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Getting Corn Without Thermostat? (Advice needed!)

Thanks for the help guys! I have the tank all set up now, and I'm going to leave it over night and see what the temp is tomorrow with just the heat mat and I'll go from there. If it gets too hot I'll turn it off and use a lamp until I can get my hands on a thermostat (if I can't find one tomorrow anywhere, that is).

I was thinking about getting a lamp for the tank anyways, as a viewing thing though, not for heat, so the lamp will probably continue to get use after I get the thermostat and UTH set up properly.

Also yay for Canadians! Haha.
 
A conventional lamp will give out a lot of heat and disrupt your setup - even a flourescent bulb. If you're thinking about lighting just to view, then a lot of folks here have found LED lights helpful - they give off a strong light with very little heat. Saves on the electricity bills as well!
 
Irefe said:
Thanks for the help guys! I have the tank all set up now, and I'm going to leave it over night and see what the temp is tomorrow with just the heat mat and I'll go from there. If it gets too hot I'll turn it off and use a lamp until I can get my hands on a thermostat (if I can't find one tomorrow anywhere, that is).

I was thinking about getting a lamp for the tank anyways, as a viewing thing though, not for heat, so the lamp will probably continue to get use after I get the thermostat and UTH set up properly.

Also yay for Canadians! Haha.
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YAY for Canadians and also MUCH LOVE to all our American corn'rs
 
I wouldn't use a heat lamp. Corns don't bask, and the overhead light will dry out your viv. Plus it's a fire hazard.

The reason you need a thermostat is because the UTH will get to 120-130F, unregulated. The way a snake senses temperature, it will get severely burned before it realizes that it is in pain and needs to move. You _can_ buy a thick piece of floor tile and place it in the viv, over the UTH, to decrease the temperature, as a temporary solution.

I don't know why your pet stores up there don't sell thermostats. The ones here do. You'd think with all the other BS they try to get you to buy, they'd be all over that...
 
I also made my own rheostats, actually 2 of them, with the link that Radiance posted. The temps don't flucuate that much, and as long as you check it a couple times of day and adjust accordingly, they work great. (You'll be looking at your snake anyway, so how hard is it to glance at the thermometer and adjust it a little a couple times a day? ;))
 
Psh, the American's get enough love they don't need anymore. (Totally kidding by the way hahaha).

The only reason I'm getting a heat lamp is to heat the tank for a few days/a week until I can get a thermostat, I'm definitely taking the thermostat route for long-term. I'll look into LED bulbs for viewing once I am done using it as a temp heat solution, though I believe LED are pretty expensive... We'll see. The lamp would only be on for MAX a half hour at a time and I can watch the temps when I'm there and turn it off if it seems to be getting too hot.

On another note, I do have a hydrometer in there, so if I notice it's getting too dry while I'm using the lamp, I can give it a bit of a spray.

Last night the UTH went up to 109 against the glass, so I shut it off. I was hoping telling my mom that would get her off my case, but no go, sadly. Because apparently the temp of the glass means nothing, even though the snake could get down there and burn itself.

I had to put down a strict no talking policy for my mom today when we go back to the store, haha.

And yeah you'd think they'd be all over having something else to push on people, but sadly, thermostats just don't exist in Canada apparently.
 
thermostats just don't exist in Canada apparently.
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So true! I live in Canada as well, you cant find a thermostat anywhere and when you ask for one people just think your saying thermometer wrong and take you to look at those....

I ordered mine off of LLL Reptiles in the states. I had my stuff within 5 days. It was just a cheap one, $26 or so, but it works well enough and so far I have not had any issues. I use it to control the temps for my hatchling rack. I am going to upgrade the thermostat that controls both the hatchling rack and the adult heat mats this summer to fully digital, so excited :p

When I told my boyfriend I was excited for new thermostats he laughed at me :p
 
Yeah, I checked Canadian Tire and Walmart and no go, so I ordered one off of Amazon.

I went ahead with the lamp idea, the temps are good, 85 right now on the hot side and 72 on the cool side. The humidity is hard to keep up but nothing I can't handle for a week or so, it's going between 45 and 55 and I have a paper towel in the cage I've been keeping wet and the top of the cage is partially covered with newspaper to keep the heat and humidity in.

I should be getting the thermostat sometime this week or early next week, and I'm probably not going to feed him until I get it, I figure a little over 2 weeks without food is better then a regerge because of improper temps.

And yes, thermostats are exciting! Haha.
 
Nanci said:
The reason you need a thermostat is because the UTH will get to 120-130F, unregulated. The way a snake senses temperature, it will get severely burned before it realizes that it is in pain and needs to move. You _can_ buy a thick piece of floor tile and place it in the viv, over the UTH, to decrease the temperature, as a temporary solution.
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Um.. If possible, you should not use the UTH inside the viv, it's ment to go under the tank as the name says. And it especially should not be wedged between two surfaces - it should have at least a tiny bit of free space either above or below to prevent overheating. A UTH crushed between two surfaces is a fire hazard, even with a thermostat/rheostat.

The airspace between the UTH and tank bottom can be used to control how much heat is transferred and how warm the tank bottom will become above the UTH. This way it's possible to use a UTH without any control device.

If you need to use the UTH inside the viv, you should place it in a small ventilated box where the animal cannot directly touch it and no water or animal droppings can fall on it, as the UTHs are not completely waterproof. Again, there should be a bit of free space between the lid and the UTH.

It's a good idea to remember that if the UTH is inside the viv, all the heat from the UTH will stay in the viv in any case. If the UTH is outside the viv, part of the heat warms the viv bottom and the rest is dispersed in the room. This way UTH-in-a-box-in-a-viv design can help keep viv ambient temp up, if the room temp is cool. Then again, if your room temp is around what the cool end temp should be, UTH inside the viv will rise the ambient temperature inside the viv above the room temp.
 
A UTH is designed to heat the nearest surface and in reality has little effect on the ambient air temps in the tank or viv. Ambient temps are a bit of a red herring in my experience - the snakes spend their time on the floor, so that's the heat that I concentrate on.
 
I have my UTH under the viv, it's stuck under the bottom with packing tape and is working fine. I now have a thermostat hooked up to it and all is well, temps are doing fine and I don't have to worry about it anymore.

Thanks for all the help though guys! It all worked out fine, at least it seems to have haha.
 
proileri said:
Um.. If possible, you should not use the UTH inside the viv, it's ment to go under the tank as the name says. And it especially should not be wedged between two surfaces - it should have at least a tiny bit of free space either above or below to prevent overheating. A UTH crushed between two surfaces is a fire hazard, even with a thermostat/rheostat.
Click to expand...

..Nanci never said to put the UTH in the viv?
 
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