snake room info

I am in the process of converting my shed to a snake/rodent room and had a few questions for those of you who have built one. First, what did you use as insulation on the walls? I was thinking of using normal household insulation but then thought about maybe using something else as insulation. Are there any good spray insulations that can with the normal cotton candy looking insulation? I was thinking some kind of rubberized spray type. Over that will be sheetrock. Is all of this overkill?
Second, this will not be a slab foundation, but one of wood. Not quite positive what it is like underneath the floor, but I would imagine it is like a deck with supports spanning the length of the shed and the plywood laid on top of it. The floor is beat up because of the doors falling off (some rotten wood on the door and the nails came through) so the floors will be replaced with some type of treated or sealed playwood. To better insulate the floor and make it more water resistant, I was thinking once again, using that rubberized spray or possibly even a truck bed liner spray on. I wanted the floor to be water proof in case anything spills or my rodent watering system develops a leak.

I don't know of any type of can insulation for the walls. How about good old R-15 or 19 for the walls. Would be close or same as in your house. I would think you would want it to be warm and hold heat like your house.

As for the floor it it is wood on posts than I would think you would want to insulate that also. I know Advanta-tek 50 is one of the best subfloors you can get and would make a good base if you did go with a spray on bedliner type coating another choice only a bit costly unless you find some on a close out would be ceramic tile.

What type of heating system are you going to use?

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Originally Posted by jotay

I don't know of any type of can insulation for the walls. How about good old R-15 or 19 for the walls. Would be close or same as in your house. I would think you would want it to be warm and hold heat like your house.

As for the floor it it is wood on posts than I would think you would want to insulate that also. I know Advanta-tek 50 is one of the best subfloors you can get and would make a good base if you did go with a spray on bedliner type coating another choice only a bit costly unless you find some on a close out would be ceramic tile.

What type of heating system are you going to use?

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I am not talking just a spray on insulation, I meant that along with the r-19. Since the only thing between the insulation and the outside is some wood, I figured I would add a little more. I am going to go through all the corners with expanding foam to make sure there are no gaps to the inside. The temps here never reach outside of 30-100. It is rare that it gets to either extreme so I will probably just try only r-19. As for the floor, I am going to look into maybe putting down new floor and building a subframe on top of that and insulate in between.

For heating, I am going to be using an oil filled heater on a ranco to keep the temps to 80 and all my adult racks use 11" flexwatt for the hot side.

I was thinking about doing something the same but the heating will kill us on money. I think it would be a fun project do redo a shed into a herp room.

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Originally Posted by PJ FF

I was thinking about doing something the same but the heating will kill us on money. I think it would be a fun project do redo a shed into a herp room.

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If you insulate it right, heating won't be a problem. I forgot what breeder it was, I think the Sutherland's that don't even heat the herp room because all the flexwatt heats it to the right temps.

http://ballpython.com/page.php?topic=facility

R13 is meant for 4 inch studs, if you can stuff in R19 more power to ya. Most houses in my area only have R13 and it gets 0-100 F here.

If you really want to go all out I think you have the right idea hitting all your corners with Great Stuff insulation foam. I would worry more about your ceiling and floor then the walls obviously. You'll lose way more heat out the top and bottom then the sides.
Go thicker on the ceiling, R25 if you can make it fit. Its all going to depend on the thickness of your studs and trusses.

If we could see some pics of the shed it would be alot easier to make suggestions... :D


Another thought, after the R19 on your walls put up some deafening board and then sheet rock. It is cheap stuff and helps insulate.

I work at The Home Depot, "You can do it, we can help". lol

Good to know. It is built with all 2x4 so sounds like R13 is the way to go. I may be having some questions for you soon. I will try to get pics up this week. My weeks are very busy Mon-Wed

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Originally Posted by green_man

R13 is meant for 4 inch studs, if you can stuff in R19 more power to ya. Most houses in my area only have R13 and it gets 0-100 F here.

