Heating

[Cracker2012]

I am in the process of building my own 'tank' for my leos, and I was just curious on how I should heat it properly.

My tank is 2'x2'x3.6' the sides, top, and back is made out of 1/4" maple plywood. The bottom is made out of 1/2" oak. All of it is clear coated. The front is all plexi-glass, 2 swinging doors.

There will be 3 'levels' to this tank. one at 6" or so, and another I am thinking at 1' or 1.5'

I am thinking reptile carpet then getting heat tape and putting it under the carpet, but I an just not sure.

I also have a basking light, it's only a 60w and that will go on one side, and I have a 100w CHE that will go on the other.

Any help with this would be really helpful.

 

[Crewdog00]

Heat tape sounds fine. I'd set it up and do a dry run without your gecko in it to test temps for a few days. If the heat tape is too hot you cout have a burnt gecko. I use tile. Much easier to clean and no chance of stuck teeth or toes.
Plus reptiles can't lift tile they can get under reptile carpet.

 

[T2theG]

I would also recommend slate tile for ease of spot cleaning and evenness of heat distribution. You can pick it up at your local hardware store. Sounds like a good start though. :main_thumbsup:

 

[Crewdog00]

I'm trying slate tonight. It's got long grooves and I will assume it will create less "air pockets" should help.

 

[Crewdog00]

Slate is working so much better than ceramic tile. I feel it takes more heat on UTH to surface but on the surface it's distributing evenly.

Slate: A+
Ceramic: B+
Repticarpet:C
Sand: Epic Fail!

 

[Crewdog00]

Issue with finding the "sweet spot" for warm side temps. Slate is heating it nicely entire tile is 80-88 degrees. But I can't get the surface temp up to 90-93 degrees. Maybe my UTH is set too low or it takes more heat to penetrate slate tile?

20L tank with Zoo med 10 to 20 Gallon - 8 Watt - (8"L x 6"W) UTH
Model: RH4

 

[mudskipper]

Your tank sounds amazing. I would love to see the finished tank

 

[Crewdog00]

Your tank sounds amazing. I would love to see the finished tank

My entire tank is hotter now, lol. Slate is working great. I will post pictures for you guys.

Left side is the cool side and ranges from 70-75 and then hits 80 where the slate tile begins up to 90. Trying to get the inside of the warm hide up to 93 still.

 

[GodzillaGecko]

so you finally got it to heat up enough to hit the 90's using the slate? Did you have to change to a larger UTH? Just curious to know so if I run into the same mistake I can configure it correctly.

 

[Crewdog00]

UTH and Slate Tile

so you finally got it to heat up enough to hit the 90's using the slate? Did you have to change to a larger UTH? Just curious to know so if I run into the same mistake I can configure it correctly.

I got it up to 90 Degrees with the same UTH. but I can't get it over the 90 degree mark. Please let me not that I have reptile carpet on top of the glass bottom, and then the slate tile. If I can't get the slate over 90 I'm gonna take out the Reptile Carpet, and see what happens.

I needed the carpet before for the ceramic tile due to air pockets between the tile and glass bottom.

According to Ron Tremper 90 is fine but I like having it read between 90-93 degrees in the warm hide.

 

[mudskipper]

Don't you have a red nocturnal heat lamp? If you leave that on 24 hours/day just over the warm side, your temperature can easily go up to 100F (without a thermostat). On my tank, I dim the red bulb down about half way and just leave it on and set the thermostat for the heat pad to the temperature I want. Basically the lamp brings the temperature to like 85F. Then the heat pad brings it up some more to 95F. My house central air is very cold at a constant 69F.

 

[Crewdog00]

My basement is at 69-70 and yes I have a red nocturnal bulb. Been sliding it closer to her warm hide. Still 90 is the top heat. I will try directly over her warm hide.

 

[Crewdog00]

I slid the red bulb over the warm hide and the temp went up 2 degrees. Finally got it over 90. Tomorrow I will take out the repti carpet below the tile and see what happens since I have the day off to monitor it.