The Rack That Nearly Got Away!!

I began my day clearign the garage of rubbish! I came across an old bed (the wooden ones, with wooden slats to hold up the matress) that i had been meaning to dump for a long time. As i was loading the bed into the car to take down the tip i thought (yes i was shocked too, and i needed to take pain killers for the resulting headache) to myself 'I could make a small, crude and pretty pointless rack out of that for my snakes!!'. I had to carefully consider the implications of taking on such a project not only because i have no tools whatsoever but also because im rubbish at DIY.

Anyways, after a rummage round the garage i managed to scrape together a handfull of screws, an old hack saw (not designed for wood), a tape measure, pencil and an electric screwdriver which had some battery life left woooo. I was ready to begin, and what a typically beautiful day it was....



Heres what i started with.


I made measurements with the tape measure, using the edge of the metal strip as a ruler lol. I had to remove some staples from the wood then it was time to get the old eleccy screwdriver out...


Oooh its slowly taking shape.



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Uh oh. I ran out of screws of the ideal size so had to improvise. The 'new' screws were too short, therefore i had to drill starter holes with the screwdriver attachment of the drill so that the screws would penetrate the bottom piece of wood far enough to keep things sturdy. Turns out this method actually looked better lol.


Three hours later and 'Voila', one small, very shabby, wonky rack (i take that last comment back, its not the rack thats wonky its my house...honest!!).


Well, im proud of it and the snake seems to like it, afterall thats all that matters really :grin01:


A sunday well spent. This rack cost me absoultely nothing to build aprt from bachache and a few sore fingers. I want to get hold of a few sheets of wood to go under each tub as i don't think the heat mats will work very well hanging between the wooden slats (so at the mo the new rack is'nt being used ).

I had fun making this rack. The main reason of making it was to see if i was capable of constructing such a thing. In that in the future i will be confident enough now to go and buy some decent wood and construct a bigger rack. Hopefully it will be alot more appealing to the eye aswell!

Hope you have all had a good weekend and enjoy the pics :grin01:

:cheers:

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:cheers: excellent ghetto chic!

diamondlil said:

:cheers: excellent ghetto chic!

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LOL yea she loves her new shanty town :grin01:

Great job with what you had to use. Not too bad for your DIY venture not too bad at all. Looks good, very functional and most of all you and your snakes are happy with it. :cheers:
Jay

Looks pretty good, from what I can see! :cheers:

In fact, it looks good enough, and your description of yourself as being "...rubbish at DIY..." actually gives me hope that I *might* be able to accomplish something on my own in this manner. Because if your DIY skills are "rubbish", than mine must be rotten compost...

tyflier said:

Looks pretty good, from what I can see! :cheers:

In fact, it looks good enough, and your description of yourself as being "...rubbish at DIY..." actually gives me hope that I *might* be able to accomplish something on my own in this manner. Because if your DIY skills are "rubbish", than mine must be rotten compost...

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I thought it would be really difficult but if you've got a plan in your head (or better on paper) then it will slowly come together. All i used was a bunch of screws and an electric screwdriver to screw them directly into the wood, not pilot holes needed or wood glue of any sort. I really would suggest just giving it a go with any spare wood you have lying around. Thats the reason i attempted it as i ddin't want to splash out on lots of fancy wood and then make a complete mess of it lol.

Thanks for the comments guys. The only problem is i have a spare shelf on the rack and room to put another shelf on the very top. Instead of my snakes being spread out they are now concentrated into the rack. This means i could accomodate 2 more adult corns or 4 younger corns. To know you have extra snake space is a dangerous thing :grin01:

Bank Holiday Update!!

Considering i had the day off work today i thought i would make a few mods to my new rack, the one that nearly got away :grin01:

As i mentioned above i could not use the rack due to the gaps between the support planks on each shelf being too far apart to place heat mats. I therefore had to come up with a plan. I managed to find an old sheet of really thin laminated wood. After measuring i realised there wasn't enough to complete all 4 shelves. I ended up using it anyway, after all i only needed the wood as support for the heatmats which only take up about a quater or a third of each shelf. I secured the sheets of wood with 4 screws, one in each corner as this seemed adequate.

Heres out it came out, ta-da...



Here are a couple of pics with the rack decked out with my snakes.



Thanks for looking

:cheers:

Whoot for really useful boxes!

Hehe yea thanks Tula, i took a trip down staples and stocked up on boxes!! Cheers for the tip

I swear they are made for snakes LOL

Tula_Montage said:

I swear they are made for snakes LOL

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Hahaha lol i think your right. They even do the little 10 ltr ones (exactly the same as the big ones but smaller). These are perfect for little snakey's and great for feeding tubs. Youv'e converted me to the staples tribe!!

Actually they are 9lrt... Theres no 10ltrs as far as I know. I use the 5, 19, 50 and 64 religiously! LOL

Tula_Montage said:

Actually they are 9lrt... Theres no 10ltrs as far as I know. I use the 5, 19, 50 and 64 religiously! LOL

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Ah yea 9, i saw the 9 near the top so assumed you could squeeze another sneaky litre in there I will have to go take a look at the 5 litre ones aswell Thanks mate