Quote Originally Posted by Gloryhound View Post
If you are good with tools, you could build a display type enclosure using 16" wide laminated shelf board at Lowes or Home Depot at less than the cost of a new 29 gallon tank.



Rancos can be had for the same price or less (if you can wire it) and are my preference for economy T-stats. Otherwise I like the Herpstats. A temp probe goes bad on a Herpstat you just get a new one and plug it in. On a Helix you have to send it in!



I have been through Infra Red imaging training and honestly with what I know, without going into detail, I would not get any of the above tempguns. I got a Fluke Tempgun that came with an ISO-9000 cert of calibration. With that said though mine cost over $150.00 which is more than most people seem ready to fork out! Yet some of those same people will fork out a grand or more on a snake! With that said others have used the above guns and have had them work well enough for them. I just can not bring myself to trust cheap equipment that does not come with any gaurantee of calibration.



Either should work, but I only use the digital thermometers as a reference for the direction the heat has moved. These are mass produced with a resister used for calibration and they only calibrate 1 in 100 then use the same resister in the next 100 produced.



Natural looking may look pretty to you, but your ball python does not care! All those nice little grooves and such that make them look so natural also make them extremely difficult to clean and sanitize. With that said if it makes you feel better about using them and you have the extra time to spend cleaning them go for it!



If you are going to be using a dimmer do not, I repeat do not, use Flex-Watt. If you were using an actual T-stat and it was not being placed inside the enclosure with the snake then Flex-Watt is an excellent choice as you can make it the size you need. I would look into the reptile basics UTH for under your tank or inside a display type enclosure. We have used them with good results in our display enclosure. Our racks all use Flex-Watt though!

The above our my opinions on things and I have built several enclosures and racks. Some turned out good, others not so good! The more I build the better they seem to get!


I will probably just keep using the tupperware hides that the rescue is in now, maybe spray the outsides camo or something?
Sounds like if I go with the Herpstat, I should use flexwatt?, if dimmers, then UTH? I got the tank free, so thats not an issue, but I def dont have that kind of money for a tempgun yet. I want the zilla thermo/hygro because of the 2 probes, rather than getting 2 accurites( or would that be better to get ground temp at cold/hot sides and ambient on both sides too?)

So, I guess, does everyone think that the zilla thermo/hygro, which is digital w/ 2 probes, would be a viable replacement to accurite, and with the accurites, should i have 2 to measure the temps stated above?