I'm looking into getting an all acrylic cage for my etb. Those of you that use acrylic cages how do you heat them without melting the acrylic? Is there a hole cut in the top for the lamp with screening or do you just use a certain kind of heating pad? Any help would be appreciated as I don't want to melt a $200.00 cage.
My acrylic tank is a three hundred and fifty gallon. It has two recktangular shaped holes cut on top. I made screen tops for each of the holes, (the tank is partitioned to house both my critters.) I have heat lamps with 100 watt bulbs centered on top of the screens. Then the lamps that are clamped on the inside of the tank (out of reach of my animals of course,) are my uva/b bulbs.) I have never had a problem with melting, and I've had this tank for four years. I was really worried about it because I didn't want the fumes to poison them, but I got great and simple advise for how to set it up. I have two windows open in the room for ventilation, and its been a great tank so far. I'm not sure about how strong a bulb I would use for a hundred gallon. But I would make sure that no part of the lamp is on the acrilic, and I'd stay away from heating pads altogether. If you want to see how I set mine up, there is a picture of it in the bearded dragon forum titled Fergus and Pogona. Its a bad picture, but you can kind of see how I did the lamps in it. If you look, the ones on top are at least eight inches from the edges of the acrylic around the recktangle shaped holes and only touching screen, and those are the only ones that have heat. The inside ones are the uv ones, with no heat at all. I hope this helps. -Cristine
With an ETB you will not need a heat lamp unless your house is kept cold and the temps cant be kept at the proper levels with under tank hear. A human heat pad under the cage should be more than enough to heat it. Just make sure you leave approx 1/2" for air flow between the cage and the pad.
