Neo.Reptiliac
New Member
- Messages
- 901
Well I decided to do this a good while back. But cause I had a small car I couldn't haul any of the wood I needed. So finally I got my lazy brother to help me out with his car and then I had to borrow him and his saw lol (I'm scared of using a saw, and cant cut a straight line to save my life, go figure) I'm sure most of you don't have any of those issues so this should be a cake walk for you. Anyways I've never built any kind of cage in my life. Ive decorated them but never built one per'say so this was a whole new experience for me. I took my time and even then I still made mistakes. Everyone makes them so don't feel bad if you do as well. Trial and error as they say, right?
Any who enough with the rambling and on with the project. I have a lot of leopard geckos and frankly I would like to see them in something larger and nicer then plastic containers. I'm sure that a lot of people that own a lot wants the same thing. But lets be honest, its hard to keep as many as some people have in anything other then racks. I watched a lot of people make racks over the years and wondered if there was some way I could make one on a more fancy scale. I realized to make it look nice the plastic containers would have to go. Cause there's nothing fancy about plastic containers.
I thought about getting some of those stackable enclosures. But most of them where made for snakes, not geckos. Not to mention the size of one that I wanted, would cost TONS. I think I asked one of the places that make them one time if they could make me a custom one, that would fit into the space that's vacant in my living room and they quoted me a few thousand dollars. I about choked on my own tongue. So I started plotting, and here is what Ive come up with.
First of all this is where it started. With a little sketch on the ol Photoshop.
I decided on making 5 cages with one rack on top. 4ft across, each cage section 1ft tall and one hatchling rack on top that would actually hold some of my shoe box sized containers for baby geckos.
Once I started building it I decided that I would put a divider on 2 of the shelves to make 2 cages on each of those 2 instead of just one really long one. Those two can be used to house single males.
I started working on it tonight and here is where I got with it. I'm not done putting the shelves on. I still need to finish the hatchling rack on the top. After that I will start painting the whole thing black.
When I started I laid it all on its back and started putting the shelves on one at a time. Here is a link of what it looked like while I was doing that.
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/ll248/neoreptiliac/Other/unit002.jpg
I used a paint can to help me hold the shelves up while I got the screws in.
The materials I used for the shelf parts you see here is half inch furniture grade plywood. I got it at Lowes.
I will add more as I complete it. Tomorrow I go to get the paint and finish screwing in the hatchling rack piece of plywood shelving. After painting I will add the dividers which I will paint first. Then paint the backing and add it on. Well you can just wait and see XD there's a lot to describe.
Any who enough with the rambling and on with the project. I have a lot of leopard geckos and frankly I would like to see them in something larger and nicer then plastic containers. I'm sure that a lot of people that own a lot wants the same thing. But lets be honest, its hard to keep as many as some people have in anything other then racks. I watched a lot of people make racks over the years and wondered if there was some way I could make one on a more fancy scale. I realized to make it look nice the plastic containers would have to go. Cause there's nothing fancy about plastic containers.
I thought about getting some of those stackable enclosures. But most of them where made for snakes, not geckos. Not to mention the size of one that I wanted, would cost TONS. I think I asked one of the places that make them one time if they could make me a custom one, that would fit into the space that's vacant in my living room and they quoted me a few thousand dollars. I about choked on my own tongue. So I started plotting, and here is what Ive come up with.
First of all this is where it started. With a little sketch on the ol Photoshop.
I decided on making 5 cages with one rack on top. 4ft across, each cage section 1ft tall and one hatchling rack on top that would actually hold some of my shoe box sized containers for baby geckos.
Once I started building it I decided that I would put a divider on 2 of the shelves to make 2 cages on each of those 2 instead of just one really long one. Those two can be used to house single males.
I started working on it tonight and here is where I got with it. I'm not done putting the shelves on. I still need to finish the hatchling rack on the top. After that I will start painting the whole thing black.
When I started I laid it all on its back and started putting the shelves on one at a time. Here is a link of what it looked like while I was doing that.
http://i290.photobucket.com/albums/ll248/neoreptiliac/Other/unit002.jpg
I used a paint can to help me hold the shelves up while I got the screws in.
The materials I used for the shelf parts you see here is half inch furniture grade plywood. I got it at Lowes.
I will add more as I complete it. Tomorrow I go to get the paint and finish screwing in the hatchling rack piece of plywood shelving. After painting I will add the dividers which I will paint first. Then paint the backing and add it on. Well you can just wait and see XD there's a lot to describe.
