Heating problem :(

[Andreamorey]

Hi I have a problem with the temps in blues vivarium he has the following set up 4x2x2 viv with a 36" UVB tube in the middle with a reflector, a 250 watt ceramic heater on a 600 watt habitat pulse stat set on which is in the middle jelling it at 84 degrees, warm hide cold hide and basking rock and of course a water bowl in cold end, my problem is although I live in England we are having a small heat wave like the last two days and I can't get the cool end cool enough I put two digital thermometers in earlier one at either end and there was only a 5 degrees difference cool end 85 and hot 90 so the hot end is not hot enough and the cool end is not cool enough I can only assume that's because our house is so warm even with windows open am I correct that the cold end should be around 75 middle 85 hot 95 if anyone has any ideas please let me know
Andrea xx

[Linnea]

move to sweden.

//Linnea

I can only think of the most simple solutions, one is adding a shallow water bowl and let the water help cool it off, but it is not very effective as it tends to dissappear into thin air. literally.
but the water might provide your skink some coldness, if it wishes to. but it must be changed every now and then, the same day, which is quite a bother.
EDIT: i re-read and saw you already did this. then i am not really of any help at all...

is the terrarium well ventilated?

what is your current room temp?

i find it strange that a 250W ceramic heater cannot produce enough heat on the warm end. i use a ferplast hundred W bulb and it reaches 37 C easily in summer.

take the temp in a hide on the cool side for reference, if there is one. or in a hide elsewhere.

[Andreamorey]

The stat is turning the ceramic heater off when the middle reaches 84 degrees but the problem is that the whole viv is around the same temp have we got the stat probe in the wrong place?
Andrea x

[Susann]

Is the ceramic in the middle? Or the probe is in the middle? Or both are in the middle? I'm a bit confused...
In this case, provided that it is POSSIBLE, I would move all the lamps, lights, and heaters, AND probe, to one side--as far over as you can. This would help cool the opposite side.
If this is not possible, I would exchange the ceramic for a spotlight-type of light bulb and put an elevated basking rock underneath it, where the temp on the rock reaches the desired 95-100 degrees, but keeps the rest of the tank cooler.
I would also highly recommend getting a temp gun. This way you are not relying on thermometers that measure ambient air around the thermometers only, but can get exact temperatures of the surfaces your skink spends time on. And an EXACT basking temp in the exact basking spot.

[Fatal_S]

What Susann said

During periods of high heat you can also put cold water into a bottle and put that under a towel on the cold side. Mine enjoy curling up near it if they're feeling too warm.

[Richard.C]

id ditch the ceramic bulb,at least as a basking light,they are better at raising cage temp all over than as a basking spot,250 watts is alot of power to,spotlight bulbs do a better job of creating a concentrated basking spot with the added benefit of producing light,you wont need that high a wattage either

how have u set up thermostat,wheres it reading the temp from,ideally it should be well away from basking spots

[Scotts1au]

Properly set up you should need no more than an 60W spot. Have fun.

Scott

[iLoveMyLizard]

Hi Andrea, I can relate to you as I have the exact same setup practically. Naturally, I would suggest adding more vents to your viv, but since this is only a heat wave, then that wouldn't be practical, however depending on your skink, this could be detrimental in terms of keeping humidity etc.

Would you be able to upload a picture of your probe placement, there are many techniques to probe placement, so if we can see the position then we could maybe adjust that.

Another thing I would suggest is keeping the viv door open slightly, with a viv lock so it can't be opened further, but to lodge a foam strip or something in the gap so that your skink can't escape, creating a top vent, which will allow the hot air rising to escape, but also allow some more airflow

However, downgrading ceramic wattage and a more suitable probe placement should do the job, unless its the ambient temps in your house?

[Andreamorey]

The ceramic heater is far right hand side and probe is in the middle I will upload a photo
Andrea xx

[Andreamorey]

[Andreamorey]

The end of the stat probe is in the middle

[iLoveMyLizard]

Try moving the probe to the basking site first and play with the temps, if that fails, put it at the far end of the tank in the cold end and get a 100w ceramic. This will allow you to control temps at the cool end, however could create unsafe basking temps. If you do move it to the cool end with the new bulb, set it to a low temp and work UP until you get desired temps. what are the temps in the room?

Ps, what substrate are you using, looks nice and dark coloured.

[El Lobo]

I have similar set ups and only use 60W spot lamps with my Habistat probes around 3/4 of the way to the end of the cool side. A 40W lamp will get the basking spot warm enough but they blow too often due to a finer filament. An infra red temp gun will give a far better reading of the temp at the basking spot. I wouldn't recommend a ceramic for basking as the heat is widely dispersed rather than concentrated.

A dark coloured slate will also attract more heat than a lighter one.

A pic of one of my enclosures showing the placement of the lights. This was before the Habistat was installed so doesn't show the probe position.

