Viv heating in a cool room

[Cam]

I see most rack and viv setups with the warm end heated by a UTH, Flexwatt or a RHP but then I think these are in snake rooms where the ambient is fairly high.

My question is in a cool (70-72F) ambient room (my living room), I'm thinking more than this might be required to manage the temperature inside a vivarium of any height (Thinking 3 wide, 3 tall, 2 deep or somesuch). Is this a typical problem, or something that most people manage by simply managing the amount of air circulation and insulation on the sides of the vivarium?

I'm wondering if I'm going to need a secondary source of heat to keep the general ambient inside the viv where I want it, with a UTH (or whatever) in one particular spot for thermoregulation.

Thoughts?

[infernalis]

one word....

INSULATION

I use it, I recommend it, and it saves energy.

[Cam]

Originally Posted by infernalis

one word....

INSULATION

I use it, I recommend it, and it saves energy.

Your Dr. House avatar is pretty appropriate for at least one reason.

I assume what you're saying is that one heat source is probably enough, even for a tall viv in a cool room so long as it's insulated. What about ventilation? I assume you want some degree of air exchange between the viv and the room... I guess one is just fairly judicious about where the ventilation holes are so that there aren't any cold spots in the cage?

What about redundancy? I come from sort of a monster aquaria background and typically in a big tank you want more than one heater so if one fails ON it's too small to overheat the tank and if one fails OFF, you have at least one other that can maintain a minimum temp. Is this an issue with most UTH/RHP type products?

[infernalis]

I am a big believer in backup everything, so if you are going to have UTH type heaters, I would install a second, or at least an alarm to notify you if temps fall.

What species are you intending to keep, we can discuss the plan further.

Reptilian oxygen requirements are minimal, so air exchange is not uber important, as long as you are opening the cage door once a day.

I use minimal venting.

But my methods are not "popular" or "common"

I keep way too many animals, so I heat the whole reptile room to 80 degrees.

[Lankyrob]

All my snakes are in wooden vivs in our living room, they all have one Ceramic Heat Emitter in the viv, because they are stacked together if one should fail then the other vivs will keep it warm enough until the bulb is replaces.

Obviously the warmer the ambient the less the heater has to work to create the hot spot

[shaunyboy]

a non light emmiting ceramic bulb set up on its own,will heat your viv with no problems

cheers shaun

[Snakefood]

It really depends on what your keeping, colubrids can easily take those temps at the cool end and lower with no problems at all!! (as long as they have proper temps at the hot end) My corns THRIVE in my home!!

I keep my house cool, like you, and I have just had my first health problem with my ball python. The vet thinks it is because ambient temps dropped to low, compromising his immune system and allowing the RI to take hold. So I now have a CHE hanging over his viv keeping the ambeint "in tank" heat at 80f, and still use the UTH to keep the hot end at 96 (while he's still sick) and 91 (once he's well again)

So like Wayne said, we could answer better knowing what you plan to put in your living room.

[Cam]

Thanks all. I'll be designing and building the viv myself so there's some opportunity to make design changes that will better suit the house temp and so on.

I'm planning on keeping a Jag Carpet Python in the enclosure. It just seemed to me there are two things you're trying to control - overall temp and warm end temp. I guess achieving the balance by adjusting the ventilation and circulation within the enclosure is probably not that difficult. Regarding redundancy I might just use two thermostats if I decide I am that worried about it. I have lost an entire aquarium from a failed thermostat before.

[Lankyrob]

Fish are much less hardy in terms of temperature changes imo

[Cam]

Originally Posted by Lankyrob

Fish are much less hardy in terms of temperature changes imo

Well that's true, but I do travel for work, so if a thermostat were to fail it's possible I wouldn't notice or catch it for several days. Just better to design it to be failsafe.

[red ink]

Originally Posted by Cam

Well that's true, but I do travel for work, so if a thermostat were to fail it's possible I wouldn't notice or catch it for several days. Just better to design it to be failsafe.

Working with the appropriate wattages V basking temp will be your best fail safe...

I.e. if say a 75w CHE on for 5hrs straight can only ever get the basking temp up to 45-50C max... then in the event of catasthrophic failure while your away as long as your thermal gradient is good, your animal will simply move to the cool spot.

Now you can also piggy back the thermostat onto a secondary mechanical/analouge thermostat placed at the cool spot if your really worried. These types of thermostat measure air temps so if you set them at say 20C then it will shut off when the air temps are at 20C in the spot where it is placed.

[Cam]

Originally Posted by red ink

Working with the appropriate wattages V basking temp will be your best fail safe...

I.e. if say a 75w CHE on for 5hrs straight can only ever get the basking temp up to 45-50C max... then in the event of catasthrophic failure while your away as long as your thermal gradient is good, your animal will simply move to the cool spot.

Now you can also piggy back the thermostat onto a secondary mechanical/analouge thermostat placed at the cool spot if your really worried. These types of thermostat measure air temps so if you set them at say 20C then it will shut off when the air temps are at 20C in the spot where it is placed.

All good thought process, I like the piggyback idea but I don't know if I'd go that far. With two small independently controlled heat sources if one fails on or off the animal should still be OK as long as they are small enough not to overheat the whole enclosure but large enough that a habitable area would stay warm if one failed.

I could also increase the house thermostat while I'm travelling but that seems a bit wasteful and easy to forget.

[icole]

Nothing is fail safe (Titanic), but redundancy helps. I am using a 75 watt RHP in a 4' by 2' by 14" plastic enclosure for my Dumeril in my basement. Ambient temps are 68. THe guy who helped me at pro-heat said that if I put foam insulation under the tank that will be sufficient on its own. Plastic does hold heat better than other materials though. Also if it fails A boa won't die at 68 degrees, but RI is a risk.