i personally like turning the eggs manually, but then again i have never used an egg turner....i heard they just tilt the eggs slowly side to side. because i don't incubate a large number of eggs, i don't feel i need the turner at this time and turning by hand gives the family something to participate in. we wear rubber gloves when we turn them-heard something one time about skin oils and the pores in the shells so we just do it that way, we mark one side with an x, one side with an o, and try to turn them at least five times daily on good days when possible-don't get me wrong some days it's probably been 3 depending on which family member has egg duty and how well the communication is going. then closer to the hatch say we stop turning and increase the humidity. the eggs aren't out of the incubator during turning for a long time especially since we don't pack it full of eggs, in fact we try to just lift a corner of the lid and squeeze our skinny little arms in carefully to turn them so the temp stays relatively stable. if you are not putting a lot of eggs in or work part-time, i guess hand turning is fine, but if you do a lot of eggs at a time or have a full time job maybe the auto-turner would be better. i also hope to do different eggs and don't have the money to spend on one of each size turners. i do recc. getting the fan to circulate the air nicely.
