heatmat

what temperature do heatmats give out when plugged in normally,i have a large one in my 4ft wooden viv,my thermostat has just broken down and cant get to shops until monday,i am in uk :rockon:

Hi daveyboy,


If its a normal reptile heatmat from a petshop they tend to run at about 10 degrees c hotter than the ambiant temps in the tank but yeah you might want to keep a fairly good eye on it to prevent the possibilities of burns.

When you say you cant get to the shops do you mean any or just a specialist - because if there a b&q or somehting close you could buy a dimmer switch and box to give you some method of control for about £8 all in.

Maybe allow £12 and get some extra cable and connector strip so you don't have to cut up the heatmat lead any more than necessary.

main thing is keep a decent thermometer on the mat so you can tell the surface temps the snake is exposed to.



dr del

Reptile heat mats without a thermostat or dimmer on them get hot enough to burn your snake.. I've measured 130 degrees on them.. or more.

Hi Shelby,

Maybe the decent American ones do - ours suck. :mad:

They do have a bad habit of developing "hot spots" though. I tend to put my matts on the back wall to prevent problems for most species but most of them run just from a plug and , to be honest, struggle to reach 90 most of the time.
This may be because I have a cool house of course.

This is the reason I just spent $79 (£42) getting a 24" x 11" 240v flexwatt shipped over from America to test for a rack I want to build.

I agree they are best with some form of control attatched (if they are placed flat so the snake can lie on them especially) which is why I mentioned the cheap/quick solution.


dr del

Wow I guess you guys have some wimpy UTHs. ;) I love my flexwatt.