My New Project - 5 Viv "Entertainment Center"

[Jabouty]

Okay, so first off, I've been a lurker of BD.org for years now (found you guys in '05 when I got my first beardy) and have been off and on here since. I've garnered a LOT of information from everyone here, but have never been enticed to register or login until recently.

Last week my wife's Beardy, the one eluded to above, finally passed on. We got him in '05 and he was already 11 years old at the time. The previous owners simply couldn't keep him any longer, and he had a really nasty wound on his right arm (apparently they tried to get him to breed with a neighbor's beardy, and she was having none of that, so she bit his hand off) and only had half a finger on his right hand. After getting that healed and handled, we've had him since and he's been a huge part of my family for a LONG time now. While his passing was sad, he was well beyond the age I'd expect a beardy to live, and so it was time for him. We figure we did something right to have had the blessing of his presence for as long as we did.

Whelp, time for another adoptee!

So we gave his enclosure a really good steam / bleach cleaning and then moved our Uromastyx in to that (it's a 75G long), and then did the same disinfecting cleaning on the Uro's enclosure and moved our Juvie Albino Leopard Gecko into that one, and lastly cleaned / disinfected the leopard's old enclosure and went and got another beardy for my wife.

So with all this moving around, I decided that I was very successful with the rabbit hutch I built for my daughter's bunnies, that I would try my hand at a furniture quality enclosure setup for the lizards. What I came up with was this:

This is still in the very early planning stages of getting everything designed and solidified before I even think about new lumber, but I wanted to get your opinions on what pitfalls I may run into. The Arborial vivs are 24" wide, 24" deep, and 84" tall, while the desert vivs are 48" wide, 24" deep, and 16" tall (I'm still adjusting the sizing of the desert vivs, as I'd like an interior height of 18", but It's proving to be some give and take with the electronics cabinet requirements).

The enclosures will be light / temp / humid / weather (yes, weather) controlled using three Arduino controllers and will run everything from the basic day / night lights, to the rain / dry seasons in the arborial vivs. I've already started the programming of the Arduino controllers and am testing proof of concepts for the misters, fans, lights, and heaters at the moment using an old dead tank that will never house another lizard due to cracks and whatnot. With the controllers I'll be able to customize each enclosure to the individual(s) living in them, and will be able to set certain alarm conditions for each variable that I'm able to control (which is pretty much everything except food).

As for the interior setup, I can't really show that in the CAD program I'm using to design this with, yet, but the UVB will be at the front of each enclosure (the desert vivs will have it behind the doorframe, at the top, and the arborial vivs will be to the right and left of the doorframes, so that you can't see the bulb, but the lizards still get the benefits). You can see where the basking bulbs will be in the arborial vivs, the desert vivs will have slightly recessed baskers on one side of the enclosure.

Anyway, I wanted to post what I've got so far as far as woodwork design functionality and see if you guys see any major pitfalls with what I'm putting around in my head before I get to work on this. Thanks for any thoughts, suggestions, or help you can give with this project in advance.

I will update this thread as this project progresses. I'm expecting a timeline of about 6 months from supplies purchased to fully functional.

-Jab

 

[mrsphate]

I'm very sorry for the loss of your beardie. I hope mine can live that long. He isn't doing that great and is 7 years old. We have had him a week now. Your viv plans look great

 

[dragonov]

Sorry to hear about your dragon.

Your project looks great. Only suggestion I have is to not go for glass doors on the bottom storage area. I think that will distract from all the vivs and might look a bit "junky" quickly. I would use the same material for the doors as the front material under the jungle vivs. And if you sacrafice a shelf there and make it equally tall as the bottom areas of the jungle vivs, you also maybe find some extra space to make the arid vivs taller?

Good luck with your project, it will be an interesting one to follow!

 

[Jabouty]

... Only suggestion I have is to not go for glass doors on the bottom storage area ... I would use the same material for the doors as the front material under the jungle vivs ...

I took this suggestion and rolled with it. I matched the height of the bottom storage to the jungle vivs, and adjusted the top storage height by 1/2 inch, and I was able to eek out exactly 18" inches of interior space for all three desert vivs! Thanks boss, and it looks great too!

I changed the materials used for the render for version 1.23 of the design, in that I went to my local store and made a list of the materials they can readily provide me with without having to order it in special for me. I also added some decorative trim to the design to make it more "Living Space Presentable" since I do want this to be furniture quality work that I'll be happy to display for years. While the exterior is oak paneling and redwood framing, the interior of the vivs are all melamine for heat retention and easy cleanup. As well, the void space between the melamine and outer walls will be filled with foam insulation prior to placing the top wall of the enclosures. This should help with heat retention as well. I've not yet added the vents or other environmental requirements, but I will do that soon.

