Heating a wood enclosure

[Brad]

What's the best way to heat an all wood (with the exception of the plexi front) enclosure for a blood python. I just built one it's 5x2x1.5 foot (LxWxH) enclosure.

[ohh_kristina]

flexwatt heat tape or a UTH would work.

[ohh_kristina]

UTH = under tank heater, by the way.

[Invictus]

UTHs work just fine on wood. The size of the UTH governs how much heat it will give off and how much energy it will use though... how thick and of what type of wood is it?

[Lisa]

We use UTHs with our wood enclosures, works great.

[Burm41]

I got a question on this since im building some cages for my snakes. but the UTHs there under the cage? kinda a wierd question but how thick are they. are they like heat tap... ahh

Alan

[reverendsterlin]

my wood floored enclosure have regular human heating pads in them. The large sized one at Wal-Mart (pharmacy area) was about $15USD and waterproof. Works fine in 6X2X2 enclosures.

[mark129er]

I use a heating pad under my melamine enclosure, the melamine is 5/8" and the heat pad creates a hot spot of 90-93. Hope this helps. Actually, it has been cold here at night so I have another heat pad on low under the col side of the tank because the ambient house temp drops at night.

[jay76]

UTH is as Kristina said, under tank heaters, so yes they go under the enclosure. It needs some airflow under it though to prevent heat build up. There is a kind of UTH that is fundamentally the same as heat tape, a sheet of plastic with elements embedded in it. They have to be different than heat tape somehow, since heat tape is not CSA approved and the heat mats obviously are, since they're sold in stores.

[Lisa]

the UTH (exoterra) we use are similar to heat tape, the heat pads come in 3 sizes and have adheasive. We use 3/4" melamine and it heats just fine though the wood. We use 3/4" melamine cause they sag less then the 5/8" and there's enough wood we can router them when needed.

[Brad]

The floor of my enclosure is made of 3/4" plywood. I guess I'll just stick a UTH underneath it, I wasn't sure if that would be a fire hazard or not. What's biggest size UTH available? Reverendsterlin said something about a human heater how big is that?

[Linds]

Originally posted by jay76
They have to be different than heat tape somehow, since heat tape is not CSA approved and the heat mats obviously are, since they're sold in stores.

The only reason that heat tape is not CSA approved is because you have to manufacture it yourself. Nothing wrong with the actual product. UTH are basically the same thing. ZooMed are thicker and you can feel wiring in them so they are a bit different.

[Invictus]

Originally posted by Linds
The only reason that heat tape is not CSA approved is because you have to manufacture it yourself. Nothing wrong with the actual product.

Actually the reason why it is not CSA approved is because of the class action lawsuit against Flexwatt corp. for their home heating panels which burned down several houses. Because of the loss of the lawsuit, the CSA dropped Flexwatt from the approved list for ALL of their products.

Though the fact that you have to wire it yourself obviously automatically negates it from CSA, unless you are a journeyman electrician.