planthelper Posted May 12, 2006 (edited) we often had discussions about what heat mat or heat source is apropiate in our quest to provide our beloved plants with the best conditions. beer brew, water bed or professional horticultural heat mats got suggested. than ther is an array of alternatives, the spot behind your fridge, hotwater bottles wrapped in lots of fabric and so on. i allways advocated the lightbulb hot box, but it's downsides are that diy is involved. so her is the 30sec and you are finished hot box that carters for all of your hortucultural needs! why spend hundreds of $$$$ on a heat mat which proly breaks down and costs you more $$$$ to fix? but wait there is more! everything you need for this you propably have already at home. you want your stakknives for free on top? than bloody get them out of your kitchen drawer, allthough you don't need them, as a fact no tools are needed in this space age asembly. you need: 1 eski, 1 small bedside lamp, 1 sheet of glass or just plastic, seethru plastic if you can find some, something to patch the gap. methode: place small bedside lamp (the ones who have a flexible shaft work well) into eski. put seed tray on top, put a book or some wood in any gaps if there are some. hit the switch and hooray!!! Edited May 12, 2006 by planthelper Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
reshroomED Posted May 12, 2006 we often had discussions about what heat mat or heat source is apropiate in our quest to provide our beloved plants with the best conditions.beer brew, water bed or professional horticultural heat mats got suggested. than ther is an array of alternatives, the spot behind your fridge, hotwater bottles wrapped in lots of fabric and so on. i allways advocated the lightbulb hot box, but it's downsides are that diy is involved. so her is the 30sec and you are finished hot box that carters for all of your hortucultural needs! why spend hundreds of $$$$ on a heat mat which proly breaks down and costs you more $$$$ to fix? but wait there is more! everything you need for this you propably have already at home. you want your stakknives for free on top? than bloody get them out of your kitchen drawer, allthough you don't need them, as a fact no tools are needed in this space age asembly. you need: 1 eski, 1 small bedside lamp, 1 sheet of glass or just plastic, seethru plastic if you can find some, something to patch the gap. methode: place small bedside lamp (the ones who have a flexible shaft work well) into eski. put seed tray on top, put a book or some wood in any gaps if there are some. hit the switch and hooray!!! Beware an electrical fire. The lamp will be designed to take a maximum wattage bulb due to it's capacity to dissipate heat (incadescent bulbs giving off something like 85% of their energy in the form of heat). By boxing it up you're making it work at a lot higher temp than it's made to cope with. Ed Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
cactuslizardmagick Posted May 17, 2006 By boxing it up you're making it work at a lot higher temp than it's made to cope with. i was about to mention that ... i found an excellent and cheap way is disembowelling an electric blanket and tacking it to a piece of rigid insulating board ... works well in the bottom of a fish tank more specific directions here: http://www.earthalchemy.net/cultivation-sacred-cacti.html Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ferret Posted May 18, 2006 i use the top of my fluoro light case,, loph and trichos up in about 5 days. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Alice Posted May 18, 2006 i use the top of my fluoro light case,, loph and trichos up in about 5 days. i also have found this to be quite effective. i have 2 of those metal propagation chambers (from hydro shop), they are sized so they will hold 2 propagating domes each. i stack they one on top of the other, with a rectangular shaped piece of ~2cm x ~2cm styrofoam used as a spacer between the top and bottom chambers. The spacer is there coz they wont sit flush on top of each other otherwise. the spacer also has the added benefit of creating a sealed 2cm thick cavity between the two chambers, to avoid hotspots in the floor of the top chamber arising from the heat of the fluoro on the roof of the bottom chamber, thus allowing a fairly even distribution of heat. i have heatmats in the bottom chamber, but the top chamber utilises the heat produced by the fluoros beneath, so i dont need to get another (expensive!) thermostated heatmat. i found this set-up ideal, soil/water/rockwool temperature of both top and bottom chambers sits at exactly 29 degrees celcius. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Alice Posted May 18, 2006 (edited) of course, having a set up as ive described requires you to spent money, rather than utilise existing items from around the house, which was the purpose of PH's post in the first place.... oh well btw, happy birthday planthelper! Edited May 18, 2006 by Alice Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
planthelper Posted May 18, 2006 (edited) when you place something on top of fluros make sure no water or moisture finds it's way there where it shouldn't go... if the eski is too risky, just use a take away container or similar and let it hang down by a string or piece of wire... make sure you choose an apropiate distance (the distance is the variable heatcontroll). use a timer if you prefere temperatur flactuations. not everybody has a fluro setup, but everybody has a bedside table lamp and an old plastic container with lid! lophs treated that way for example take sometimes only 3 days to germ!!! aswell germination rates increase. cuttings take root within 10days, yep all those myricals can be achived by bottom heat, lol. Edited May 18, 2006 by planthelper Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
