Reptile Forum, Reptile Classifieds - CaptiveBred

[garysumpter]

Hi all.

I am speaking to an experienced builder of all things wooden this weekend who is going to be building me a rack to house my balls and corns.

The rack will be 2 tubs wide by 9 high.

I am working out the design and have come to the heating part. I had originally planned to buy 18 smallish heatmats (££!!) and run each off individual matstats but I am now weighing up my options.

Do you guys have any thoughts towards the use of heat cable as a substitute? It SEEMS cheaper than mats would be and I know a few people use it.

I assume the best thing to do is route out a channel for the cable to lay in?

Does heat cable come with a mains plug on the end?

Does it give out sufficient heat compared to a heat mat?

I'd really appreciate any thoughts on the best choice of rack heating.

Many Thanks

Gary
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[Scott W]

Hi Gary, I use a heat cable for one of my racks, it holds 70 of the cadbury type hatchling tubs.

The cable is on a dimming switch and I dial the switch to adjust the temp every few days, I would probably change to a dimming thermostat when I get time to swap it over.

As for the cable, yep router a channel and then cover over with Aluminum tape, this helps the heat spread better.

I like the cable better than a pad because you can get a higher basking spot without flooding the whole tub with heat (i.e. it gives a better gradient), the down side is you have to build a rack to fit the cable, this normally works out with either not enough cable or too much cable hanging out!

Also I wouldn't go to many levels high because the thermostat controls the entire cable, this would give a much higher top level temp to bottom level.
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[BallGuy]

As Scott said the cable comes in pre-determined lengths already terminated, so you have to make the rack/viv to suit the cable.

I've seen it in 3, 5 10, 15 ,20 ,25 metre lengths
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[RoyalCrazy]

Where do you guys buy your heat cable?

Thanks

[BallGuy]

Most of the rep websites do it but you can actually pick it up quite reasonably in Garden centres as soil heating for green houses and the like.
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[RoyalCrazy]

Thanks, when you routing do you do a single channel or 2/3 so that there’s a decent size heat spot?

Thanks

[peaches]

On mine there's a single channel for the cable with aluminium tape over to spread the heat.
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[RoyalCrazy]

ok, thank you.

[Scott W]