can I use an egg carton inside incubator to keep eggs large end up?

[50-45-1]

Think about how the broody hen hatches her eggs.
They are on there side. She constantly rolls them.
All i ever did was mark an X on one side and an O on the other and roll them either 3 or 5 times a day so they spend the night on alternating sides.
During storage your hatching eggs should be round side up so the air bubble stays on that end.
And those hatceries that have trays pointy end down.... those trays tilt fully from side to side constantly.

 

[Fairview01]

Generally speaking the proper way to incubate eggs is on their side, but commercial hatcheries will place them pointy-end down to save space and hatch more eggs at a time. In nature eggs are laid on their side, so if you're looking for whether you should do this or try the egg carton method, I suggest just putting them on their side if you have enough room.

Generally speaking as soon as eggs are placed in an incubator they are no longer in their natural environment and much of what happens in nature is no longer applicable in the artificial incubation environment. Comparing what occurs under a hen and in the artificial incubation environment is an apple to oranges comparison.

In the artificial incubation environment keeping the eggs upright ensures the embryos are constantly oriented to pip within the air cell. Laying the eggs on their side in the incubator is not a problem. The problem occurs on hatch day when the first ones out of the shell play kick ball with the slower ones. A chick that internally pips in the correct location can easily drown if the egg all of a sudden is rotated 180 degrees and the aircell partially fills with any remaining liquid. It works so well in the natural environment because there are obstructions under the broody hen including the hen herself that impedes the activity of the first hatched chicks.

No where in these posts is there mention of monitoring aircell growth progression. Very few breeders have a dozen or 2 dozen eggs to ship after one day of laying. Usually eggs are stored at stasis temperatures using pre incubation techniques to maintain viability and balanced embryo growth. Those first collected eggs may have nearly a week head start on aircell progression as compared to the last ones. Ignoring this, not candling the eggs and not making humidity adjustments in relation to the fastest/ largest aircell size is the best way to kill shipped eggs. Up to 80% of my shipped eggs are killed during the last 3 days of incubation because the buyer depended on textbook humidity needs rather than this.

When eggs are incubated artificially a modified approach to nature is required to be successful.

 

[50-45-1]

my first incubator i had was a Marsh turn x incubator like the one pictured below, without the automatic turner. you rotated to lid by the knobs on the outside and could see the eggs roll.
the eggs laid on there side. i rolled 3 or 5 times a day.
my hatch success rate was good. it held one dozen eggs and i rarely would end up with less than 10 chicks. i ran this incubator for years.
i loved it because you had a good view of the chicks hatching.

 

[Throbak]

Funny you ask I just hatched 6 and that’s exactly what I used
But I cut the egg holders down to have just enough to cradle the eggs I used cardboard worked perfectly for me !

 

[dougieee]

Cardboard works fine, my shipped eggs werent great when i recieved them so i used a craft knife to cut away as much cardboard as i could without damaging the integrity of the cups and then just put the eggs in the bator upright in the cartons but not right next to each other.
The cardboard didnt go soggy so im wondering if they are infused with some kind of moisture resistant.
I didnt turn them fully just tilted them a little twice a day.
Out of 12 shipped eggs i had nine hatch, the other three internally pipped but it looked like they drowned. That to me is a good result for shipped eggs.