Just for the heck of it, I sandwiched a UTH between two pieces of glass and wrapped it in a big thick blanket (don't try this at home kids), left it on for hours, while it got super hot, nothing melted or caught fire. I'd say UTH was bad plain and simple. It shouldn't get hot enough to melt no matter the conditions. No I'm not saying it's acceptable to go without a thermostat because it will certainly get hot enough to cook your snake. And yeah a thermostat with a failsafe would have certainly come in handy here though. For half the price of one of the fancy thermostats you can get two of the Hydrofarms.