Designed and Built Incubator - Have to start somewhere!

[coleco]

A little bit of background information about me is that I have a history of building my own things and taking on ideas that I probably should not have. When a close friend suggested that I hatch some eggs I started looking at incubators and quickly decided with my background of hobby equipment design that I would tackle the task of building my own incubator. I prefer to build things in my late 30's that I could leave behind as examples of my design influences. I thought "If i were an egg" lol and "Imagine if i was trying to raise a human" I stay up entirely too late.

The requirements that I laid out were something that would auto turn eggs, maintain temp and humidity without my constant meddling and with reliability (I keep chickens away from where I live and plan to incubate at, so I have to have the freedom to leave it to it's own.

After several weeks of tinkering I ended up with what is pictured below.

















I designed and built it so now comes the delicate part of hatching a first batch of eggs. I am somewhat superstitious about posting about or even expecting the best of my creations and I do worry that I will end up slow cooking my eggs or keeping them too cool. If I do please forgive me this is a first hatch, I am bound to make many mistakes.

The eggs came mostly from a close friend who separated some orpingtons for me(the roo is lavender and the hens are also a blue/lavender)(I will edit to add photos of them if I get some) and also from my own flock but mine are co-mingled; some of my eggs will be pure barred cochin bantam and others mixed breed birds.

To start I weighed and pencil marked each egg and attempted to pencil the air pocket outlines. I put 2 aquarium thermometers from walmart in 2 different simulators(shown below).



I asked around and settled on setting the humidity at 36%

I wanted to post a thread to discuss the results of what i learn from the scientific method while I hatch out eggs in an insulated wooden incubator heated by a 100 watt cartridge heater and humidified with a usb personal humidifier. Hopefully I can hone this thing to be reliable and whatever I learn can be used somehow here.

Thanks for taking the time to view my only 3rd thread on BYC.
I did incorporate the little mp3 player that plays a 280 beat per minute chicken heartbeat sound softly in the incubator.

 

[gpop1]

nice looking build.

Temp is always a hard to calibrate during the first hatch as you tend to over think it. 99.5 is the ideal temp but to be honest anything around 98-102 will work. After your first hatch if you calculate the days that will tell you if you are slightly cold or hot. On the first batch I would mark the eggs in the corners and one egg in the center if they all hatch with in 18hrs then its perfect if one egg is early or lagging then I would take a closer look at the design (maybe slow the fan down or add a deflector).

 

[coleco]

Thank you. My update is i have a pip 6 hours before day 20, someone just couldn't wait. My broody splash marans hatched out a barred cochin bantam from her clutch just in time to show me how it's really done.

 

[coleco]

25 hours later and an hour and a half into hatch day #22 hatched successfully.
I have another pip, other eggs are very slightly wiggling. Humidity was hard to keep at 60%. I got some new glass storage containers out of it tho. I had to put rectangular glass dishes with sponges in them. I have grown to distrust the little humidifiers they have started getting finicky(i will take one apart to see if i can determine what causes it before next hatch).

 

[melamb13]

Wow, that's impressive. Looking forward to see how well it performs.

 

[coleco]

Thanks, welcome to BYC by the way. I weighed an egg and it lost .79 grams in 32 hours. I need it to lose an average of .34 a day so i increased humidity to 37% from 36%

 

[melamb13]

What temp are you running?

 

[coleco]

What temp are you running?

I have it set at 99.6 in a room that is 75 degrees and 44% humidity, the fan that constantly circulates is 22cfm and i'm guessing that it's just slightly over 1 cubic foot of space it's insulated with 1-1/2" pink foam. I am having a much harder time pinning down what temp my eggs achieve inside. My thermostat readings sway from about 99.6 degrees to 97.9 degrees and I was having issues with the element ramping up too much initially but I installed a dimmer on it to reduce the heat that the actual element reaches. Now its a much softer ebb and flow of hot air than before. I erred on the side of cooler than hotter. It seems to be slightly warmer inside than the readings that i get from my sensors so i'm working on it.

 

[melamb13]

I'm just learning about incubating, but what I've seen so far with a forced air method is around 60% humidity and 100 degrees. Anyway, looking forward to see how it works out, it is a sleek design.

 

[coleco]

I am on day 3 now.

I worry over and over about temp. is it too low is it too high hahahahahahahahah.

Thermometers are a frustration.
There is currently no way i can guess the internal temperature of my eggs with the tools that i possess.
I tried the infrared thermometer, aquarium thermometers, oral thermometers, digital thermometer. Those have all proven more confusing than my entire build.
Meanwhile the two temperature controllers consistently read within .3 degrees Fahrenheit of each other.

One egg has lodged itself or stuck to my auto turner tray, I have been trying to come up with some method of loosening it without handling it too much or breaking it in there. for the meantime it's ok; it's just really stuck in there.

None of these have really been surprises after reading so many hatching and incubating threads I just wanted to give an update.

The update is: "Oh No i set the eggs and I have no idea whats going on with them" (So pretty much normal first hatch)