DIY rain attachment

[Psychobunny]

I know you get a lot of splashing with the rain ring. I did pretty much the same, covering the sides, esp. the lower portion, where I get most of the splashing.
I cut a piece of thick clear plastic to cover the lower panel on the front door as well.
Still get minor 'misting' outside the cage. And by afternoon, the floor around the cage is slightly damp. So I put some cut sheets of plastic on the floor around the cage and duct taped the edges to the floor so it wont slide around and I can step on it.

I found with the rain ring, since the holes are not as tiny as the mistking nozzles, I can use tap mixed with distilled water 50/50 without worry (so far) of any mineral buildup.

I re-read my first posts, the instructions on how to make a rain ring, and forgot I had stressed the use of small pin holes only.
So, the last RR I made, I didnt even follow my own advise and stupidly made the holes too big

So, need to make new ones, which my chams will love, because it means they get to hang out on the free range while I work on their cages

 

[sofasig91]

Why not try making the tubing in a single spiral instead of rings with all those connectors??

 

[falconut]

Why not try making the tubing in a single spiral instead of rings with all those connectors??

If I understand you correctly, it would only be fed from one end and the end of the spiral would be furthest from the feed tube. I'm guessing it would loose too much pressure by the time it got to the end. The circle with fittings allows it to get feed from both sides, so less pressure loss, I think.

 

[falconut]

I just finished with my 1st attempt. My inner ring is about 6" diameter and outer is about 10" diameter. There's about 6" from the outside ring to all sides of the cage, it doesn't look like it from the photo. I was trying to leave room for the heat lamp, without it being right over the tubing. It doesn't seem to splash outside the cage as it is. I could add another ring if I need to. Here's what it looks like:

Now I just need to find a way to get the tubing to exit the cage without destroying the screen.

 

[MelissaB]

Would it work if it was placed on top of the screen? That way you wouldn't need to make a hole.
Or, you can get a rubber grommet from the low voltage section at the hardware store. I made a small hole with a phillips head screw driver, and the squeezed the grommet into place. Worked pretty well. I saw the suggestion in someone else's post.

 

[Psychobunny]

I dont think it will work right if you put it outside the cage.
The small size of the screen mesh will just make the water puddle up.
You only need to make a 1/4'' hole in the top screen for the tube.

A hole that small is easy to mend later if you need to.
If you had a mistking, you would need a much larger hole. No way around it.

All my cages are swiss-cheesed with holes!!

 

[caietaro]

I know this thread is fairly old, but I found it when I was looking for an alternative to the AquaZamp raindome and thought it was extremely useful. I wanted to post some thoughts I had while making my own DIY rain attachment in case others find it useful as well!

First, I used black tubing mostly for aesthetics, I just thought the black blended in better inside my Atrium cage than the white tubing.

Second, instead of making a rain "ring", I made a zig-zag using a bunch of the elbows from Mistking (http://www.mistking.com/value-elbow-14.html). Since I have the atrium cage which is wider than it is deep, I thought the rectangle shape of my zig-zag rain attachment would provide better coverage than a circle.

Next, I experimented with a few different methods for poking holes in the tubing. When I tried a standard push pin, the holes were too big and even with the needle valve closed almost all the way, the cage was still getting drenched and water was shooting everywhere. I ended up using a safety pin and found that the only way to get perfect, controlled rain drops was to use just the very tip of the safety pin to barely poke a hole in the tubing. I ended up using tape to create a "stop" on the pin to avoid making the hole too big.

Lastly, I made sure to keep the tubing far enough away from the edges of the cage so that the water doesn't splash out when hitting the leaves and cage floor.

So far I think it works great and my chameleon doesn't seem to mind it at all when the rain starts! I did find that I had to lengthen each rain session from 3-5 minutes to more like 5-6 minutes, because it takes almost a good minute to get the water through the tubing and to build up enough pressure before the rain starts.

 

[SocialNumb]

Looks pretty sweet. Mind sharing where you got the tubing from?

 

[caietaro]

Looks pretty sweet. Mind sharing where you got the tubing from?

It's the same tubing that comes with the Mist King systems; I bought the starter system from LLLreptile and just ordered about 20 feet of extra tubing (they sell it by the foot). I've read that you can get the same tubing at the big box home improvement stores but I'm not sure if they carry black.

 

[MelissaB]

Caietaro. that is a fantastic, well thought out job! You have a very lucky chameleon.

 

[caietaro]

Caietaro. that is a fantastic, well thought out job! You have a very lucky chameleon.

Thank you!

 

[SocialNumb]

It's the same tubing that comes with the Mist King systems; I bought the starter system from LLLreptile and just ordered about 20 feet of extra tubing (they sell it by the foot). I've read that you can get the same tubing at the big box home improvement stores but I'm not sure if they carry black.

Thank you caietaro. Might do one myself.

 

[Wowbango]

It's the same tubing that comes with the Mist King systems; I bought the starter system from LLLreptile and just ordered about 20 feet of extra tubing (they sell it by the foot). I've read that you can get the same tubing at the big box home improvement stores but I'm not sure if they carry black.

Both Home Depot and Lowe's carry black tubing. It's in the plumbing section with all the irrigation stuff. $4 for 50 feet.

 

[caietaro]

Both Home Depot and Lowe's carry black tubing. It's in the plumbing section with all the irrigation stuff. $4 for 50 feet.

This is good to know, thanks! That's a lot cheaper than what I paid online.

 

[MSMorgan]

Making one tonight. Will post up tomorrow. What a great idea.

 

[Chamaniac]

Completed our rain dome last night, total cost less than $10...another example of the helpful information that can be found on this site!

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