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Hydro farm and heat mat

C

chag67

New member
What is a trusted Internet site to purchase a Hydrofarm thermostat and heat pad for my 12" wide x 30" long x 12" high viv?
Is there anything else ill need to buy? I'm finally getting rid of the unregulated UTH by Reptitherm. It gets too hot with no way to turn off unless I unplug it.
 
I got my first one form Amazon, but I did find one at a Walmart one time though I since have not been able to find them again. Kinda disappointing since I now have to wait to get them in the mail again. As far as anything else to buy it depends on if you plan on mounting the probe in or out of the cage. I did mine in and have it glued down with hot glue, dries fast and stays strong for a good long time and it comes off easy if you need to replace it. That's for my corn anyway, my ball python is another story his is just held in place with the weight of the substrate and his hide, as well as the suction cup that is on the hydrofarm. Anyway hope that helps.
 
The heat mat I plan on taping to the underside of the tank. So the thermostat would be outside of the viv.
 
Okay, well if you want you could stick the thermostats probe between the glass and the heat mat, or you could run to inside the cage over the heat mat. If you run it inside the cage you may need to cut a hole in the lid of your cage or improvise somehow, not sure what your setup looks like. Oh one more thing before I post this, if you do put the probe on the outside of the cage between the heat mat and the tank you may need to set it a degree higher than you normally would if the probe was inside the tank to make sure the temp inside the tank gets to the desired temp. And if you do put it inside your tank, sorry I know I said one more thing but this is very IMPORTANT, you need to make sure the snake CAN NOT move probe out of the range of the heat mat otherwise they can reach extremely dangerous temps. Because the thermostat will think the probe is on the heat mat and keep pumping power into it to make it hotter even though it has moved off the mat and this can get out of hand real quick if you don't catch it early.
 
I was going to hot glue the probe on the inside of the tank underneath the aspen bedding. I was also going to have a separate temp monitor near the thermostat prob as another reading.
 
Sounds like you've got a solid plan there then, just remember you have to run the wire through the lid of your viv. I know the exo-terra tanks make it easy because of their fancy lid holes for doing just that, but people like me don't have that so we have to use wire cutters to make holes in screen lids. Anyway, the point of mentioning this is that you make sure the lid is secure even with the one/two wires running into it. Snakes are sneaky that's all I'm saying
 
My lid is the slide on lid with two clips. It has slots for wires to tuck into so I can still snap the lid closed.
 
Do I purchase a separate heat mat (like the Zoo Med UTH pad)? Does this UTH pad plug into the Hydrofarm thermostat?
 
chag67 said:
I was going to hot glue the probe on the inside of the tank underneath the aspen bedding. I was also going to have a separate temp monitor near the thermostat prob as another reading.
Click to expand...
This is exactly correct.

chag67 said:
Do I purchase a separate heat mat (like the Zoo Med UTH pad)? Does this UTH pad plug into the Hydrofarm thermostat?
Click to expand...
Yes the UTH plugs into the Hydrofarm t-stat and it controls how hot the UTH gets. If you already have a UTH there is no reason to buy another. Just plug the one you have into the t-stat and set your temp. You may need to adjust the temperature on the t-stat up or down a bit as sometimes they aren't calibrated perfectly. Go by the temperature on the digital thermometer.
 
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