The doors for the desert vivs are sliding plexi, and the jungle vivs will be a swinging doors that are hinged on the outer wall with plexi for display. I decided to do the storage area doors with a hidden latch instead of the standard magnet catch and handle. Basically you push the door in slightly to close and open it. The top storage will lift up and latch open, while the bottom storage areas will open to the sides.

Here's today's version of the rendered project design. Thoughts?

-Jab

 

[dragonov]

I think you nailed it, looks awesome! Great idea too on the hidden latches, I love those, those will be perfect for this setup!

 

[disturb3d0n3]

Looks great! I can't wait to see the progress of the final project!

 

[Claudiusx]

Interested to see some pics when you start building it.

-Brandon

 

[RobertsKitty]

... Only suggestion I have is to not go for glass doors on the bottom storage area ... I would use the same material for the doors as the front material under the jungle vivs ...

I took this suggestion and rolled with it. I matched the height of the bottom storage to the jungle vivs, and adjusted the top storage height by 1/2 inch, and I was able to eek out exactly 18" inches of interior space for all three desert vivs! Thanks boss, and it looks great too!

I changed the materials used for the render for version 1.23 of the design, in that I went to my local store and made a list of the materials they can readily provide me with without having to order it in special for me. I also added some decorative trim to the design to make it more "Living Space Presentable" since I do want this to be furniture quality work that I'll be happy to display for years. While the exterior is oak paneling and redwood framing, the interior of the vivs are all melamine for heat retention and easy cleanup. As well, the void space between the melamine and outer walls will be filled with foam insulation prior to placing the top wall of the enclosures. This should help with heat retention as well. I've not yet added the vents or other environmental requirements, but I will do that soon.

The doors for the desert vivs are sliding plexi, and the jungle vivs will be a swinging doors that are hinged on the outer wall with plexi for display. I decided to do the storage area doors with a hidden latch instead of the standard magnet catch and handle. Basically you push the door in slightly to close and open it. The top storage will lift up and latch open, while the bottom storage areas will open to the sides.

Here's today's version of the rendered project design. Thoughts?

-Jab

Just a heads up, I have used those style latches before, after a few months of frequent use (use every couple of days) the latches start to loose their effectiveness and eventually no longer work well at all. I did this with an entertainment center I made in highschool that I made in '08. The latches are all completely worthless at this point. I will be replacing them soon.

 

[gunkleneil]

looks great. Very ambitious project. Look forward to seeing it come to life. I like how you are designing and thinking it out well before actually starting it. my only concern would be the ventilation as you would need to have vents on 2 opposite walls for good air circulation and the only available walls for the three middle ones would be the glass doors and the back walls. Are you planning to drill vent holes in the doors? Just curious what you were considering.

 

[Jabouty]

... My only concern would be the ventilation as you would need to have vents on 2 opposite walls for good air circulation and the only available walls for the three middle ones would be the glass doors and the back walls. Are you planning to drill vent holes in the doors? ...

There's a void space between the inner and outer walls of 1/4" that will have ducting placed prior to being filled with the insulation for the three desert vivs. This ducting will be routing to vents on the side walls near the door, and there will be a vent on the rear wall of each enclosure with a 120mm, 8db (if you can find a quieter fan with equal CFM capabilities, I would love to know so I can use it instead), 40 CFM fan to pull air from those vents, through the front and out the rear. I've calculated this setup to give a rate of 87.5 air changes per hour, which is above the industrial requirement for humans of 62 air changes per hour in any given enclosure, so ventilation shouldn't be an issue. Plus the front sliding doors on the enclosure have a space between the front and rear sliders for air to move in as well.

For the arborials, I've changed the design slightly for two reasons, a) plexi is F****ING expensive in a sheet large enough to do the whole door in one panel, b) the reptiles I'm planning on housing there do better with mesh than glass anyway, c) the only way to get enough air changes per hour for the volume inside these vivs would be to use a bank of 6 of those fans, and that would be too loud at 48db for even me to tolerate, let alone a sensitive herp. So I'll be using 1/32" square pet proof screen mesh for the doors of the jungle vivs. This will make keeping the humidity up a busy job, but that's why I'm designing and automation system for this beast as well .

Speaking of the automation system; I was thinking particularly hard on the air and ventilation of the enclosures, and I decided I should monitor the O2 and air quality in addition to temp and humidity and the other stuff. So I've ordered in some O2 and air quality sensors for each viv that will be monitored by the automation system. If the O2 drops below 19% or the air quality within the enclosure drops below safe levels, it will alert, and send the fans into full 100CFM speeds. Giving 250 air changes per hour of ventilation, which should clear out any bad stuff and give fresh air long enough for me to figure out and fix the problem.