Rhp are a VERY controversial subject in here. You are going to find some people that swear by them and you are going to find some that are going to tell you that terrestrial snakes such as ball pythons will not benefit from them and you will also find some that are going to tell you that they are not as economical as UTH. Here is my take on them.... I have been running them in my system for about 7 months now ( which includes this past winter!) I live in Chicago so the weather here can get VERY cold. I also live in a very old house that is drafty so I needed something that could keep up with all of that . I am running a properly sized RHP in all of my cages ( the key is Properly sized. If you are not sure what size you need for your cage than talk to Bob at Pro Products and he will set you up! ) Another key thing to mention here is that you must maintain a proper " head" clearance. My cages are all made from 3/4" plywood ( so they have a good insulation factor) and have a height of 24". The RHP are plugged into a herpstat thermostat. I personally have found that with my set up I do not need to run an UTH. My ambient Temps stay at 86 deg hot side, 78 deg cold side and basking spot under the RHP is 92 deg. ( I will add this for technical reasons. RHP do not heat the air, they heat objects which in turn raise the air temps. A trick I use is I have a thick piece of stone in each of my cages to absorb the heat ) Uth's do very little to raise ambient temps and if the thermostat fails you are going to have a very badly burnt snake. I do not ever have to worry about burns because if my thermostat fails the snake will simply move to the cold side to escape the heat if it gets too hot! ( I know, a snake can move away from a UTH to but for what ever reason they never seen to move away from belly heat ,rather they just stay there and get burned! hence the reason heat rocks are frowned upon. ) So in my opinion RHP are safer than UTH. I have also seen a very dramatic change in my electric bills since I have switched from Heat lamps to RHP. So to some it up. In my opinion, under the right conditions and paired with a high quality thermostat, a RHP can be a great heating option!!!!
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