tips for farm innovators model 4200

[AmyLynn2374]

I'm on my first batch with one, and the temps have held steady through the last 17 days. Lockdown tomorrow, I've been running it dry (in a humid climate) with good air cell development so far with 23 eggs developing on schedule. Going to add some water tomorrow and keep my fingers crossed until I see hatching!

Advice so far - put some electrical tape or something over the built in gauge as it is totally off (4 degrees low reading in my unit) and rely on your secondary thermometers. Run it dry until you need to add water, I had a drop of moisture fail to evaporate for over 4 days in there! Run it for 3-4 days after setting up new thermometers and before setting eggs, extremely small adjustments to the knob make huge temp fluctuations, so keep an eye on it until it's totally steady for a few days with both plugs out at 95.5.

I'll be posting my resultant hatch at Amy's hands on hatching thread if you want more updates

Best wishes!

Good luck!!!!

He did, but I think she lost him to something else later on.....got an old brain here but that's what I'm thinking...

You're old brain is working better than my old brain!!! LOL

 

[LocalYokel]

I've heard both decent and not so decent. It's not as bad as the LG 9300 that TSC sells. :/  At least from the things I see....  

Agreed

Then again plenty folks hatch from the LG'S too.

 

[LocalYokel]

I'm on my first batch with one, and the temps have held steady through the last 17 days. Lockdown tomorrow, I've been running it dry (in a humid climate) with good air cell development so far with 23 eggs developing on schedule. Going to add some water tomorrow and keep my fingers crossed until I see hatching!

Advice so far - put some electrical tape or something over the built in gauge as it is totally off (4 degrees low reading in my unit) and rely on your secondary thermometers. Run it dry until you need to add water, I had a drop of moisture fail to evaporate for over 4 days in there! Run it for 3-4 days after setting up new thermometers and before setting eggs, extremely small adjustments to the knob make huge temp fluctuations, so keep an eye on it until it's totally steady for a few days with both plugs out at 95.5.

I'll be posting my resultant hatch at Amy's hands on hatching thread if you want more updates

Best wishes!

Good advice here.

 

[LocalYokel]

Nooooooo You weren't supposed to say that!!! I have an egg here with your name on it-----was gonna name it after you and everything!!! I didn't have him...someone else had hatched him out against overwhelming odds and I just had the honor of naming him. I think she finally lost him. I've been haunting hatching sites like mad...I'm sure yours will be one of them. By golly, I will MAKE this hatch work if I have to incubate them in a Mama Heating Pad cave!! With so many great eggs and duplicates, maybe I'll put some in one and some in the other just to cover my bases.....

Oh me oh my oh those are gorgeous! You will do fine Blooie!

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Oh me oh my oh those are gorgeous!

You will do fine Blooie!

xs 2 Some of them look huge!

 

[newwestchick]

Ok so a few further observations on my first batch with the FI

I removed the turner at day 14, and the motor on that sucker is quite hot! That combined with the eggs being a little lower on the wire rack meant I had to adjust the thermostat up a HAIR (literally a hairs width) to bring the temp back to 99/100 at middle egg level.

Again today for lockdown, once I added water I needed to make a slight adjustment upwards (even though the water was hot) to get the temp back up. I'm not joking that knob is so sensitive that if you touch it the slightest bit it reacts!

Curiously, now that I've upped the humidity to 75% the built in thermostat is reading the correct temp? Maybe it's calibrated to read in a humid environment? Either way I'm relying on my fish tank ones

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Ok so a few further observations on my first batch with the FI

I removed the turner at day 14, and the motor on that sucker is quite hot! That combined with the eggs being a little lower on the wire rack meant I had to adjust the thermostat up a HAIR (literally a hairs width) to bring the temp back to 99/100 at middle egg level.

Again today for lockdown, once I added water I needed to make a slight adjustment upwards (even though the water was hot) to get the temp back up. I'm not joking that knob is so sensitive that if you touch it the slightest bit it reacts!

Curiously, now that I've upped the humidity to 75% the built in thermostat is reading the correct temp? Maybe it's calibrated to read in a humid environment? Either way I'm relying on my fish tank ones

The LG9200 is the same way. Just a tiny adjustment will send it swinging. That's why if I can get it between 99.5 and 101 I leave it alone...lol Yes, those turner motors give off a LOT of heat. That is why I switched from using my turner to hand turning. I had a full bator and the eggs closest to the motor was growing at an excellerated rate and then quitting by day 6/7. That corner of my bator was about 2 degrees higher.

 

[newwestchick]

Yes I noticed in my test run how hot it was - I kept the eggs a few sections away from it and their development didn't seem any different than the rest. The fan might be what helped out there

 

[Blooie]

The LG9200 is the same way. Just a tiny adjustment will send it swinging. That's why if I can get it between 99.5 and 101 I leave it alone...lol Yes, those turner motors give off a LOT of heat. That is why I switched from using my turner to hand turning. I had a full bator and the eggs closest to the motor was growing at an excellerated rate and then quitting by day 6/7. That corner of my bator was about 2 degrees higher.

Yes I noticed in my test run how hot it was - I kept the eggs a few sections away from it and their development didn't seem any different than the rest. The fan might be what helped out there

These comments are golden to know! Thanks for sharing your information!!

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Yes I noticed in my test run how hot it was - I kept the eggs a few sections away from it and their development didn't seem any different than the rest. The fan might be what helped out there

Mine has the fan, but I still have hot and cool areas of the bator. The two hatches I did before that one I didn't have a full bator, so I could just leave that corner empty and the eggs were back enough to not be affected. But the that particular hatch I had a full turner, so I had to use the corner. 100% fertility. After I started haveing first week quitters I just pulled the turner and I ended up with 36 going into lockdown and 33 hatching. I decided to hand turn after that and found I prefer it.

These comments are golden to know! Thanks for sharing your information!!