What I currently use is a 10 gal aquarium with a heat lamp. My temp gun (which is very acccurate) shows about 90ish on the warm and 82ish on the cool. Every time I check it, it's usually good and I'll adjust it as needed by re-positioning the heat lamp. I also keep a damp shirt covering over the tank so my humidity is usually 50 but sometimes drops to mids 30s.

However, I wanted to switch to tubs for each of use (can just use newspaper and throw the tubs / bowls / hides into the washing machine). What was recommended here was flexwatt and a thermostat, so thats what I got but it's not what I expected and doesn't do as good of a job as the lamp.

I live in an apartment with central air and heat and it's a steady 70 most of the time. It never drops below 65 and it never goes over 75. With my flexwatt, the warm side stays pretty consistently between 88 and 95, but the cool side / ambient reflects pretty close to my actual room temp of 70ish which is too cold for my snake.

What should I do here? I don't want to spend more money as I've already spent 200 on everything so far (not including snake.) I'm thinking of just returning the flexwatt and theremostat and just keeping my current aquarium / lamp setup. This would put about 100 bux back into my pocket.