Slide In Python Hide Box - Lucas Perrett

Description

I keep pythons, and they like to climb and generally be in the highest spot in their terrariums. So, I want to provide them with a hide box up there for them to rest and feel safe. The problem is that these are normally fixed and hard to work around as far as lighting and heating, as well as difficult and problematic to clean.I have tried to adapt some drawers in the past, but due to the size of my pythons, I have found that they haven't held up under the weight of scaly babies and have broken off fairly quickly.Inspired by a few designs, I came up with this more rigid concept that would hold the weight of my snakes whilst still giving them a relatively light and easy-to-remove hide that could be slid in and out when needed for cleaning or working in the enclosure or getting my lazy snake out of bed.Given the depth of some enclosures, I designed 2 boxes, with one a front-facing entrance and one with a side-facing entrance. Both have 2 sets of ventilation holes, and the walls are 3mm thick.Box dimensions are 150mm (excluding rails) wide x 180mm x 154mm high, making it approx 4L hide box.This is just an initial design as I was inspired to enter this competition for all the reptile nerds out there, and I am sure it can be refined and improved.Printing-wise PLA and PETG (Food Grade) are the go-tos for reptiles as they are non-toxic. I like to make them as solid as I can, so normally like to print with 25-30% infill and 4 walls, but will work on basic settings (2 walls, 15%…