Can you post a pic of your "homemade" rack?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ginevive

Awesome pics/cages JCAus!

---

thanks, the cage took alot longer but turned out real nice.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by recycling goddess

put me down for the next shipping date girls... my attic is pretty small so i'll put the three boys up in my bedroom instead :) after all... that's where i keep all the BIG snakes!

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...bellydance.gif and i can, of course, invite the belly dancing class over to entertain them while they are workin' https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...bellydance.gif don't want them to get bored stiff in there https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...bellydance.gif *clears throat* although we do need their work to be stiff... cause a flimsy rack is no good to anyone :rofl:

---

O my the comments that this is going to bring :eek: :8: :8: :8: .I will leave with no comment being made as i like this site to much:D

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by joepythons

O my the comments that this is going to bring :eek: :8: :8: :8: .I will leave with no comment being made as i like this site to much:D

---

i know!!!!Its hard not to leave a comment..... :carrot: ;)

that means two points https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil.../4/7/heart.gif https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil.../4/7/heart.gif for the girls and zero for the boys!

I thought I had posted my monstrosity in here already :(


Anyway here is phase 1 - there will be a couple more twin sections for the bigger bins - once that done all the extranneous supports and justtign 2x4s will be out of the picture - and the wooden riser at the bottom will be replaced with a nice continuous chunk of molding.

https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...rackphase1.jpg

so no lids with your's right? after the um... ah... situation with nate the other day (his ball python was sitting on top of her rack instead of inside her bin) - it got me to thinking that perhaps we NEED to build our rack with lids... so... a question to you... how do you get the bins to NOT move and how do you keep the snakes inside?

There are a couple of the shelves that wound up with a little more clearance than I had planned for. Plunking down one of those cheap brown rubber doorstops in front of the bin prevents any sort of forward movement. I thought about building little slider blocks on a pivot no wide than the thickness of the shelf that could "twist" down and keep the bin from being able to slide out.

Ditching the lids though was part and parcel of why I wanted to do this - the cleaning and maintenance time just dropped off majorly - even feeding is a much much quiker process - I am floored by the difference I did not expect it to be so significant - jut wanted to consolidate some of the footprint space we had been using down there.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by recycling goddess

how do you get the bins to NOT move and how do you keep the snakes inside?

---

The snakes cannot open a tub unless there is something for them to get leverage on (see below story)

The first racks I built I used melamine and routed channels for the heat tape. These are built very solid (read heavy as a horse), and the sterilite underbed tubs I used slide very easily. I never had a problem with an escapee for the first year of housing animals in it. One day after feeding I found one of my big girls (3300 grams) on the floor in the middle of the room. I thought i must have left the tub open or something and put her back in, making sure to slide the tub all the way in. The next morning, I found her out of her tub again!!! I knew it was not human error this time, and she got moved to a different rack. I believe she found out that if she crammed herself between the inside on the handle and the top and moved around enough, she could get the tub to slide out enough to escape. I have not had another snake escape from this rack since, but I'll bet if I put her back in, she would be out in a matter of hours. I have used Iris CB-70s in all the racks I've built since, as they have no lip inside the tub for leverage. All of these tubs slide VERY easily, and I have never had a snake escape from them.

Here are a few racks I built a couple years ago. All these pics are pretty old, but here's a one of the sterilite underbed storage tub rack. You can see the lip that she wedged herself into where the handle is.
http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f4...e/100_0320.jpg

and the rack she got moved to
http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f4...e/100_0317.jpg
That was my first time working with plastics, so the bottom has a nice lean to it https://ball-pythons.net/forums/imag...es/biggrin.gif Most of our animals are now housed in open air racks I've built similar to this one except with 10 CB-70s each.
http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f4...e/100_0321.jpg
Heat tape is run on sheet metal toward the back under each tub and I love how light they are!!!

-Evan

Heres a pic of my adult rack, I use 3" flexwatt run on top of sheet metal and the sterilite 1960 tubs. Not a very nice looking rack but it gets the job done.
http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f2...AdultRack1.jpg

p.s this is a very old pic, I took the pic right after I finished it.

thank you thank you thank you!!!

Heres a sideways sweater box rack. you can also pull out a sweater box and use 2 med. boxes in the same slot. :) https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...mela.rack2.JPG

Nice, Ed! Looks like a wannabee-escape-artist in there though. :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ECLARK

Heres a sideways sweater box rack. you can also pull out a sweater box and use 2 med. boxes in the same slot. :) https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...mela.rack2.JPG

---

Nice rack Ed! Are the smaller tubs 15 qt? I'm sure it's nice to have a versatile rack that you can easily upgrade your juveniles into bigger tubs. I need to make something that size.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ECLARK

Heres a sideways sweater box rack. you can also pull out a sweater box and use 2 med. boxes in the same slot. :) https://ball-pythons.net/gallery/fil...mela.rack2.JPG

---

Daaang! Thats either one very big female or a very small escapee!

J, The rack was built around the rubbermaid 28 qt.sweater boxes. which fit 2 med. size boxes that are perfect for growing up balls.


Stangs, That female is well above 3000 grams. the mojave that is going down for a visit is about 350 grams. I pulled a couple boxes out to give you a better idea of the tub set up. :cool:

Sorry to hijack the thread, but.....Ed, I just noticed in that pic that you use a shredded wood substrate(Aspen, or cypress) in most of those tubs, but in 2 of them, you have newsprint...reason for the difference?

Chris, I always prefer aspen because it maintains humidity much better. may have been out of it when they needed to be changed. they have problems with shedding when I keep them on newspaper to long. :)