Okay, so I have started experimenting with screen door kits and making vents for tanks, but I can not figure out a way to make them smaller than 2 inches. I just fail miserably and dont like spending money just to throw the stuff away.. is anyone good at making tiny vents?? like half inch or 1 inch?? Just enough to keep front glass clear without having too much humidity loss?? Basically like this..
I need it for a 24 inch wide exoterra. its going to be for the 24x18x36 exo and I want it to be as small as possible! if someone feels they can make me one please let me know. I will pay for material and labor!
well if you can't make one from the window framing like pictured you could go about it like this (may not look as attractive but you could make it however small you wanted.
Take a piece of plexi or acrylic (acrylic has a tendency to bow under humidity and heat from lights), and cut it to the width and length you want your vent. Then take a drill and drill a bunch of holes in it, then attach some screen over it. or if you are good and routing you could take w/e material and router out a frame or use a jigsaw or w/e tool you think would get the job down to route out (remove) the section you want to cover with screen. The possibilities are endless. Just for example (i'd never do this) you could take dow rods and make your frame out of those and attach the screen to it. Making a vent is easy just comes down to how nice you want it to look. Fashion over function or function over fashion is the big decision imo
How Wide Total including Frame?
A Solid Surface Material could be Routed out as Small as maybe 1/8th of an Inch and screen siliconed onto the Bottom.
trick is getting enough air flow.. 1/4 or 1/2 might be better..
have you considered using an Air Exchanger to help with Humid Air Flow?
it's going to constantly pump humid air into the tank, so lets say you wanted to maintain a humidity level of 90%, the air exchanger alone wouldn't do this. You would have to also add some type of controller like a herpstat, ez400, herpkeeper, etc. that monitors the humidity level and tells the air exchanger when to kick on and off, yes?
From what i understand the OP is trying to keep his glass from fogging up with minimal humidity loss as possible. The way you keep the glass from fogging up or forming condensation on it is with air flow. Take for instance an exo terra tank. They have ventilation underneath the doors and then up top with the screened topped, which provides an air in air out ventilation, moving air across the front glass basically. Now if you were to say replace that top screen with all glass or something beside the screen you would most likely get condensation build up due to there is only one route for air to travel which is through the vent udner the door so air going in and air trying to come out are butting heads in a sense. Now with dart frogs you want high humdity which with an exo terra usually means completely blocking the top screen lid with glass or what not or blocking as much as possible to retain humidity and still provide some sort of ventilation which becomes trial and error i believe to determine how much of the screen you can block to still give you some air flow to prevent or reduce front glass condensation. If you have to completely block your top screen in order to keep your humidity in check I think you would have to look into something like putting PC fans inside the tank to move the air thats inside your tank around (the key is that you are just moving the air around, not bringing in air outside the tank or taking the air inside the tank out).
take my thoughts with a grain of salt, i could be totally wrong its just my input from what i have read. Its why most people you ask about setting up a viv will tell you to get everything in your viv setup and running for awhile before you introduce your animals. Get your temps right, your humidity in check before you put the frogs in because trying to adjust things to get the right temps and humidity while having frogs in your tank will put them in stress and can cause bad outcomes.
I just pump air all the Time.
The Frogs tell me when They are Happy.
Basic Principals at work..Cooler Air Retains Gases Better than Hot Air..think beer..
Cold Beer slowly Bubbles..Hot beer Foams because Of Gases escaping.
Either way you have moist air movement..Without Fans..Many people are starting to believe we are keeping the Frogs at too high of a humidity anyways
Plants need a drying out period also and tend to survive better with one.
Here's a thread I did of lids and screen. Tops for tanks
All you have to do is cut the tabs shorter that are shown in photo #1, to end up with a vent more like you want. My vents are wide. I like a lot of airflow, but am able to keep the humidity levels up, no problem If you've already made these, just pull them apart and shorten the tabs and joining pieces.
How Wide Total including Frame?
A Solid Surface Material could be Routed out as Small as maybe 1/8th of an Inch and screen siliconed onto the Bottom.
trick is getting enough air flow.. 1/4 or 1/2 might be better..
have you considered using an Air Exchanger to help with Humid Air Flow?
Anyone good at making vents??
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