NEED HELP calibrating Brinsea Mini Advance temperature!!!

[song of joy]

I'm hoping someone can help me! I bought a used Brinsea Mini Advance and will be using it to hatch eggs in about 2 weeks. (This is my first time hatching eggs.)

I've disinfected the incubator and had it running 24 hours. The incubator says the temp is 99.5 degrees. However, my Spot Check thermometer (which is supposed to be really accurate) reads between 100.9 and 101.0. My digital candy thermometer reads 101.8. Based on these readings, I think it's about 1.5 degrees warmer in the incubator than the Mini Advance is indicating. This is a BIG temperature difference! I don't want to cook the eggs! (OK - yes - I'm panicking)

When I turned on the incubator, I held down the OK button while powering the unit on to bring the unit back to the factory settings, but this did not correct the problem. What do I do now??? Which thermometer do I trust?

 

[Kelsie2290]

http://www.brinsea.com/Manuals/MiniAdvancePlus-US.pdf The incubators do need calibrated from time to time (they recommend having them serviced every two years), there are directions on doing it in the user manual. I would be inclined to get another thermometer or two and take more readings and go from there, but it does sound like your is running high. Then calibrate the incubator, or just make allowances for the real temp difference/ reading.

 

[song of joy]

I've done some more temperature testing, and I'm feeling better about the results.

The Mini Advance says 99.5 degrees.

The Spot Check shows a very steady AIR temperature of 100.4 to 100.5 degrees approximately 1" above the incubator floor.

The Spot Check is reading a WATER temperature of 99.5 to 99.8 degrees in the "water egg" I made. (It's a small glass of water, sealed with "press and seal" plastic wrap, with the Spot Check probe put through the plastic wrap into the water, which has been in the incubator for several hours.)

Is it normal for the air temperature to be higher than the "water egg" temperature reading?