uscpsycho
Member
At the risk of sounding like I am shilling this product (I have no relationship with the seller) I want to share a thermostat that I am in love with.
I've only had a tortoise for one year (exactly one year and one day) but have had lots of other reptiles and always had trouble maintaining a basking spot with the perfect temperature. You know the difficulties. You can get it just right and as the home temperature changes the basking temp drifts. If you have a manual dimmer, the intensity is never the same when you unplug it and plug it back in. The affordable thermostats maintain the temperature by pulsing the basking light on and off which is not ideal for the animal. The struggle is real and you end up compromising with the best you can do.
I never got a dimming/proportional thermostat because they were typically very expensive so I avoided them. Shortly after I got my tortoise I discovered the Zoomed Environmental Control Center and excitedly bought one. It has a lot of cool features including a dimming thermostat for a great price. It turned out to be crap. The "dimming" thermostat is not very precise and frequently resorts to turning the bulb off to maintain the temperature. This totally defeats the purpose of a dimming thermostat. And the humidity probe is way off compared to all my other hygrometers. I hate this thing and don't recommend it at all.
Anyway, I got sick of it and was finally going to invest in an expensive dimming thermostat for the benefit of Comet, when I discovered this one. I got it during one of the Amazon holiday sales for $20. It was cheaper than most pulsing thermostats so at this price I fully expected to receive a hunk of junk that I would have to return. But it works PERFECTLY!!!! It continuously dims the heat bulb to maintain your temperature without ever turning the bulb off. I love it so much I bought another one for my uromastyx at full price which is just $27. It doesn't have a built in timer so you will need to put it on a timer so it only operates during the day, I put mine on a smart plug. When it comes back on in the morning it will remember the temperature you had it set at. Oddly, it has a clock on the LCD which serves no purpose at all. I asked the seller what the point was and they said so you know what time it is. LOL I don't think anyone is using this thing as a clock.
I've received so much great advice here and I wanted to return the favor by sharing this awesome find. I think a lot of you can benefit from it and will love it as much as I do.
I've only had a tortoise for one year (exactly one year and one day) but have had lots of other reptiles and always had trouble maintaining a basking spot with the perfect temperature. You know the difficulties. You can get it just right and as the home temperature changes the basking temp drifts. If you have a manual dimmer, the intensity is never the same when you unplug it and plug it back in. The affordable thermostats maintain the temperature by pulsing the basking light on and off which is not ideal for the animal. The struggle is real and you end up compromising with the best you can do.
I never got a dimming/proportional thermostat because they were typically very expensive so I avoided them. Shortly after I got my tortoise I discovered the Zoomed Environmental Control Center and excitedly bought one. It has a lot of cool features including a dimming thermostat for a great price. It turned out to be crap. The "dimming" thermostat is not very precise and frequently resorts to turning the bulb off to maintain the temperature. This totally defeats the purpose of a dimming thermostat. And the humidity probe is way off compared to all my other hygrometers. I hate this thing and don't recommend it at all.
Anyway, I got sick of it and was finally going to invest in an expensive dimming thermostat for the benefit of Comet, when I discovered this one. I got it during one of the Amazon holiday sales for $20. It was cheaper than most pulsing thermostats so at this price I fully expected to receive a hunk of junk that I would have to return. But it works PERFECTLY!!!! It continuously dims the heat bulb to maintain your temperature without ever turning the bulb off. I love it so much I bought another one for my uromastyx at full price which is just $27. It doesn't have a built in timer so you will need to put it on a timer so it only operates during the day, I put mine on a smart plug. When it comes back on in the morning it will remember the temperature you had it set at. Oddly, it has a clock on the LCD which serves no purpose at all. I asked the seller what the point was and they said so you know what time it is. LOL I don't think anyone is using this thing as a clock.
I've received so much great advice here and I wanted to return the favor by sharing this awesome find. I think a lot of you can benefit from it and will love it as much as I do.