as the details what wood would be good to use and how to seal the enclosures are things I am also looking for. Any help would be appreciated. Again thank you in advance.

https://youtu.be/40XhIlZ0zD8

That is an awesome guide for building. I think I am going to use it. My next question would be environment control when it is done. right now we use heat lamps in our enclosures. What are the best things to do for cabinet like that?

radiant heat panels

So using the 3 heat panels, one in each enclosure what would be recommended for a thermostat? I was looking at the Herpstat 4 since I will have 3 enclosures. Also with the building of the cabinets in the video he didn't show any sort of ventilation? I am trying to get a list of things together to start piecing this build together and try and get a ballpark of the cost for everything.

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Originally Posted by gsxr750emt

So using the 3 heat panels, one in each enclosure what would be recommended for a thermostat? I was looking at the Herpstat 4 since I will have 3 enclosures. Also with the building of the cabinets in the video he didn't show any sort of ventilation? I am trying to get a list of things together to start piecing this build together and try and get a ballpark of the cost for everything.

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Yea the herpstat 4 would work well. Vents could be a return air grille or just drill holes.

We are now up to 4 ball pythons and a red tail boa. Looking at building multiple enclosures on a shelf I am wondering would it be more cost efficient to buy them pre made? I like the AP cages. I am afraid that with that many melamine enclosures how heavy it will be plus room to add more if need be. If anybody has any pros and cons comparing both that would be very helpful. No trying to be cheap about this but also thinking that we will get more snakes in the future.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gsxr750emt

We are now up to 4 ball pythons and a red tail boa. Looking at building multiple enclosures on a shelf I am wondering would it be more cost efficient to buy them pre made? I like the AP cages. I am afraid that with that many melamine enclosures how heavy it will be plus room to add more if need be. If anybody has any pros and cons comparing both that would be very helpful. No trying to be cheap about this but also thinking that we will get more snakes in the future.

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Melamine is CHEAP, much cheaper than buying one! And you can build it right now, on your own time. But they are really heavy! I built a few 6x2x2 enclosures, which were about a sheet each, so they weigh over 100 lbs each.

With AP, it's pvc, so they're much lighter and they're very well made, but it's more expensive and it's a really really long wait. Months and months of waiting.

I went with the melamine route because when I want to add another snake, I can build my own enclosure, and it'll match the rest of what I've already built. Who knows what will happen to AP in the future, etc; I'd rather be reliant on myself, if possible.