Trouble with temps

[Freakonaleash]

I'm still having trouble with temps. First of all, let me see if i have this right... The best environment for a young adult ball python is, hot side, 90-95 during the day, and 85-90 at night, and the cool side is 80-85 in the day, and 75-80 at night. and the humidity is supposed to stay above 50 (im having no trouble with that). im still having trouble with the warm side getting too hot. It seems like maybe the whole tank needs to be 3-5 degrees cooler. I tried blocking off most of the screen top. still got a little more than 95 in there. Any idea of what i can do? And how can i provide ventilation for a sliding screen top aquarium? i cant just put holes in the sides. im not a breeder or herper or anything, i just want a nice aquarium set up for my snake, no rubbermaids.

the only lamp dimmers i could fine require that i cut into the power cord for the heater, i dont want to risk destroying something i just got the other day for 60 bucks. Are there any sliding lamp dimmers that i can plug directly into a wall, and then plug the heater into it? without messing with any electrical cords?

[MouseKilla]

Night time drops aren't really necessary so for the sake of simplicity I would forget about them for now at least. I wouldn't let any part of the cage get much below 80 day or night myself.

You haven't said how you are providing your ambient heat but it sounds as though you are using an under tank heater for the hot spot. Assuming that is true, there are lamp dimmers that you can just plug things (like lamps!) into without cutting any wires but even cutting wires is better than having something that doesn't work.

If you are getting hotspot temps that are over 95 but less than 100 I wouldn't worry about it but if you just want to tweak it a bit you can get a couple of books or a pieces of wood and put them under the cage at each end leaving a space between the heater and the bottom of the cage. Adjust the size of the space until you get the right temps.

The advantages of this method are that you don't have to buy or wire a dimmer and therefore you don't need to worry about the dimmer breaking or failing exposing the animal to dangerously high temps, the heater runs full blast but you are allowing just enough to be diffused into the air to get what you need but no more.

[mykee]

If you're having that much trouble maintaining your temps and humidity, time to move on from a glass tank to something that is more easily sustainable husbandry-wise for your snake. It is about the snake.

[Big Mike]

Also, make sure you are measuring the temp right on the floor of the enclosure over the UTH.

There is a thread on this site on how to make your own dimmer.

I found some pretty good ones very cheap at IKEA.

[Freakonaleash]

Wow thanks for all the responses all. If i dont need to worry about the night time temp drops, that will really make this process easier. like i said im not really having too much trouble with the cool side, day through night it seems to be sticking right around 75-85 (drops to the high 70's at night probably cause the room it's in). and the highest its risen on the hot side was 101, that was the first night and it seems like weve fixed that by pulling the heater out a bit. But yeah, the hot side is pretty much stuck between 95-100 rather than 90-95. i will try setting the aquarium up on a few books until i can find a better lamp dimmer. also, how can i provide ventilation for the aquarium? do i absolutely have to drill some holes in it? or is there another way to do it?
thanks again everyone

[Vengeance]

I have a 50 gallon Glass tankand what I found to work best for me and keep up the ventilation is this....

http://www.ssnakess.com/photopost/data/500/3606Lid-med.JPG

It's a plexi glass lid that I made. It cut it to fit on the inner lip of the tank and then I put the screen lid over top. The holes are drilled at an angle to help slow the release of hummidity but still prodive adiquate ventilation. I can keep a 60% hummidity without ever misting, just keep the water bowl over on the hot side. This has worked great for me this far, if I were to do it again I would just build a custom wood enclourse because it would have been cheaper and still been a nice display cage.

As for controlling your temps, I used this

http://www.ssnakess.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=8858

Works great and is pretty cheap, they cost about $15 to make.

[Freakonaleash]

Wow thats a great idea, i was thinking i would have to try my hand at glass drilling... but wasnt to keen on the idea of shattering my new 120 dollar aquarium. I will definitely try that plexyglass lid idea. as for the thread you linked me. i have seen it. but i am by no means an electrician heh. I would undoubtedly kill myself. im sure its not too hard, but ill just try and keep my eye open for a dimmer that i can just plug the heater into, rather than messing with a bunch of wires. if anyone happens to see a dimmer like that online or something please post a link here. i will just order it online... ive called every pet store/ wal mart / home depot in my area and no one has the type of lamp dimmer im looking for, they all just have to be wired into the heater. But thank you very very much on the awesome plexyglass lid idea vengeance, i will give it a go this weekend.

[Big Mike]

Repti Temp Rheostat (http://www.zoomed.com/html/rheostats.php)

[JRQ]

Quick question. I'm not a snake guy.....but a frog guy. SOme of you may think this is for girls or maybe not, but anyway i thought that both of our groups of people could have an exchange of ideas.
My question is this does a person need to have vent holes for the tank to be heated? Or can one put a basking light or a ceramic heat emitter over the plexiglass lid? This is just a precaution for me becuase with the amount of humidity that would leave my tank, i wouldn't want to kill the frogs or burn my house down. lol

[JRQ]

oh i forgot vengeance you lid looks awesome. I love the whole Addams Family theme.

[crazyboy]

you need to have vent holes for air circulation. i forget who it was but someone on the site recommended drilling the holes at an angle to let air circulation in but not let the humidity out. sorry if i didn't interpret your question right it was kind of fuzzy.

[Vengeance]

The lid is supposed to help with the humidity and air circulation in the cage. As far as retaining heat, I would assume that if you put a plexi glass lid on top of any tank and there were no holes, the cage would retain the ambient air temperature much more easily because the hot air would have no where to escape.

My leaf turtle which is a very high humidity loving animal, I've used the same method, just on a smaller scale. The lid is much smaller and the holes are drilled on a much larger angle and there are fewer holes. It keeps the humidity very high in the cage. I don't have a Hydrometer in the cage but there is constant condensation on the glass and the lid, which is what I need. I use sphagnum moss as a substrate to keep the humidity up and never have to mist. Also leaf turtle don't like heat so the light I have over the cage is used only for a day and night schedule.

One thing to take into account, and I didn't when I as first making the lid is that lights and CHE get very hot! Plexi glass isn't made to withstand high temperatures, so if you look at my lid it's warped and has a few melted marks in the middle, that's because I had lights placed directly on the wire lid which was on top of the plexi glass. I have since suspended the lights above the cage and this has rectified the situation.

[sapphire_moon]

if your lamp dimmer cost $60 take it back. go to wal mart and find a lamp dimmer that plugs into the wall, then you plug the heat pad into the back of the part that plugs into the wall.

Here is a good example of something like I use.

Go to this site and click on the image.

http://www.homedepot.com/prel80/HDUS/EN_US/diy_main/pg_diy.jsp?CNTTYPE=PROD_META&CNTKEY=misc%2fsearchResults.jsp&BV_SessionID=@@@@1344980456.1085769779@@@@&BV_EngineID=ccejadclikgglffcgelceffdfgidgnk.0&MID=9876


(sorry it's such a big link)

You just plug it in, plug the heater into the back, and voila! you got your UTH controlled.

How are you mearsuing heat?

[sweet]

beware drilling plexiglass, it cracks easily

[JRQ]

okay now as an alternative what would you guys say the tank i would like to make would be made from plywood. And the back side would be made of sheetmetal, the sheetmetal would be covered with truckbed liner as well as all the plywood except for the door and the side view. Would i be able to put a flexi tape on the sheetmetal on the back to heat the tank that way?
Tell me if you guys understand.
P.S. I will post the whole project in this site and some people could learn from my idea