Racks in Colder Climates

I'm narrowing down my rack purchase options and am concerned for the cold months (in WI it that's most of them). We keep the house @ 67-68 in the winter but prfer 65 and one rack company said that it would really be pushing it keeping their rack at good BP temps w/ those kind of ambients and the other said no problemo (both racks have belly heat). I have two Boaphile cages sitting here unoccupied because they just can't hold the heat and I don't want to make the same mistake with a rack :taz:. Thoughts or more specifically, experiences? I'd love to have a dedicated herp room but that ain't an option; nor is moving at this point...
Best,
Jon

Hi,

Can you add external insulation to the boaphiles in any way?

Might be tricky to get it looking the way you want but it will probably help with the temps.


dr del

I'm in Iowa and luckily have a dedicated herp room currently. But didn't for quite awhile.

What I found is that commercial racks didn't typically have enough heat to support midwest winters. What I usually ended up doing was either placing a space heater within close proximity of the rack and/or adding extra heattape to the enclosure. An added row of 3 or 4 inch heat tape tended to help temps quite a bit.

Something also to remember is that the ambient air temp and the temp in the front of the rack are sometimes not the same because the hot air from the heated keeps it just a bit warmer.

Hope that helps :)

Indeed. Add some blue foam insulation board to the outside back and sides of the cages and you might see some better results. I had a 4x2 RBI cage that wouldn't really hold the heat either since I keep my home rather cool as well, but insulating it really helped. (Sold that cage after I decided to build a rack)

I used to keep my winter temps at 68...but made the "sacrifice" when I got snakes and raised that to 72. :) All my enclosures, from tubs to tanks, have insulation around them and I have an oil-filled space heater that runs near the enclosures during winter. It's one of the few things about keeping snakes that my (rather skinny) BF likes. :D

As for racks, you might be able to boost efficiency if you wrapped the outside of the rack with insulation and covered the front with a blanket or something similar at night. Just some off the top ideas. :)

All very helpful, thank you. I'd like to move on from the cages and go with a rack. Can I ask thoughts on a "sideways" rack Vs. a "regular" w/ regard to my lower winter temps in the house? Seems like more flexwatt per inch on the sideways rack. General thoughts about sideways Vs regular?

Also, was just reading my recently purchased Barker book and they were saying (don't quote me) a basking of upper 80's.Best,
-J

Hmm... 1- BPs don't 'bask' per say, they stay in one hide or the other depending on their temp desires.
2- I wouldn't go lower then 90 for the warm side temps. 80's are for the cool side.

As for 'sideways' I assume you mean long instead of deep. :) Well, that's how I built mine:

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...tRack-full.jpg

Saves space IMO and is easier to maintain a gradient. Also lets you see more :). For heating, I used UTHs - 30gal size for warm sides for better coverage and 10gal size for cool sides. That's just how I do it, tho.

I use a ranco with an oil filled heater in the room with snakes to control temps.

I faced the same problem last year. I keep my house temperature at no higher than 68 degrees in the winter and the rack temperature wouldn't keep up. One thing that I did was to buy a reflective sheet that you put in a windshield in a parked car to reflect sunlight to keep a car interior cool in the summer at a Big Lot store for a dollar or two. This is the same material as reflectivex insulation which is much more expensive. I cut a piece to fit the backwall of the backheated rack.That did raise the temperature a few degrees but it didn't quite raise it enough. I ended up putting an electric space heater hooked to a ranco thermostat in the bedroom that I use as a reptile room to solve the problem. But you say that you don't have a dedicated herp room so that may not help you. Casey Hulse of Nature's Spirit offers on his website a rack with extra heat for use in lower than average temperatures. You may want to talk to him. www.nsreptiles.com

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Argentra

http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...tRack-full.jpg

---

Ok, I *really like* this setup. Why? Because it's not a "commercial" rack system, but shows the efforts of a keeper who has taken the needs of her captives into consideration & thus built enclosures to accommodate them.

Snake cages don't have to be state of the art. They DO have to be effective, and this is a great example. I love the fact that as herpers we can be inventive & "think outside the sweater box" when it comes to caging solutions that allow us to really enjoy these animals while meeting their needs as well.

Good stuff. Thanks for sharing! :gj:

K~

:oops: Aww... thank you! Coming from you, Kara, that is a HUGE compliment that made my month! :D

"adding extra heattape to the enclosure. An added row of 3 or 4 inch heat tape tended to help temps quite a bit."

JD, Does adding another strip of Flexwatt to then require an additional thermostat?
-J

I have had luck with the insulation board in bringing up temps on the bottom drawers of my racks. We like to keep our heat low in the winter as well and just ended up making a reptile room which we heat to 78-80 in the winter with a space heater. The balls, beardie and fat tails are all on inside walls to be sure they get the warmest temps while the cresties are all on an outside wall. Good luck! Its one of the challenges of living in WI for sure!

i have rbi racks and i dont have a problem in the winter im in nw indiana, but what i had to do was place my air holes on the sides of the tub only no holes in the front at all. i did 1 hole every inch. and that was just because of the air temps mixing in the front tended to create that steamy look to the front. now instead the air mixes inside the rack where its somewhat heated before it goes into the tub. btw im also in a basement so it stays fairly cooler year round.

