Homemade ceramic infrared chick brooder - for larger hatches

[Island Roo]

I have seen lots of write ups and threads about heat mats used to brood chicks. I can see this working for smaller numbers but not for the 100 chicks I'll have this spring.

I'm thinking about building a infrared heat panel with several infrared bulbs - like the ones used for reptile enclosures. Maybe 2 rows of 4 x 50 watt emitters spaced 1 foot apart. That would give me a 2ft x 4ft area using 8 bulbs = 400 watts.

When everyone starts to feather out I could raise the panel and remove some bulbs.

Has anyone tried something like this. Any suggestions or warnings for me?

 

[paneubert]

My 2 cents is that the IR emitters tend to have a narrow cone of heat when compared to a visible heat bulb. It is probably explained by the fact that the ceramic emitter is literally a smaller circle while the standard heat bulb is huge. The higher you have the bulb, the wider the cone of heat, but also the colder the cone will be.

I think your idea is totally doable, but you may need to adjust the spacing between bulbs to account for the smaller cone of heat each bulb emits.