Foam as substrate

[Tammy24]

I have previously had tile as my substrate for my leo but was not monitoring temperature and discovered her UTH was far too small. So I went out, bought a new UTH and a thermometer with a probe and set it up. Temp through the straight tile was over 100 degrees so I started putting paper towel under it (can't afford a thermostat at the moment, maybe after Christmas) but still couldn't get it under 100 and the tile was starting to rise quite a bit with all that paper towel under it (and we have really nice thick paper towel).
So I was thinking and I have had this piece of thin foam sheet on Tammy's second level for a couple of years and it's her favorite place to be. I thought if I put some of that down maybe it would bring the temp in a good range. I found some that was a more natural color, cut it to size and put it on top of the tile. low and behold it did the job, temp is between 93 and 97 during the day, drops down into the upper 80s at night.


I was searching this forum and another one seeing if anyone else had used this sort of foam and I found a couple posts with people being concerned about the foam melting or giving of toxic fumes. I do not think it would melt, it doesn't feel like 90 degree heat is all that hot, there is tile and paper towel under it. I've used hot glue guns on this foam before and it doesn't go through. But I don't know about fumes, does anyone have any ideas about this? Do you think it's safe? If it is it would be a really nice option for people, it's easy to clean, cheap, and better looking than paper towel.


This is the foam I'm talking about, still sort of hard to picture from the photos unless you've touched it before.

 

[Owens]

Hi Tammy,
If you don't mind me making a suggestion you can solve your heat problem with a 10 dollar bill (rough cost haha). Go to a local building supplies and purchase a plug in lamp dimmer switch, it has a sliding control bar that lets you adjust the flow of electricity to the source (in this case your UTH). Monitor your therm for a few hours and adjust accordingly until you hit the desired temp, I use them in all my tanks

see below link
http://www.amazon.com/Lutron-TT-300H-WH-Electronics-Plug-Dimmer/dp/B0000BYEF6

 

[tiedxupxinxknots]

or buy a zoo med thermostat for 25 shipped from amazon.. But if you really have no budget right now then i would recommend placing cardboard under the paper towel substrate so it wont get so hot.

 

[Tammy24]

I never thought of cardboard, that's a good idea. So I take it no one knows if the foam is safe? I like how it looks better than the tile I have in there so if it's safe I want to leave it.

 

[nnoossss]

i woudnt use foam as a substrate, my reason being that i have tile and used too use paper towel for her toilet well for some reason she started yanking away at the paper towel so now i have switched too tupperware lid, just saying that ingestion is possible. What type off tile are you using, my slate and layer off towel distributes the heat well, i could see if u maybe have a different type off tyle with some kind off coating on it that that could reduce the heat.

 

[Anejodave]

Two layers of tiles with a 1/32" thick spacer will solve your problem.