incubator set up

[white guinea333]

I finally finished my incubator I was building and I ran into a problem. The thermostat I used was hard to set to the right temperature and when I got it to the right it started going from a 2 degree fluctuation to a 7 degree fluctuation.

Any ideas on how I can set it to keep the right temperature?

 

[thehackleguy]

Is it electronic or a wafer? If it is a wafer thermostat then that flucuation is pretty normal as it expands and contracts. If it is electronic I would replace it with a better/ new one.

 

[white guinea333]

It is a brand new electronic thermostat. It works fine when I set it to 90 degrees and 125 degrees. When I set it to 100 degrees it starts perfectly by going from 101 degrees down 99 degrees and back up. Once I leave it alone for a couple hours it starts going down to 94 degrees and back up to 101 degrees. It is set about an inch from the wall of the incubator. Do you think I should flip it or position it at a different angle for it to tell the temperature better?

 

[cameronfarm]

Whats the make and model of the thermostat?

 

[white guinea333]

It is a Rheem lower water heater thermostat with settings between 150 degrees down to 90 degrees.

 

[white guinea333]

Okay so I placed one of the fans in my incubator in a different place so that it would blow the heat from the other light bulb to the thermostat and I moved the thermostat so it is in the middle of the incubator to let it sense the temperature better. Out of this the result was a fluctuation from 100 degrees to 98 degrees and back up to 100 degrees and so forth. Is this good enough to hatch chicks out of? I have hatched chicks at a low temperature such as temperatures between 98-95 degrees The only problem was that instead of hatching on day 23, 24, or 25 as usually late chicks hatch at they were hatching at day 28, 29, or 30.

 

[thehackleguy]

You should be good with that, wafer thermostats routinely fluctuate between 5 & 10 degrees.

 

[white guinea333]

I watched this youtube video,

, and moved my thermostat 2 to 3 inches away from the light bulb and had one of the fans blowing the heat from the light bulb to the thermostat. Now It is staying at exactly 100 degrees without even changing one degree.

If you guys want when I am done setting up the last few things in it I can post pictures of it.