Why not?

I have a question. Last week, I got a new thermostat, and realized how much heat I was loosing by having too much newspaper as the substrate. Some of you may remember that I had a temp of 122 under the paper to achieve a temp of 94 on top of it. That being learned, I had a thought last night. If I owned a UTH that was as big as the bottom of my enclosure, why couldn't I adjust the amount of paper on the inside to achieve the perfect thermal gradient? I am certainly impressed by the consistent temps that the T-stat is delivering, and don't know why I couldn't have one sheet of newspaper on the hot end to get my 92-94 degrees and 15 pieces of newspaper on the cool end to get 82-84 degrees. I think that I have enough other stuff in the tub to keep him from getting under the paper; rocks, logs, plastic greens (even though I realize it still may be possible). BTW, I do own a UTH almost the exact same length as my tub. Is this plausible? If not, tell me why?

The chief limiting/complicating factor in relying on the newspaper to act as that sort of a heat baffle is that snakes can and most likely ultimately will manage to burrow their way underneath it. So if you have a surface temp of 122 degrees under that paper . . . . you get the picture - bad news.

(i know you meantioned things you could use to mitigate the chance of him getting down there - but they can and will especially once they have "rearranged" stuff slightly. I would just worry it would be a crapshoot - a matter of how long it took them)

Why wouldn't you want your snake to get under the paper?

I use 4 sheets of paper in my tubs and the snakes love to get underneath and make themselves little "tents"! :D

-adam

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Smulkin

The chief limiting/complicating factor in relying on the newspaper to act as that sort of a heat baffle is that snakes can and most likely ultimately will manage to burrow their way underneath it. So if you have a surface temp of 122 degrees under that paper . . . . you get the picture - bad news.

---

My temp under one sheet of newsprint to get 94* on the hot side is 95*. The hottest part of the tub floor is would be 95*. I just want to know what the downside is to my little plan, I think that it would be wonderful if the temps are consistent, and it is my experience that you can get consistency through a certain amount of newspaper (before I realized I had too much of the stuff in the tub, my hot hide temp was consistently 26-28 degrees cooler than the floor of the tub, this was with about 15 pieces of newspaper between the floor and the surface).

the thermal gradient is a major downside. the gradient is just as important as the right temps to snakes. personally i wouldn't cover more than 1/3 to 1/2 of the tub bottom with heat. the setup and ambient room temps have alot to do with proper temps. most racks are heated with only a 3 inch strip of heat.


vaughn