I have a closet in my herp room, which has always been pretty much dead space. So, with the help of my younger brother (who is the guy that appears in the following pics), we converted the closet into some more useful space. I apologize to all those people stuck in the stone age that are still using dial up!! Here we go:
We start out with a bare closet with the studs marked:
Next we mount wood for the back and sides, adding several coats of poly and sealing the corners with caulk:
After painting the walls of the cages (CapeCod Grey) and sealing them with poly yet agian, we start with the framing of each level:
Each level must be tested for strength!
Continue building each level (he has to climb a bit to accomplish this. A very good reason to have a much younger sibling help you with this step!!
It gets a little tight up towards the top!! No way my big *** was going to climb up there!
Of course, each cage has to have seperate heat and lighting, so there is quite a bit of wiring to be done. All wiring is hidden and secured with in the walls!!
Had to build and mount a control pannel for all the lights and heating elements.
Here is the mostly finished bottom unit. Still some more work to do, but you get the idea.
And YES, all that electrical stuff is working. We ran conduit out of the room and tapped into the house power. This unit is on a seperate fuse from the rest of the herp room.
I know that is a lot of pictures, but it is not even half of the pics we took of this project. There will be three full size cages (each measuring approx 6ft x 3ft x 2ft), and the top unit will be devided into two seperate units (3ft x 3ft x 2ft). Of course, we made the two top cages smaller because we don't want to be lifting any giant snakes up there at head level.
We are going to have the entire unit painted Cape Cod Grey to match the rest of the room, as well as add some trim around the frame of the closet door to neaten up any slight gaps or anything.
What do you all think? (sorry so long, but I was having fun with this project and wanted to share!!)
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