I'm confused about snake racks

Do the snake tubs touch the flexwatt or is there a space between the flexwatt and the tub? I just read an article on how to connect flexwatt and it also said that the tubs don't touch the heat tape to reducing wearing it down.

can be done either or so long as temps are spoto n.

mine touch.

My tubs that are belly heat, have the silver tape over the flexwatt.

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Originally Posted by llovelace

My tubs that are belly heat, have the silver tape over the flexwatt.

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Sure hope you mean just the Edges of the flexwatt. if not its a fire hazard waiting to happen if entire flexwatt is covered with foil tape. And the Flexwatt under neath is a lot hotter.

All of my homemade racks had the tubs directly touching the flexwatt. I've read sometimes the flexwatt will wear out from friction due to the sliding of tubs. I've never had that happen to me.

On my homemade rack they touch the flexwatt, on my RBI rack they do not.

One rack touches and one has back heat.

Most touch or at least partially many tubs have raised edges so the contact area is quite small. (2 or 3 inches) it gives a slight air space between heater and tub (1/8 inch) That tends to promote a bit larger hot spot and nice tapering off of temps.

Ive never heard of fires in snake rooms because the heat tape got to hot. I have heard of fires from faulty wiring but not from the heat tape itself. Some of my racks have back heat, some have belly heat and some have heat cables and i have never had any issues

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Originally Posted by snake lab

Ive never heard of fires in snake rooms because the heat tape got to hot. I have heard of fires from faulty wiring but not from the heat tape itself. Some of my racks have back heat, some have belly heat and some have heat cables and i have never had any issues

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Go cover your back heat 100% with foil tape and see how much that surface temp is lower than the actual tape temp underneath. I did this on test and the flexwatt hit 150F

I cant argue that because i never cover heat tape completely with foil tape. But i do know in college we did an experiment with different combustibles, flash fire, and heat fire and we didnt get flame till over 300 degrees. We did get smoldering at 250 with certain foreign materials but it wasnt hot enough to start fire. Again what we did in college may have no bearing on this situation and like i said i dont have any experience with covering heat tape with foil tape. But i am intrigued now lol. I may have to try this and see if i can get flame oit of flexwatt

I am very interested in the results snaklab .... mythbusters style!!!

Imma do it tonight. I have to work in the snake room tonight so im gonna try it. I have a 3 ft piece of flexwatt and im gonna tape the entire piece up. wish me luck lol ill post results and maybe pics if i can get fire

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-owew...eature=related

I was thinking about building a snake rack at some point in time. I watched this youtube video and it was helpful, but I had some questions about it too.

1) he soldered the wires directly to the flexwatt and covered the ends with electrical wire. Is that a good idea?

2) Are you only supposed to have the one strip of flexwatt in the back. Do you just set it to the high temp and it tapers off to 80 in the front or are you supposed to have 2?

3) He only had one thermostat for the whole rack, but he had three series of flexwatt, was that a good idea or should he have had 3 thermostats?

All ya need is one thermostat,
One strip of heat in the back or back belly so you create a hot spot
Soldering keeps the clips from coming loose

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Originally Posted by snake lab

Imma do it tonight. I have to work in the snake room tonight so im gonna try it. I have a 3 ft piece of flexwatt and im gonna tape the entire piece up. wish me luck lol ill post results and maybe pics if i can get fire

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How did you make out?

Do you prefer back heat or belly heat?