heating melamine cage

How should I heat my 4' x 2' x 1' cage? I was told by someone that I could pretty much make my own panel but takeing flex watt and putting it in between to peices of plexi glass and then seal it with silicone; then from there I would mount it to the top of the cage??? Would that work? Could I just tape it to the bottom or is the melamine to thick for it to go through it?
Also, I use a radient heat panel but would like to avoid it as it will get very expensive very fast for the amount of cages I plan on building...
Thanks
PJ

You could do that, but I don't think it would project very much heat. You could put it on the floor and cover it with a piece of plexiglass, and silicone everything into place. If they needed extra heat, you could put a ceramic fixture in the ceiling on the cool side for a CHE or red bulb just for some extra ambient heat(guarded of course).

Melamine is just a pain to work with if you can't get those heat panels. I don't think you can router into it like other woods(might weaken it?).

I'd try an 11"x24" panel of flexwatt and see how that does.

What are you housing? Those new FWCs? :)

Okay. Will it heat the plexiglass to much to the point it will burn the snakes? I also e:mailed pro-products to see what the price would be. I use one of theres on my other cage and it works great but the price kills.
Also, I know this was brought up in alot of other threads but not in this case. Where would I place a probe?

Oh, and its the egyptian false cobras that will be in them. I am going to make another cage tomarrow or Wednesday.

I really am not quite sure where the probe would be placed. Maybe others who have done this before will chime in and help out a bit.

You can use foil tape to attach the heat tape to the outside bottom of the cage. You will then need to place the probe inside the cage over the hot spot. It will heat up through the melamine just fine. I did this for a few years myself. Just make sure you do use a thermostat to control it. Keep in mind also it could take a couple of hours for it to heat through the melamine.

we are creating a melamine enclosure for our hog island. i was thinking of putting the UTH on the floor of the enclosure with a piece of ceramic tile over it. this would keep it in place. then i'll put the probe on the ceramic tile.

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Originally Posted by recycling goddess

we are creating a melamine enclosure for our hog island. i was thinking of putting the UTH on the floor of the enclosure with a piece of ceramic tile over it. this would keep it in place. then i'll put the probe on the ceramic tile.

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Aleesha...personally I wouldn't do this. What you are creating is basically a large heat rock. I would use lanoliam (sp?) cleans easier and won't hold the temp as long as a ceramic tile would (which allows the thermostat to do its job).

Just a suggestion :)

As for heating Melamine I would do what I suggested in my last post. Place the Flex in the cage but under lanoliam (sp?).


You can place it under the cage and Melamine...but usually melamine is very think so you will lose a lot of the heat to dissapation (not very effecient) which means you will be running your heat more than necessary.

frig, good point sean. i didn't think about that. i do use aspen so it would be covered but yes... i would be creating a heat rock *duh*

to increase the ambient temp in the enclosure... as it's going to be large (6'x2'x2') we are going to use slate tiles on the back side with a UTH underneath them (positioned so it touches 4 tiles) which we'll only use in the winter to up the temps a little. it's going to be in the living room which is the warmest room of the house anyway, so we just want to make sure it doesn't 'chill' in the enclosure on him.

but i'll use heat tape on the UTH instead of the tile on the bottom. :P thanks for giving my brain a shake LOL