Best inexpensive incubator??

[Beaglemomof5]

I currently have an incubator like the picture I’ve attached, but am beginning to think I need another one. Everything I’ve read said to NOT trust the thermostat or humidity reading on any of the incubators - that I should buy another hygrometer to put inside - so I did! How do I know which one is correct?!!! We’ve hatched quail once & chickens twice & all 3 times we had several eggs that didn’t hatch. Some weren’t fertile, (we didn’t candle early enough to begin with & then weren’t sure, so we left them! Thank goodness they didn’t explode!), but there were several that had fully formed chicks in them but for some reason they didn’t even pip. I had a hatch last week & I started with 24 eggs from my hens (so I know they weren’t old or shaken from shipping). We candled at 7 days & 2 weren’t fertile, so we tossed them leaving 22. We candled them again several days later & saw veins in all. On day 19 I had 1 to pip but nothing else. Day 20 more started pipping but the first still hadn’t hatch, but chirped & chirped like it was screaming for help. I could see it’s beak at the hole the whole time. By this time, I’m sitting on my hands to keep from opening it!! Day 21 still none have hatched!! Anyway, ended up quickly grabbing the oldest pipped egg & helping it break out, as the area around the hole was dried to the chick. So after getting it out, I washed it off with warm water & quickly put it back in the bator. (I had the incubator in our small extra bathroom & before I opened the incubator, I turned on the shower & got the bathroom foggy & humid from the hot water praying I wouldn’t do more damage than good!!) In the end, I had only 7 hatch (including the 1 I helped). My husband took out the other eggs & cracked them & he said several were fully formed but others, they were all gooey, black gunk. Don’t know what happened or why....... My incubator is still on the factory setting of 37.5C but I did notice several times the inside thermometer had 100.2-100.4F, so I’m thinking that might be why they hatched early. The humidity level between the incubator & inside hygrometer was usually around 10% difference, so I tried to keep it in the middle of the 2 (around 45-50%). I’m terribly sorry this is so long, but trying to get as much info to y’all as possible! Can anyone tell me what’s going on & do I need to get another incubator? If so, what is the best inexpensive one, as I can’t afford an expensive one. Thank you in advance for ANY help!!

 

[cmom]

From what I have read about those incubators, they are supposed to be good. I incubate in a cabinet incubator and use my styrofoam incubators as hatchers and a homemade one I made out of a styrofaom cooler. It works great. I used to candle around day 10 and 14 but now I only candle at day 18 when I put the developed eggs in the hatcher. So far all of the eggs in the hatcher have hatched. I usually hatch chicks once a week. I have had some questionable eggs and usually mark them (X) so I know which ones they are. I have some hatch and some that didn't.