OK here's the deal. I got tired of stacking bins and all that, and because of the setup of my snake room, I don't really have room for a rack. For the snakes that I have in sterilite bins, I mounted a few wire shelves on the wall. Not a traditional rack, no, but it works.

I haven't moved all of the snakes that will go there onto the shelves yet because I'm still trying to figure out what kind/how much Flexwatt to buy to be efficient. The bins that I'm using are 14" wide by 22" long. There are two bins per shelf, butted up against each other on the short edge.

Which setup sounds better with the flexwatt?
1) One 4" strip of flexwatt running the length of the shelf along the long edges of the tubs.
2) Two 1' long pieces of 11" flexwatt. One under each bin.

I think setup #1 sounds easier and less cluttered with wires, but would that leave enough of a cool area?



The second question that I have is... which has the potential to get hotter: 4" or 11"? 4" runs off of 8 watts/ft and 11" runs off of 20 watts/ft, so it seems like the 11" would, in the event of thermostat failure, get hotter than the 4". On the other hand, the wattage density for 4" is .17 w/in^2 rather than a density of .15 w/in^2 for the 11" flexwatt.

Thanks!