I see a good many posts about thermometers, both cheap and expensive ones. Often folk wonder why their hatch fails, or is delayed, or they get early, bloody chicks when all seemed well during incubation.
Cheap thermometers can be a major headache. Accuracy within a couple of degrees is fine for you swimming pool, but not for the incubator.
So how do we calibrate a thermometer?
Google it, and you will get a bunch of clever and complex answers, some involving iced water and boiling water with an allowance for altitude, etc.
All good ideas that work, but there is an easy way too.
All you need is a ball of modeling clay and a cheap medical thermometer.
Put the modeling clay in your incubator in place of an egg. Bury your thermometer in it, or probe, or whatever you are using. When the temp stabilises, poke your medical thermometer into the clay and take it's temperature.
The beauty of this method is that medical thermometers can be had from Walmart for about $5, and they are guaranteed accurate to 0.1F, right in the range we are interested in. Even if another method tells you that your thermometer is good at 32F, that does not mean it is good at 99F.
If your thermometer reads the clay higher or lower than the medical one, then simply add or sutract the difference evry time you use it.
For example, my very cheap indoor/outdoor electronic thingy, which cost $6, reads 1.3F low at 99.5F .... so it's easy. I just maked *add 1.3F* on a label on the device.
Hope this helps
Cheap thermometers can be a major headache. Accuracy within a couple of degrees is fine for you swimming pool, but not for the incubator.
So how do we calibrate a thermometer?
Google it, and you will get a bunch of clever and complex answers, some involving iced water and boiling water with an allowance for altitude, etc.
All good ideas that work, but there is an easy way too.
All you need is a ball of modeling clay and a cheap medical thermometer.
Put the modeling clay in your incubator in place of an egg. Bury your thermometer in it, or probe, or whatever you are using. When the temp stabilises, poke your medical thermometer into the clay and take it's temperature.
The beauty of this method is that medical thermometers can be had from Walmart for about $5, and they are guaranteed accurate to 0.1F, right in the range we are interested in. Even if another method tells you that your thermometer is good at 32F, that does not mean it is good at 99F.
If your thermometer reads the clay higher or lower than the medical one, then simply add or sutract the difference evry time you use it.
For example, my very cheap indoor/outdoor electronic thingy, which cost $6, reads 1.3F low at 99.5F .... so it's easy. I just maked *add 1.3F* on a label on the device.
Hope this helps
