THG Heat Tape help

[Densen]

Hi,

I am using THG heat tape in a DIY rack i made out of some medium sized plastic drawers from office depot. here is a link to the drawer (Office Depot Brand Large Plastic Storage Cart 3 Drawers 27 H x 21 12 W x 15 D Black by Office Depot & OfficeMax)

I put down THG Heat tape under one end of the individual drawer. I soldered my Heat Tape. I followed the instructions: melt the laminate a bit then scrape off and the solder to copper. When i check the general temp range of the tape at full power, it is about 70-90 deg. The drawers dont go above 82. Why is the temp not getting to the 90's? I have leopard geckos in there currently. They all seem scared as I just moved them over. I will monitor them to see if the temps are not good for them and if so move them out until i fix this.

So does soldering the heat tape not get it as hot as using the rivets and crimping tool?

Also, I could leave the setup as is and put mini heat lights in each drawer to up the themp and making a basking spot, but it would be a tight fit and may be unsafe because of the proximity to the leos.

If you have any suggestions or just want to tell me im doing something wrong please do. This is my first RIY rack and I really want to do it right.

Thanks,
Denis

 

[warhawk]

Sounds like you are on the right track, just a few questions.

What size heat tape are you using?
How many feet of heat tape are you using?
How close is the heat tape to the bottom of the drawer?


I use 4" tape, peal back the plastic so you can solder the wires to the copper section. My rack is made of wood so I put the aluminum foil tape on the wood and tape the heat tape right on top. The plastic tubs sit right on top of the heat tape but as my tubs are not flat on the bottom there is a 1/8" gap between the tub and the tape. The bigger that gap the more your temp will drop inside the tub. My tape reads 108-110 degrees but my tubs are 90-92 degrees, so there is a huge drop with that small gap. I have my tape on a dimmer switch so I can adjust the temperature but I'm a little more than half so yours should be a lot warmer then 90 degrees.

If I had it to do over I would have gotten the 3" tape and bought flat bottom tubs but that will be for the next rack.

 

[Densen]

I have 4in wide and 1 foot long strips that i put on each level wired in series. right now only 2 strips. i had a third but it wasnt working to im going to test it individually.
The tape is touching the bin, but since there is only a lip around the level(open middle on each level) the side of my tape is not pressed up against the bin. I plane on either putting a thing plastic across the bottom to cover the whole or use aluminum tape to make the bottoms and cover the open sticky side with something so that it doesnt get gunk. Right now the 2 in parallel are running full power on a dimmer and i can touch them and not worry about any burns, just really warm. it lasted all night and the geckos seemed comfortable this morning. Some levels have normal Zoomed Heat mats as I didnt want to run all heat tape until i got it working. I also have one level which is 1 ft of heat tape directly to the outlet. ALL OF THIS IS PLUGGED INTO A SURGE PROTECTOR. Im not sure how much that helps with shorts, but it will keep them from breaking during an outage. I am in talks with someone about a herpstat intro for an awesome price and really considering to get it soon so that i know how hard my tape is working. Now given the herpstat, can I plug a surge protector into the herpstat and then plug akk the heating devices into that?

Thank you so much for replying, I am kinda worried but I know I can get this to work.

 

[Densen]

The 4in doesnt even cover 1/4 of the bottom of the tub, so I may buy 6in. When I get home I will send photos of my solder connections

 

[warhawk]

Sorry for the delay I didn't see you replied.

If you have the 4" tape touching the bottom of the plastic bin and your not getting the good heat it might be bad tape. Take the tape and get a temperature reading on each one of the gray bars that go across. Maybe something is wrong with the tape and not allowing the power to go thru it like it should.

I have never plugged the tape right into the wall so I don't know what temp that would give you but it should be well over 125 degrees on the tape.