I love yours. I've thought of adding a window to the tops of mine, but am not comfortable doing that much cutting. Yet.
Like I said, mine's been used for reptiles. I'm seeing how well it does with poultry eggs. I figure if it can incubate python eggs for 60 days as well as it does, it'll do just fine. I used reptile supplies I had on hand to flesh it out.
Start with a Coleman 120 quart cooler, about $50 at walmart.
I'm using a Herpstat ND to control temps. Most expensive piece of equipment on it, but well worth it. That's mounted on the front.
Inside.
Heat source would normally be flexwatt, but for this one I used an Ultratherm undertank heater. Same thing, just encased in coating to make it a bit tougher. It can also be mounted on the sides, but I like it on the bottom. Foil tape mounts the thermostat probe and an exterior thermometer probe to the lid of the cooler, so that when the lid's closed, they hang about in the center of the cooler. Jars and a couple water bottles in there for thermal mass, and the deli cup sitting in the pvc coupler provides plenty of humidity. Fan is propped against the side, but I'm working on a cage to place it in for safety. I could mount it to the side, but need to be able to remove things easily for when I need this for snake eggs. This way it can be easily switched back and forth.
Egg cartons sit on top of a kitchen cookie cooling rack, to keep them up off the heat source so there's never danger of them cooking. Makes for great air circulation, too. I've got a Honeywell TS33C temp probe sitting on top of those, my thermometer of choice. I have 3 of them, along with a base station. I like to keep that downstairs, where I can see what the temps are in the incubator at a glance. Very handy, and very accurate.
Sitting in the corner of my reptile room, along with the 1588 on the storage rack.
Hopefully this inspires someone. You really can make an incubator out of a whole range of different things.
