CB-70 Heat Tape setup - For Chad Schwinn

this design is from freedom breeder racks


www.freedombreeder.com

most racks like these are in heated rooms. the room temp is the cool side temp. one strip will heat a tub just fine, some breeders put 2 strips on the bottom rows, some have different thermostats for the bottom rows. racks with flexwatt and proportional stats like helix work very well and ball pythons thrive in them. no light needed in the racks.

proportional stats
www.helixcontrols.com




vaughn

im going to need to build my own design that will heat all the tubs inside the rack to a room temp. and have other heating for the warm side. balls need good ventalation right, so i couldnt make it a closed up rack? where im going to have to have the rack it'll be too cold.... so would you know how i can heat the tubs in the rack properly?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jwk811

im going to need to build my own design that will heat all the tubs inside the rack to a room temp. and have other heating for the warm side. balls need good ventalation right, so i couldnt make it a closed up rack? where im going to have to have the rack it'll be too cold.... so would you know how i can heat the tubs in the rack properly?

---

I'm no rack expert, but here's the thoughts that come to mind anyhow...

One...if you know the room the rack is going in is going to be cold, you could make life easy on yourself and just get a space heater for it. Warm the whole room up.

Two...if for whatever reason you won't get a heater...maybe you could go with two strips of flexwatt on each level instead of one...so that one strip warms up to 93ish...and the other strip warms up to 83ish. That should keep the ambient temps in each tub warm enough.

would a tub 16"x20"x5" work for a bp.. and how big will this hold? and the flex watt will work on wood right? is there any other kind of heating tape that will work good on wood?

Judy's idea sounds the best to me. I personally would warm up the room to the desired ambient temp.. That is how our room works. In answer to an earlier question, if you do not use a thermostat, the heat tape plugged directly ninto the wall will heat up to greater than 120 degrees, and will melt holes in your rack, and potentially sverly burn your animals. This is not from personal experience, but I do know someone who did do just that. A thermostat is a necesiity and not an option. I wire my heat tape in series, and have one plug per rack to plug into my Helix. I plug three racks into one Helix, and have had no problems.

Okay I think I understand how the heating tape works. Will this thermostat work with it? http://mgreptiles.com/ZOOSTAT.html and what are the disadvantages of this one compared to the others? and for the flex watt this is what i should be getting correct? http://mgreptiles.com/flexwatt.html and is there any differences when buying, how many feet of it do you think i should buy for about a 4 foot rack with 5 tubs going down?

Tim,


Thanks! I don't know how I missed this post so many months ago!!! That is exactly what I was looking for.

Thanks Again!

No problems Chad. Actually I thought you might have seen it and just didn't respond. I hope it helped.