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If you shoot the temp gun right on the glass you will get a wrong reading since it is a reflective surface. I would shot the temp with a tiny bit of substrate over the UTH and that would be more accurate.

Hi,

How do you get temps at the cool end 7 degrees below ambient? :confused:

How are you controling the UTH?

The best plan would be to adjust that until the temps on top of the glass (under the substrate )inside the hide are 92 - 95f (ish) and then adjust the depth of the substrate until the top of the substrate reads between 90-94f.


dr del

alright, so here we go.

As of right now, i have two UTH one on each side. Currently i have no means of controlling the heat output on them other than putting a thicker layer of substr. above it.

The ambient temp is 75* and humidity is 52*(i have an analog thermo on the glass on the inside), (and using the gun) the hot spots' surface is 91*, and the cool side (with more substr. covering it) is 85. Since i've put the second one in, he has been more active and not hiding. So the second one has already helped. I have trouble with the ambient because the terr. is infront of a window. So i think the cold coming off of the window directly affects his ambient temp. I would move him but the only other place, is another window. So i put a thick pillow inbetween the terr. and the window to help insulate, but it seems that hasnt done much in the way of keeping it warmer. I do have a lamp to add head but it just drops my humidity to 30%. Argh...*sigh*

Hi,

I know getting things dialled in can be a complete pain in the sit-upons.

The good news is it doesn't have to cost the earth for a lot of the fixes.

For insulating the tank I would suggest foam board on the back, sides and possibly the bottom if you really need to. It's fairly cheap, can be cut and taped taped over aquarium background picture paper so it doesn't have to be ugly, and works well.

To control the UTH's I would recommend, at a minimum, an inline lamp dimmer for each one ( I think they are about $12 each ). The reason for this is simple - your snake is perfectly capable of moving the substrate if it decides to and could easily get burnt on an unregulated UTH.

If you can afford it then the better option is a thermostat to control the hot end UTH and the second cool end heatmat connected to that via one of the inline dimmer switches to allow you to dial it down to the correct temps.

I would also invest $12 in the acurite digital thermometer and humidity weatherstation with probe from walmart - those round analoge ones are, seriously, only fit for throwing at the people trying to sell them.

I may be slightly off but I think that should help you tremendously getting things spot on for only $40 or so.


dr del

Just to be clear, him being more active is not a "good" thing really. If it is during the day in particular it means he is stressed out with his environment.

Since you have a hot spot in the 90's and a cool side UTH, then 75* ambient is fine.

Hi,

Well if the cool end heatmat isn't being controlled either it might also be sitting at 91f under the substrate. :(

At the very least a lamp dimmer would let him dial that one in correctly to give the correct temp range - when he insulates the tank the temps are likely to go up a few degrees at least.

Which at least means he should be able to avoid using the lamp that ruins his humidity.


dr del

Alright cool. Thank you guys, so much, i will definatly invest in the dimmer switches as i just whitnessed him burrowing in the substrate. Case and point! I will also invest in a digital thermo. Had i known from the beginning about the analong ones being to terrible, i wouldnt have gone cheap with the meters.

I tried researching all this stuff on the forum but sometimes it's more benficial to talk to someone about your own situation. :)