Lots of people have had problems with LG incubators. But there are also quite a few people out there who swear by them. For us, it was a matter of urgency and finances. We needed an incubator on very short notice (lost our rooster suddenly) and we had very limited funds with which to buy one. The Little Giant still air incubators were on sale for $35 that weekend so that's what we went with. I haven't made it through my first hatch yet, so I can't say what kind of luck I've had with them personally. But I can say that so far we have not had any temperature spikes that I am aware of. Our temps have been holding pretty steady and the fluctuations that I have seen can all be attributed to fluctuations in the room temperature (that kind of happens when you go from 80 in the afternoon to 40 for an overnight low, and don't exactly think you'll need to turn the heat on when it's still 80 in the house when you go to bed). No, it's not the best or most reliable incubator out there. But so far it has met our needs.
1. Hand turning eggs works just fine if you have the time and aren't prone to forgetting. But if you aren't going to have the incubator in your home and you can afford one, I would spring for the automatic turner. That way you know for sure that the eggs are being turned even when you can't make it in for some reason. It would also make weekends less stressful for you. I don't know how far away from your school you live, but unless it's within walking distance I can't imagine that the gas to drive there and back three times a day on Saturday and Sunday wouldn't make it worth the investment for an auto turner.
2. An accurate thermometer. The ones that come with the incubator are notoriously inaccurate. Also, a hygrometer. Humidity can make or break a hatch, and it's good to have a hygrometer just to keep an eye on the humidity regardless of which side of the humidity camp you are on. And an LED flashlight with a high lumens rating for candling. Those are the basics. Since I'm assuming that this is going to be a teaching tool and not just a personal hatching, you should probably also get a small notebook to keep notes. I have one (cost like $0.50 at
WalMart) that I write the date, time of day, which side I turned to (since I am hand turning), temperature and humidity before turning and the end temp. and humidity when I close the incubator back up after turning. I also noted how many eggs we set, how many were clear on what day, and how many eggs from each hen are in there. And I make notes after candling or adding water or on the few occasions where I've felt the need to adjust the temperature. If you're hand turning, keeping a notebook helps you to keep track of whether or not you've turned yet. Depending on how old your students are, they could help with this record book, or even keep one of their own with their own observations and feelings on the project. Even if you weren't using this as a teaching tool, I personally feel that keeping a notebook is useful because if something doesn't go the way you expect it to you can look back at your notes and be better able to pinpoint the problem so that you can fix it with the next hatch.
3. Any of the common backyard breeds should be equally easy to hatch. Some of the less common breeds may have fertility issues. For example, there are a few studies out there that indicate rose combed birds have lower fertility than single combed birds, but a breeder that has an appropriate rooster-hen ratio rarely has problems with fertility. Talking to whomever you buy eggs from should make it easy to spot if they have a breed or strain of birds that will be prone to that. Also, age and health of the flock in general can also affect fertility. Storage and handling of hatching eggs between the time they are laid and when they are set tends to have a much bigger impact on hatchability than breed. Shipped eggs are particularly difficult to hatch, so if you're looking for easy to hatch I would try to find eggs that you could drive and pick up yourself rather than having eggs shipped through the mail.
They aren't "easier" to hatch, but it should be mentioned that white or very light brown eggs will be
much easier to see into when you candle them. Dark brown and green eggs can be nearly impossible to candle. Most of the eggs we set for our first hatch (at least the ones that were fertile and developed anyway) are green eggs. At day 4 when we candled most of the lighter green eggs weren't really any more difficult to see into than the brown eggs, but by day 10 even the lightest green egg was much more difficult to see what was going on in there other than , "there's an air cell, and there's a dark blob that might be moving...or is that my eyes being tired and playing tricks on me?"
Good luck on your decision. Personally, if I had $100 to spend on an incubator I probably would have sprung for a nicer one than the Little Giant. But they do work, even if not as reliably as some of the other brands/models out there.
