Incubator Design Process

[BantyChooks]

Well that disapointing but I understand staying in your budget and comfort zone. I'm looking forward to the next bator.

Good news, it's time for the next one. I have a significantly better budget and some time to kill over the next few months - no deadline either as I have no planned hatches (yet.)

 

[HatchCraft]

Good news, it's time for the next one. I have a significantly better budget and some time to kill over the next few months - no deadline either as I have no planned hatches (yet.)

That's wonderful. I'll be waiting to see your latest design.

 

[jwcarlson]

Obviously, you can do whatever the heck you want... But I like the portable-type controller. But I also don't use an auto-turner (yet).

I just finished building this last night. Controls to right around 0.1 degC once settled in (basically -0.0/+0.1). This picture was during initial heat-up, it overshot about half a degree, which isn't an issue.

I like this option as basically anything can become an incubator and when I move the eggs to the hatcher, I just drop the thermocouple into the hatcher and plug in the heater. It also has an audible and blinking light for high or low temps (programmable (or disabled) if I ever want to use this to heat anything else up). Obviously the alarm doesn't work if the power goes out, but nice to know if heater somehow sticks on or fails. The only thing I need to add is to add always on USB power outputs for the USB fans in my incubators. Both outlets are switched now, but I can separate that and power the top one for always-on fans easy enough. Should have though about that last night. I'll probably add that when I start cooling/misting the goose eggs as it won't take me but a few minutes to do that.

Good luck with yours!

 

[HRoseY]

Good job with your incubator! I built one and hatched our first quail chicks out a little over 3 weeks ago. Make sure you have enough ventilation. We lost almost 1/2 of our fully formed eggs when the first batch hatched and I think we didn't have enough ventilation. Also make sure to test it with increased humidity for lock down. I didn't test it and assumed the bowls I added wouldn't negatively impact air flow and they very much did. Adding in heat sinks of water bottles and a rock for the tray seems to have really helped with temp stability.