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which is better??

hartsock

hartsock

New member
Setting up a new cage and a small rack system

cage is melamine and I'll be using a zoomed heat pad

rack system I will be using heat cable

My question is which is better to regulate:

A thermostat (kind from pet stores that has dial on it) or a dimmer switch?

I think the thermostat turns on item till it gets to set temp and then shuts off till it is needed again --- to me this seems more like the temps will fluctuate greatly.... the dimmer switch only allows a certain amount of power to go through and should help temp remain constant, but then it won't adjust for room temp (which I think I can keep room temp pretty constant).

So what does everyone think?
 
Well, the store bought thermostats like the ZooMed 500R will keep the temp within 3-4 degrees usually. A rheostat keeps the temperature output of the mat constant, but does not account in any way for ambient air temp so has to be adjusted frequently.

I'd go with the thermostat, once it's set you don't have to worry about it much.
 
Best would be to buy a proportional thermostat like a Herpstat ND but that will set you back over $140 dollars...

For now I was planning on a zoo-med on/off thermostat and having it set temp and plug a dimmer into it and set the dimmer to like 80% of power then plug the uth into the dimmer. This way worse comes to worse the uth will never get too hot. I heard that they can get to over 100F hate to have that running full blast.

Eventually I will purchase a Herpstat ND and daisy chain it with the zoo-med and use the zoo-med as my failsafe...


Dresden
 
The dimmer I used didn't work, but it was only temporary anyway until i got my zoomed thermostat. I think you need a really high wattage for the dimmer to work. The thermostat works great for me though
 
hartsock said:
A thermostat (kind from pet stores that has dial on it) or a dimmer switch?

I think the thermostat turns on item till it gets to set temp and then shuts off till it is needed again --- to me this seems more like the temps will fluctuate greatly.... the dimmer switch only allows a certain amount of power to go through and should help temp remain constant, but then it won't adjust for room temp (which I think I can keep room temp pretty constant).
Click to expand...
A thermostat would have to be malfunctioning badly to cause great temp fluctuation. A thermostat has a range of only a few degrees between "On" and "Off". For example, if the thermostat was set for 84 degrees, it would turn on once the probed temp drops below 84, but it would then turn off once it had heated to above that. The fluctuation should be imperceptible.
 
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