RHP + screen-top terrarium?

[ToxicFrog]

My wife and I are trying to set up the thermals for this ball python we just got. The previous owners had a UTH and a UVB lamp on a timer and that appeared to work -- UTH on always, lamp on during the day -- but our house has a lot of temperature fluctuation throughout the day, so we're having trouble getting a stable temperature. At the moment we have the UTH, a CHE, and an IR lamp that we turn on at night to counter the temperature drop. This gives temperatures of around 80°F on the cool side and 90°F on the basking side. It requires a lot of manual tuning, though, and the fact that it's a glass-sided terrarium with a mesh lid rather than a door-fronted terrarium doesn't help.

Long-term, we'd like to move to a proper vivarium with top-mounted RHP. What I'm wondering is if there's a way we can get the RHP and thermostat now and use that instead of the CHE with the current terrarium -- it'll be months before we can get the vivarium set up, most likely. As far as I can tell, RHPs are designed to be screwed into the top of a door-front terrarium, but would it be possible to mount it on spacers on top of the screen in the meantime?

[bcr229]

I would remove the screen top and fabricate either a PVC or melamine top to replace it, and then attach the RHP to that. Otherwise you'll have problems retaining humidity in it.

[ToxicFrog]

I would remove the screen top and fabricate either a PVC or melamine top to replace it, and then attach the RHP to that. Otherwise you'll have problems retaining humidity in it.

Humidity has not so far been a problem. We cover the half of the tank that doesn't have the CHE on it and mist as needed, and it stays around 50-60%. If we can replace the CHE with an RHP, an 80W one would cover the other half of the tank pretty well, too, hence my original question: can I safely mount an RHP on top of a screen?

Based on the description I think we should be able to just put spacers around the corners without issue; it might even be ok directly resting on the screen, but I'd rather not chance that. And then once we get a proper terrarium we can transfer the RHP into it. But I'd like to know rather than guessing, and I figure someone here has to have tried it, right?