Best Alternative to UTH?

Radiant Heat Panel

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Originally Posted by captainjack0000

Purely hypothetical - and management doesn't ever have to make sense.

Personally, I have a UTH and a heat bulb but hate the heat bulb. I don't feel comfortable leaving the heat pad on forever. I mean thats a long time. I'm sure its designed to handle that, and I regulate it with a rheostat, but still, forever is a long, long time. I like giving it breaks, and so I use the heat bulb for that but it kills humidty, so I didn't know a good alternative was.

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I have been running my UTH since mid October and I am never worried about it because I have a proper thermostat on there. If possible, I suggest you pick up a Herpstat or a Vivarium Electronics thermostat, they will give you a lot more peace of mind than a rheostat.

Also, if you dont have one already, get a dimmer for your heat lamp and use a infrared bulb so that you can run it all night if needed without your snake freaking out. I use the heat lamp cranked extremely low on the dimmer to control my ambient temps and I never turn it off (it keeps the cool side ambient at about 78-80 at all times, and the warm side ambient between 81-83). The heat lamp does kill humidity, so I need to mist about once or twice a week, and once or twice a day during shed. Choosing the right substrate can also influence your humidity levels.

You can also try to cover the screen top with aluminum foil, that helps with humidity. Just leave a 1" inch gap at the back and a spot for your heat lamp.

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infrared bulb so that you can run it all night if needed without your snake freaking out

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Hopefully this will work better than the heat lamp I have now. I use the lamp during the day and UTH at night so as not disrupt sleep cycles.

My humidty is fine, misting, wet rag on top etc. It's a lot of work though with that lamp.

Keeping the UTH on forever - it just freaks me out. I don't leave my oven on forever ( I know, I know, different things,) I know it is probably an unfounded irrational fear, but its there.

Thanks guys/gals.

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Originally Posted by captainjack0000

Hopefully this will work better than the heat lamp I have now. I use the lamp during the day and UTH at night so as not disrupt sleep cycles.

My humidty is fine, misting, wet rag on top etc. It's a lot of work though with that lamp.

Keeping the UTH on forever - it just freaks me out. I don't leave my oven on forever ( I know, I know, different things,) I know it is probably an unfounded irrational fear, but its there.

Thanks guys/gals.

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Is your UTH on a thermostat? (it needs to be)

when a UTH is on a thermostat it isn't on forever, it gets turned on and off (or turned down depending on what type of thermostat you have)

An oven and a UTH are completely different. While the heating elements work on the same principal they are nothing alike. As long as the UTH is on a thermostat you have nothing to worry about. there are literally thousands of them that are running right now and most of them have been running for years.

I can understand an irrational fear but keep in mind a heat lamp/CHE/ any other heat source is just as likely to cause issues.

I'd say a che, but it will kill the humidity lol. So in that case I'd just put a little humidity box with some damp moss inside, with a lid and a hole cut out so the snake can go in and out as it pleases. I personally use rhp's in my PVC cages and flexwatt in my racks controlled with good thermostats because most rheostats are junk and I absolutely hate using bulbs and aquariums lol.

And now for the BIG question!

What is it about a UTH that doesn't kill humidity compared to ALL other heat sources that do kill humidity?

well there are a few reasons.

The biggest is where the heat is coming from and how far the heat gets. UTH's do not change the temperature of the air in the cage. all they do is heat up the floor.... so since the air isn't effected neither is the humidity.

I'm not a physicist, but I have been reading about it, refreshing my memory from high school.

I bet a heat pad does, via conduction, heat the air around it a tiny bit. Gasses are usually horrible conductors of heat, so it probably doesn't raise the temperature a measurable amount (at least without lab grade equipment to measure it).

I'm pretty sure then the air is not heated enough to drive convection.

A heat bulb uses radiation mostly, though there is some conduction too - touch a light bulb and find out the hard way ;)

You're right then, as the heat bulb heats everything, air as well as sticks, mulch and snake.

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Originally Posted by captainjack0000

I don't care if UTHs heat ambient air or not. I want to know what is a good heat source to provide that doesn't kill humidty that isn't a UTH....

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Oh, well since you re-stated the question that way the answer gets pretty simple...Nothing.

Also, UTH's and heat tape are designed and engineered to run all the time (regulated by a thermostat), until they don't run any more, then you replace them with another UTH or heat tape that runs all the time...

Humid air rises, hot air rises too. UTH provide local heat and typically it dissipates quickly, some have used thermal mass (a large rock) directly over the uth to hold the heat and slow the dissipation, I personally have not tried this and it takes a dangerous amount of heat to get the rock to 90º.

The things like CHEs and bulbs all require a screen to the cage and most fixtures that take them have top vents so the humidity and heat is lost through the top vents of the fixture. The high localized heat starts a convection current of air that runs between the bulb and fixture and cool end and it literally draws air from the enclosure to the outside the inflow air needs to come in from the dry air outside the enclosure speeding evaporation. A simple fixture change alters the flow (double wall) the enclosure air is drawn into the fixture and circulated over the top and back down to the enclosure the fixture is cooled with heat exchanging fins on the outside. They also provide much more ambient air temp to the enclosure as hot air is returned to it. I found when I used them I seriously needed to cut the power to the (CHE in my case) to limit the heat produced. I ran at that time a rheostat system and it was set to as low as it I could set it without turning it off.

Bulbs and CHEs do not effect the RH at all. The venting of the fixture and the venting of the surround around the fixture does.

I would suggest that UTH especially low power ones like Ultratherm and rainforest ones are much safer than bulb systems as they simply do not get hot enough to hit ignition temps of most things. My ultratherm barely hits 98º unregulated, there are very few things that can catch on fire at human body temps.