New to RHP and pvc, advice?

[Bcb6272]

Long time bp owner here. My guy is pushing 7 years old, and I just recently built him a pvc cage (48”x24”x16”). Coming from a glass 30 gallon with a uth and non proportional thermostat, this is all a bit new. I have a pro products rhp and a herpstat intro plus (proportional). I have the probe about 3-4” under the rhp on the back wall behind the rhp, set to 86 degrees. I have 2 analog thermometers in the cage, one under the rhp on top of the hide, which reads between 90-93, and one on the cool side that reads 78-80. I know digital are more precise, and I have a few laying around, but I’m a molecular lab tech by trade and in the lab we trust our analogs for everything lol. The only thing is, my infrared temp gun reads 94-97 on top of the hide when I place it in the cage close to the hide for a reading. This is only for a minute or two at most until the herpstat throttles the power of the rhp, but worrying nonetheless. At an angle from about 12” though, the ir reads what my analog shows. I calibrated the ir gun using a few different thermometers, including digital , and it’s accurate within 1 degree outside the cage. Does placing the gun in the cage under the rhp for a reading alter it’s accuracy? Or would the black plastic hide absorb more heat than the analog thermometer could? I just want to make sure I’m not going to fry him. If it helps, the ir gun also reads higher on the herpstat probe than the herpstat shows, but that could be from the emissivity difference in the probe. Temps in the hide are pretty constant at 88-91, with substrate temp around 80-82. He doesn’t seem to mind, his body temp is normal. I thought a rhp and pvc would be easier to dial in than my old school setup, maybe I was wrong lol.

[KMG]

I was kinda frustrated with the numbers my RHPs were giving me until I mounted the tstat probe like I show here. Seemed to make the numbers much more consistent.

But plenty of people use the dangle method too.

https://ball-pythons.net/forums/show...91#post2359891