I lost some chicks... Were they too cold?

[Bleenie]

I was SOOO excited when the feed store got in their Buff Wyandottes, I went and scooped up 8 as soon as I could get there. They were almost 1wk old when i got them & everyone looked good(except the 2 smutty-colored ones the guy picked out for me

but thats a different story!)

earlier this year I got tired of my seperate brooders and went "all out" and built a HUGE brooder using a large pallet as the base. It's about 1.5ft tall & the top is 2/3 covered so they have plenty of area that keeps the heat in. this brooder is on our covered, open-air porch. I used a heavy heat light casing & a Red heat light just to make sure everyone would be warm enough since it was out on our porch.

I wired the casing to hang it in the back right corner of the brooder so everyone could get enough heat. This worked out well for a long time until I bought my Layer Chicks.....
8 Buff Wyandottes
11 Black mystery chicks
Plus I had 3 duckling & a few banty cochin chicks my hens hatched.

All was well for the first few days, then one by one the BW's started dying! Completely healthy & good weight, just up and croaked all of a sudden! Well over a few days time I lost 5 Wyandottes... man was I getting upset, I thought for sure I had a genetically bad batch of chicks or something. Just in case, I immediately sold/gave away the bigger chicks & ducklings i had in there but then... one of my teeny banty chicks died. I observed them for a while one day and figured maybe it was the placement of the heat light... they're smothering eachother? but why the bigger/older chicks?

Last night I cut a hole in the top of the brooder, installed some hardware cloth & wired the heat light to the top. I will be keeping a close eye on things for the next few days. i am hoping this fixes the problem... gives them more space to spread out without being crowded or piled up.

Here's the set up now, PLEASE criticize it if you see anything that needs to be changed or anything.
Bedding is stall pellets.

When I first put them back in:

After they settled:

 

[Sir Birdaholic]

Make sure the floor under the light doesn't drop below 90 degrees at night. Put a thermometer under it , lower or raise the light until you get that temp. It looks like you have plenty of room for them to get out of the heat during the day.

 

[Bleenie]

I moved the light and took these pics last night, it was a little chilly too. I will pick a thermometer up today to make sure the heat is right, thank you.

 

[buildingmyark]

Looks similar to the set up that I have and it has worked well for me. If I ever feel that it's chilly, I just cover the heated end up with a towel to keep it cozy. I leave the other end uncovered in case they want to get away from the heat.