Nixer,
With fewer holes though do you have high humidity issues?
-J

If you think youre going to have issues. Just get more flexwatt. :gj:

Cheap, and simple to attach. Remember to use a Thermostat. ( of course)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Purkinje

JD, Does adding another strip of Flexwatt to then require an additional thermostat?
-J

---

If your Current Tstat cannot handle the extra wattage of the flex. then Yes. It will.

If it can handle the extra wattage, then nope. Attach, plug in, and go. Monitor the temps for the first 48 hours.

I'm a fellow Wisconsinite so I know where you're coming from. Prior to buying my current house we lived in a apartment where the snakes were all in the living room so we had some heating issues. I didn't want to heat the entire apartment so we used a oil filled radiator heater near the snake racks to boost the temps.

Now that I have a snake room I still use a radiator heater to keep a constant room temp of 80 degrees and work from there. It's nice not having to go from 0 degrees to 40 the next day. I always know how warm my room is going to be without the whole house having to be kept warm.

with temps in the 60s you will not be able to get proper temperatures without a space heater. the flexwatt may create a surface basking area of 90 but the ambient temp in rest of the tub will be whatever the room temperature is. i think you'll need to get a space heater and up your ambient room temperature to create proper ambient rack temps for your bps.

if you wanted to add flexwatt to the cool side you would need either a seperate thermostat or a thermostat that can control two different temperatures from different heating elements. herpstat makes one but im not sure what the model is called. the thermostat would control the flexwatt on your warm side at 90 and also the flexwatt on your cool side at 80.

the problem may be that flexwatt creates surface temperatures and im not sure by how much it would raise the ambient temps. usually it may raise ambient temps by a few degrees but that being the case then the snake would be sitting on 80 degree flexwatt on the cool side but would always be surrounded by and breathing in 68-70 degree ambient temperature air.

also the 2 strips of flexwatt would need to run the full length of the tub(halfway each) or else there would be no heat provided in the middle of the tub. if you were to use the herpstat that can control both the hot side and cool side flexwatt and a thermostat failure was to occur then the snake would have no where to escape the heat and could be cooked.

maybe people successfully heat their racks in this way and it would be great to hear from them but i would suggest getting a space heater and raising the ambient temps and using flexwatt only to create a warm side.

I use an oil filled radiator, but also have a small desk fan directed at the rad, makes a huge difference to the overall room temp, really blows the warm air around the room.
It can get pretty chilly over here in the UK

From Toronto I guess you'd have experience w/ cold whether and herps :gj:
In any case, your comment about the ambient air is in conflict w/ Nixer's post above:

Quote:

---

I have rbi racks and i dont have a problem in the winter im in nw indiana, but what i had to do was place my air holes on the sides of the tub only no holes in the front at all. I did 1 hole every inch. And that was just because of the air temps mixing in the front tended to create that steamy look to the front. now instead the air mixes inside the rack where its somewhat heated before it goes into the tub.

---

Any thoughts about that? Also, Animal plastics has this radiant heat configuration where they have heat tape on either side of the rack going vertically. Apprently, that warms the ambient air.

-J

well i dont really understand what he is trying to say and i have no idea about his setup or room conditions, etc so i wouldnt be able to compare.

what i have learned from my cold basement(70-75F) is that if you want to use a rack with flexwatt for belly heat, then youre going to need something to warm up the ambient air, unless the room temperature is naturally 80 or above. in your case the air temperature is very low and a rack with flexwatt for belly heat will not be enough and you will need a space heater. you need to raise the ambient room temperature because if you dont you'll have tubs with a basking surface temp of 90F and an ambient temp of 60-something.

what i did at first before i had a room was put up a heavy duty curtain, from ceiling to floor, in one corner of the room and my rack heated with flexwatt and space heater was behind it. the area behind the curtain held a decent temperature at the time but heat did escape and it raised the entire room's temperature by a few degrees. i didnt really mind because the basement was cold anyways. im just throwing this idea out there because you said you had no spare room to dedicate to your animals so maybe this can be an option for you.

Has anyone had experience w/ the radiant flexwatt configuration? An example would be what Animal Plastics sells? Thoughts about this concept in relation to the colder room temp. concern?

As quoted: "Dual side radiant is the preferred heating choice. In this line of racks it is 4" flexwatt running down both inner sides of the rack about 25% of the way in from the back. This still provides a wonderful gradient of heat. This system actually heats the ambient air temperature inside the tub, not just the belly of the animals. It is a much safer and more efficient way to heat rack systems."

Again, any thoughts would be appreciated.
-J