Has anyone ever tried this incubator?

[MochaDuck]

I was looking up homemade incubators and found this. https://www.instructables.com/id/The-3-30-Minute-Egg-Incubator/
Has anyone tried one? Do they work?

 

[BReeder!]

no. I have seen similar designs in cooler-bators though. Also, it's not drastically different than the manufactured styrofoam incubator I use - styrofoam container, heat source, water tray and a mesh floor. I would be concerned about the bulb going out or overheating. Also, moisture could be a problem for the light socket. A cheap or even recycled PC fan would easily turn this into a more effective incubator by circulating the air to help avoid the drastic hot and cold zones that would likely occur with the heat source on one side.

 

[Shamo Hybrid]

Making your own incubator is a fun little project if you already have most things needed laying around. But if you have to start from scratch and purchase everything, I would just buy a new cheap Chinese incubator..... which in the end would only cost like a few dollars more.

 

[jjaazzy]

I agree with Shamo, I think you can't go wrong with the cheap Chinese ones. At first they work really well, mine came with an auto turner, fan and temp readings. After awhile they start to fail, like not heating up. For that I hung a 100 watt flood light over it till I finished the hatch, the temp readings still worked really well and the darn thing hatched out some chicks. They are excellent to start out with and if you find things get more serious then you go get a Cadillac, GQF as I now own 2 of them. But start small and learn a bunch..

 

[jvls1942]

I am not a fan of light bulb heated incubators.
maybe if there is a thermostat control, they might be OK,. but not great.
there might be some exceptions.
If you are hatching just barnyard run eggs, OK, then try it. but I would never try expensive eggs in one.
I do not hatch anymore. I sold all of my incubators. I had 3 that each held 2000 eggs.
and 3 that held a total combined 1600 eggs.
plus I had 8 styrofoam LG's and Hova's.
I did lots of custom hatching..
I collected guinea eggs from a couple of friends and along with my own, I hatched and sold over 300 keets each year..
good luck with your experiment and I already can foresee you getting serious about it..

 

[MochaDuck]

Thanks everyone Your comments have helped

 

[Shamo Hybrid]

I am not a fan of light bulb heated incubators.
maybe if there is a thermostat control, they might be OK,. but not great.
there might be some exceptions.
If you are hatching just barnyard run eggs, OK, then try it. but I would never try expensive eggs in one.
I do not hatch anymore. I sold all of my incubators. I had 3 that each held 2000 eggs.
and 3 that held a total combined 1600 eggs.
plus I had 8 styrofoam LG's and Hova's.
I did lots of custom hatching..
I collected guinea eggs from a couple of friends and along with my own, I hatched and sold over 300 keets each year..
good luck with your experiment and I already can foresee you getting serious about it..

Were you big ballin' when you were selling all these chickens, etc? Good money?

 

[MochaDuck]

Has anyone tried a Currens Mini Egg Incubator? Most sites I see give it good reviews.

 

[jvls1942]

I did not make a lot of money hatching eggs for other people.
I did OK on the eggs I hatched for myself and sold the babies. but there is no way I could have made a living at it.
I did it because I enjoyed it. there is a lot of time involved. I had rotating batches of eggs.
record keeping can become a nightmare.
Do not attempt to trust your memory when you have staggered hatches going.
I marked each egg with the lockdown date.
also with the customers i.d. ..
I often would have hundreds of assorted babies in the brooder pens.
Once I hatched 127 turkeys for a guy.
Another guy used to bring 200 chicken eggs at a time. about every 3 weeks. all summer long.
the most difficult part was explaining that not all of the eggs will hatch to someone who does not know that..

........jiminwisc......