Could I put the nipple waters on the bottom of a 5 gallon Igloo cooler?

[onfire242]

I have no experience with the nipple waterers. Would they be long enough to go through a 5 gallon cooler bottom? Link below is cooler I want to buy.

http://www.amazon.com/Igloo-Gallon-...1-2-catcorr&keywords=britetap+chicken+waterer

I do NOT want to buy the BriteTap waterer that attaches to the igloo container because I don't want the water to freeze that is outside the cooler. I will be putting an aquarium heater inside cooler to bring water up to above freezing but the water in the clear tube would freeze. I live in Wisconsin. I just want to buy the individual nipples and put them on the bottom of a hanging cooler. THANKS!

 

[Eliza1313]

Depending on the cooler you will have a about 1/2" to 1" of insulation. So the nipples would not go all the way through the cooler directly. Was going to recommend a product similar to the BriteTap until I read through all of your post.

You could make an adapter with PVC pipe and fittings, however that would do away with the insulation in those spots, but would be less exposure than the spigot adapter.

Another option is to just use large PVC pipe and wrap it with one of the heat wires meant to keep plumbing from freezing. Or use an aquarium heater along with an aquarium current/flow maker to keep the water moving.

Keep in mind that I live in a much warmer climate and do not have actual experience in keeping waterers from freezing. Just know that the insulation on a cooler would be too thick for the nipples to go through. Have made chick waterers with them using drink bottles, purchased pre-made buckets with them, and the spigot adapter. On some of the thin-walled coolers they might reach all the way to the interior, but you would need to use silicone to seal them on the inside so the water does not leak into the insulation.

 

[onfire242]

Thank you so much for the info!

 

[pdirt]

x2 what Eliza said. You don't want to drill through the bottom of a cooler and just screw in the nipples. The water will go into the insulation and probably leak and worst scenario it will mold/mildew and your chickens will drink that. No way to clean wet insulation like that. Possibly you could install the correct size tubing and silicone seal the whole thing and install the nipples in the tubing, but I'm not sure if that would work without a lot of hassle to keep it from leaking.

Below is a pic of our waterer. This is our setup of winter (it gets to -15F here occasionally). It is a 5 gallon bucket with horizontal nipples (the only nipples to use IMO, the vertical ones freeze too easily even with a heater and they dribble a lot in use). The bucket is also wrapped (top and bottom, too) with aluminized bubble wrap (brand name Reflectix) which insulates the bucket and reduces electricity costs. Inside the bucket is a submerged stock tank de-icer (K&H 250W, wait until autumn to buy it from Amazon when the price drops, price is high in summer), this has kept our water free-flowing down to -9F so far, which is the coldest we've been able to test it yet. It is supported by setting it on a cinder block, the hung handle by the green strap is only to keep the handle raised, which eliminates the chickens from roosting on the lid and fouling the water.

BTW, the short version is I no longer believe submersible aquarium heaters are safe to use in a chicken waterer situation. More than once we have found our bucket dry and the aquarium heater nearly started a fire, it didn't shut itself off when dry like it was supposed to. The K&H de-icer simply shuts itself off if it is accidentally ran dry...add water and it starts working again.

 

[Eliza1313]

pdirt - thanks for the info on the risk of using the aquarium heaters. I will keep an eye out next Spring for a de-icer on clearance at the feed stores. The big chain stores sometimes get them in, but not much of a use for them here. Every few years we will get a streak of below freezing weather where things don't thaw out, so it would come in handy for then. If I need something before then I will have to use an aquarium heater and keep a close eye on the water level.

Bigger issue here is keeping the water from evaporating and keeping it cool. Just got the cooler adapter this Spring to try out on my older hens. Need to upgrade the size of the cooler and get an additional one for in with the new birds. Thinking of making an insulated wrap for the adapter to try to keep that water from heating up.