New Set Up Question

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Originally Posted by Spaniard

Ok so I'm off to home depot, conviniently located 2 minutes away. I'll let you know how it goes after the change. I also got creative and taped my thermometer probe to the inside ceiling of the hide, is this a good spot for it. In the past i've just let them rest on the substrate.

Thanks alot Judy

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My pleasure, Rich.

The only problem I have with taping the probe inside the hide is that snakes have an uncanny ability to get into any amount of tape left in their enclosure. And once stuck, they're not exactly equipped to get it off. ;) :P

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Originally Posted by JLC

My pleasure, Rich.

The only problem I have with taping the probe inside the hide is that snakes have an uncanny ability to get into any amount of tape left in their enclosure. And once stuck, they're not exactly equipped to get it off. ;) :P

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Good point...although that aluminum tape is pretty thin and sticky, so once its on its pretty flushe with the hide....i'll have to think about something else. What do you do for your temp probe?

I went to home depot but they didn't have reflectix, and the guys didn't know where I could even find it...but they did know what I was referring to. I expained my situation and I had to get creative so I bought this stickie insulation backed with aluminum, i think the guy said its normally used to cover steam pipes or something. I thought I'd give it a shot so when I came home I stuck aluminum foil on the sticky side and placed that face down against the heat strip. Taped it up good and I'll see what happens in the coming hours.

Edit: Does anyone else go back 3 or 4 times to edit spelling errors? :oops:

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Originally Posted by Spaniard

Good point...although that aluminum tape is pretty thin and sticky, so once its on its pretty flushe with the hide....i'll have to think about something else. What do you do for your temp probe?

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I just slip it under the edge of the warm hide. Actually, once I'm sure the basic temps are dialed in right, I move mine around to get temps under each hide. (She has three all together) So it'll sit under one for a week or so, and then I'll move it to another.

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Originally Posted by JLC

I just slip it under the edge of the warm hide. Actually, once I'm sure the basic temps are dialed in right, I move mine around to get temps under each hide. (She has three all together) So it'll sit under one for a week or so, and then I'll move it to another.

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Thats what I normally did under the warm hide, but when she started going in the hide it would read her body temp so I was never sure of the exact temps, and I don't like that. Sometimes temps would be in the 80s and give me a shock.

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Originally Posted by Spaniard

I went to home depot but they didn't have reflectix, and the guys didn't know where I could even find it...but they did know what I was referring to. I expained my situation and I had to get creative so I bought this stickie insulation backed with aluminum, i think the guy said its normally used to cover steam pipes or something. I thought I'd give it a shot so when I came home I stuck aluminum foil on the sticky side and placed that face down against the heat strip. Taped it up good and I'll see what happens in the coming hours.

Edit: Does anyone else go back 3 or 4 times to edit spelling errors? :oops:

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That sounds like it should work fine. Give it a day or two and see how those temps do for you. Depending on how thick your substrate is, it may still read a bit cool on top of the substrate compared to the actual temp on the t-stat probe. That's why I like using just two sheets of newspaper...don't have to crank the t-stat up too high in order to get the top of the substrate warm enough.

And I often go back once to fix spelling or typos if I notice, them. ;) Not usually more than that, though, unless I've written a small book. :P

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Originally Posted by Spaniard

Thats what I normally did under the warm hide, but when she started going in the hide it would read her body temp so I was never sure of the exact temps, and I don't like that. Sometimes temps would be in the 80s and give me a shock.

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I think this is a case of driving yourself nuts by micro-managing everything. :P If you're sure the t-stat is set correctly and the standard temps inside the warm hide are in the safe range....then it doesn't matter what it reads when the snake is in there. Whether the therm probe is reading it or not, the temps will be the same.

Well I guess its old habit. The temps in my basement flucuate a little in the winter and I was running them with dimmers (glass tanks) so I was constantly needing to know what the temperatures were, but I guess thats different now with the Helix

I hear ya. It's a whole different ball game with dimmers than it is with t-stats.

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Originally Posted by JLC

I hear ya. It's a whole different ball game with dimmers than it is with t-stats.

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13000 pennies well spent.