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Anyone Use Ranco and Heating Cables?

D

Derek_Buddy

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i just built my rack everything went well as i had hoped , once i got the heating cable attached to the thermostat i was told you should put the thermostat 10 degrees higher then what u want ur hot side to be so i put my thermostat at just over 100 , left it for 30 mins , couldnt feel any heat coming through the tub , so i put my digi thermometerin one of the tubs , and it was reading 80 deg. thats pretty much room temp in my room , so i cranked it up to 130 , still barely moved i think it went to 81 , then i did the math and cranked it up to 200deg F and still my digi is reading 82 deg. and all my geckos are on the back wall where the little heat is so i know its not hot enough.

heres what i use: i ordered a digi thermostat from matt at MG , Ranco

i have a question about this: what does the H1 and the other one to switch it to do? what does this mean.

and the diff what do i set that to?

i also was going to use just ordinary heating cables for roofs and such but i went to my home depot and all they had was a 60 foot cable and i only needed under half that, so i ordered a 50 watt 23 foot repti cable off ebay.

i have the cable routed into the melamine with aluminum tape covering it.

any help would be awsome.

oh and i have my probe for the ranco on the shelf above and its reading 97. thanks.
 
Check to see whether or not the cable is getting hot. I assume you have the Zoo med repti cable. There is a certain distance from the plug to a mark on the cable that should not heat, and then from the mark to the end of the cable it should be heating. I got one cable that for some reason was heating the opposite way --from the plug to the mark. I emailed Zoomed and they asked me to return the defective cable and sent me a new one.
 
ya i just read that tonight but thats not my problem , ive measured the temp in the middle of the cable..... its 82.. thanks for the response though its definitly appreciated cause i gutta get this fixed asap.
 
On Rancos HI=heating, CI=cooling, you want yours set to HI.

the "diff" is the differential. this is how many degrees from the set point it'll allow the temp to get before the unit kicks on. You want this set to 1, so that if you want to maintain 90 degrees, when the probe senses a temp less than 89, it switches on.
 
thanks guys ,

im passing the shelf just once... i was told not to let the cable come into contact with itself.?
 
Derek_Buddy said:
thanks guys ,

im passing the shelf just once... i was told not to let the cable come into contact with itself.?
Click to expand...


You can pass it more than once without touching. This will help raise the temps.
 
I use heat rope for my racks and do four to five passes per shelf. I also staple them down because routing takes way to long. I just shim both sides of the rope to lock the heat in.
 
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