Thermostate keeps blowing up

[brownie3215]

Hi every time I heat light blows in my snake cage the thermostat shorts out and does not work and ends up needing repair. I have two cages hooked up to this using 2x 150w globes and 2 raptapets prewired ceramic fitting with cages any idea why this is happening?? I have use a habitat dimming thermostat and a microclimate b1 and both have blown up

 

[Kurto]

sounds like the wiring to the globe fitting is botched.

 

[saximus]

Did they tell you what part they replaced when they repaired it? You might be getting a power spike when one globe blows but the other is still being powered

 

[brownie3215]

no they did not tell me what part had to be fixed in the habistat but i had to replace the fuse in the microclimate for it to work again. every power board is surge protected and all wiring is the same as when i brought it brand new. would you recommend repalcing the wiring with new wiring??? it happens to both cage lights if one blows then it blows the thermostat.

 

[saximus]

Yeah that's what I thought it might be. If you imagine the thing is working happily and then one light blows, all of a sudden it is only powering half of what it was so there's a bit of a spike occurring when one blows. How are the actual lights connected to the thermo? Is there already a power board with surge protection? If not, I'd suggest connecting one between the thermo and each light. Otherwise I'd suggest having a look at the size of the fuse in the thermo itself and maybe going up to the next value, depending on what it is already.

 

[bigjoediver]

I wouldn't use two loads on the one thermostat unless they were small ones like 25w heat cords etc. you would save more money in the long run by using two thermostats as the spikes produced are not only damaging you thermostat but probably reducing the life of your remaining heat emitters/ globes.

 

[brownie3215]

Yeah i have a powerboard in between thatis surge protected. I have just put new wiring through to them so see what happens. Thanks for you help everyone

 

[bigguy]

You will find thermostats vary in how much wattage they can handle. Most of the common variaties are only rated to 300watts. You stated you are running 2 x 150watts bulbs. You may find you are running the thermostats at full capacity, and when a bulb blows the sensitive electronics get overloaded and break. Try 2 things. 1) Reduce the wattage of the bulbs back to 100watts each, or 2) get a second thermostat and share the load between them.

 

[brownie3215]

it says they can both handle 600 watts but will try adding another thermostat