DSCF1002R.jpg

[iLoveMyLizard]

I think its crucial to know that if you do degide to buy spot bulbs, that they cannot be used in conjunction with the thermostat you have. For light emitting heat sources you should use a dimming thermostat, as your pulse stat will cause the lightbulb to flicker, which isn't good. What model vivarium do you have? I have a vivexotic ex48, these have a few more vents and my cool end temps are currently 26 atm.

[El Lobo]

I think its crucial to know that if you do degide to buy spot bulbs, that they cannot be used in conjunction with the thermostat you have. For light emitting heat sources you should use a dimming thermostat, as your pulse stat will cause the lightbulb to flicker, which isn't good. What model vivarium do you have? I have a vivexotic ex48, these have a few more vents and my cool end temps are currently 26 atm.

I believe the OP stated she has a Habistat Pulse Proportional thermostat. If this is correct they work perfectly well with spotlights and as part of their design do not cause flickering; well at least they haven't with mine (as described above) in the past four years.

This link will explain how they work.

http://www.eurorep.net/habistat/pulse.htm

[iLoveMyLizard]

I think its crucial to know that if you do degide to buy spot bulbs, that they cannot be used in conjunction with the thermostat you have. For light emitting heat sources you should use a dimming thermostat, as your pulse stat will cause the lightbulb to flicker, which isn't good. What model vivarium do you have? I have a vivexotic ex48, these have a few more vents and my cool end temps are currently 26 atm.

I believe the OP stated she has a Habistat Pulse Proportional thermostat. If this is correct they work perfectly well with spotlights and as part of their design do not cause flickering; well at least they haven't with mine (as described above) in the past four years.

This link will explain how they work.

http://www.eurorep.net/habistat/pulse.htm

Sorry El Lobo, but I still believe that they shouldnt be used with light emitting bulbs. I just cant imagine how the bulb would stay lit when the power dies each pulse? I have tried light emitting bulbs in my stat to no avail and am familiar with the habistat range, so would be interesting to see which bulbs your using, and how long each bulb lasts?

Best regards
Joe


EDIT - Just seen you use 60w lamps, do you think maybe the lamps are at full power the majority of the time to achieve set temps, thus resulting in an absence of the flicker?

[tylociraptor]

Wait, I thought you were not supposed to use thermostats PERIOD with bulbs, and instead use timers? Is it safe to have them on for 12 hr cycles without tstats installed?

[El Lobo]

I think its crucial to know that if you do degide to buy spot bulbs, that they cannot be used in conjunction with the thermostat you have. For light emitting heat sources you should use a dimming thermostat, as your pulse stat will cause the lightbulb to flicker, which isn't good. What model vivarium do you have? I have a vivexotic ex48, these have a few more vents and my cool end temps are currently 26 atm.

I believe the OP stated she has a Habistat Pulse Proportional thermostat. If this is correct they work perfectly well with spotlights and as part of their design do not cause flickering; well at least they haven't with mine (as described above) in the past four years.

This link will explain how they work.

http://www.eurorep.net/habistat/pulse.htm

Sorry El Lobo, but I still believe that they shouldnt be used with light emitting bulbs. I just cant imagine how the bulb would stay lit when the power dies each pulse? I have tried light emitting bulbs in my stat to no avail and am familiar with the habistat range, so would be interesting to see which bulbs your using, and how long each bulb lasts?

Best regards
Joe

You're right. When I first set mine up I was intending to use a CHE, hence thinking of the pulse proportional, but decided against it in lieu of a lamp. I checked mine and all three are dimming thermostats working perfectly and have done so since first installed. I have hardly looked at them in the past few years as they temps are always as good as I can get. 60W bulbs still will dim to the point where they are only just on but warm up quickly enough. Larger wattage will warm up faster if that is what is wanted but will then generally operate at much lower power emitting less heat but also much less light. My enclosures are only 15-18" high with the lights mounted internally and as I previously said will function perfectly well with only 40W bulbs.

One thing to note is by only using a simple on/off switch as used by some thermostats for the control of lamps it can make the skinks a little jumpy each time the light switches on or goes off. I rarely have to make any adjustments at all and have the thermostats connected through timing switches. If mine are still out when the timer switches the lamps off they give a substantial body shake and usually quickly head off to their hides.




EDIT - Just seen you use 60w lamps, do you think maybe the lamps are at full power the majority of the time to achieve set temps, thus resulting in an absence of the flicker?

[Andreamorey]

We have a vivexotic ex48. I am annoyed because the shop told us we have to have a ceramic heater as a bulb wouldn't be hot enough in a 4x2x2 viv, so now we are stuck with a ceramic heater that we cannot take out of the viv without taking the top off it which we can't do because where would blue go while we wait for the sealant to dry when we put the top back on and re-seal it, who thought it was a good idea to put vents in the back of a viv that you can't fit a plug through grrrr
Also we now have the wrong stat to use a bulb so i think we will have to get a 100w ceramic bulb and see how we go with that the ridiculous thing is come autumn winter time we will probably struggle to keep it warm with a bulb as our house gets so cold in winter not to mention crappy English weather lol
Thank you everyone for your replies
Andrea