If you really want to go all out I think you have the right idea hitting all your corners with Great Stuff insulation foam. I would worry more about your ceiling and floor then the walls obviously. You'll lose way more heat out the top and bottom then the sides.
Go thicker on the ceiling, R25 if you can make it fit. Its all going to depend on the thickness of your studs and trusses.

If we could see some pics of the shed it would be alot easier to make suggestions... :D


Another thought, after the R19 on your walls put up some deafening board and then sheet rock. It is cheap stuff and helps insulate.

I work at The Home Depot, "You can do it, we can help". lol

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:) shoot all the questions ya'd like. Lumber and Building Materials are my departments hehe.
If the entire thing was built out of 2x4's which is very likely, is sounds like R13 is going to be what you would want. I'd bet interested to see how your floor is set up.

Anywho, sounds like a fun project, I'd like to do the same one of these days. Probably not till my next house though.

Good luck!

Why wouldnt you just slap a sheet of linoleum down for the floor?

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Originally Posted by biggc1

Why wouldnt you just slap a sheet of linoleum down for the floor?

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Because I don't have much knowledge on this type of stuff as far as materials go? I have not gone and researched products and prices yet, just throwing some ideas around before I get started. I wanted to see what other people did for their herp rooms.

Actually you can use R-15 in your walls. Most builders use R-13 but the builder I work for ( I am a field super./const mgr ) we use R-15 in all our 2x4 walls. It really helps hold in the heat. You can use the foam on all your corners and around any door or window headers/jacks to do what is referred to as an air stop. Some call it chinking. They also make a caulking for that purpose.

If you have trusses where you can create a small attic space then a loose blown in insulation R-38 is prefect ( actually under the new IRC building codes all houses have gone to R-38 in attics or the type.)

I, like green man, building is my business. Any help you need just let me know.

The more you insulate and air stop the less heating you will have to worry about and will save you $$ in the long run.

Can't wait to see some pictures.

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Originally Posted by jotay

Actually you can use R-15 in your walls. Most builders use R-13 but the builder I work for ( I am a field super./const mgr ) we use R-15 in all our 2x4 walls. It really helps hold in the heat. You can use the foam on all your corners and around any door or window headers/jacks to do what is referred to as an air stop. Some call it chinking. They also make a caulking for that purpose.

If you have trusses where you can create a small attic space then a loose blown in insulation R-38 is prefect ( actually under the new IRC building codes all houses have gone to R-38 in attics or the type.)

I, like green man, building is my business. Any help you need just let me know.

The more you insulate and air stop the less heating you will have to worry about and will save you $$ in the long run.

Can't wait to see some pictures.

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I can't wait to get started. I have to worry about school right now but I will definitely PM both of you when I am ready.

Besides heating, I would also be concerned with how you plan to keep temps down in the warmer months. You can do this with ventilation or AC. You will need to plan this in before you build. Ventilation/cooling needs to be designed so it works! Most systems are not designed properly. (I design greenhouses for a living.) I use a lot of ventilation on my rat barn in the heat of the summer here in NJ, without ventilation I have seen temps of 140 degrees plus in that barn. Also, in August when most other rodent breeders production goes down, I see no decline in my production. I keep my reptiles in my house, in a reptile room, because it would cost a small fortune to AC a reptile barn in our heat and I just don’t like that much air passing over my reps if I used mechanical ventilation.



I have the walls of the rat barn insulated with R-13 and a ½” foam board. I also did the same on the ceiling and I filled the floor with R-13 and then put the barn on top of 2” foam board with ½” plywood under that to keep rodents out. I know this is overkill, but in the winter, with all my rats in there I only have to heat a few hours at night with electric baseboard heat.

I started today on this project. All I did was hit all the corners with the great stuff foam. I did all the inside corners and even did the outside ones too even though it may be overkill. I wanted to make sure I had all the corners sealed off. Pics to come tonight of what I am working with.

Cool, can't wait to see them!