Quote Originally Posted by xdertonx View Post
Hey guys, I have a question...

i have a 48"x24"x18"high pvcx cage, this cage has a divider in the middle. I am housing two ball pythons.
i have nighttime lows that are close to 68. I did not want to purchase RHP's, so what I did instead was purchase 4 feet of 12" heat tape and 4 feet of 4" heat tape. The 12" runs along the entire front, the 4" runs along the entire back side. I plan to keep the front at 90-92 degrees surface temp above the aspen bedding, and the back at around 80 degrees surface temp above the aspen bedding. I will be using a herpstat 4 to control these. I bought the herpstat 4 to future proof myself for when I decide to buys some racks. Does anyone see an issue with setting this up this way? The only worry I have is if the heat tape fails on both sides at once, they have nowhere to escape the heat, I don't think this is very likely to happen, but I could be wrong. If so I could always hook a dimmer to the back side, so the temps could never exceed 90 degrees in case of failure. Keep in mind I do monitor temps with thermostats and IR temp guns.
The setup you just described will not do what you want it to. Heat tape has very little if any effect on air temperatures inside the cage, especially not in cages this big.