Need Help from the Incubator Gurus

[spoggy]

Hey All,

I want to construct an "old style" wooden incubator, and I need a little help. I want to make my own nichrome heating element. Is there someone here who has done that? If so, how does one determine ohms in the coil before it's built? As far as I can tell, even 18 ga. wire ony has a resistance of .446 ohms fer foot. If I wanted 225 watts for the heater, I need something like 60 ohms of resitance. That looks like 120 ft. of wire. I know that's not right, but I'm no electrician. Can anyone help me understand the correct way to do this?

 

[spoggy]

So there is no one here that has ever done this?

 

[aprophet]

http://www.cutlersupply.com/cart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2_32&products_id=309

A much easier way

 

[spoggy]

Quote:
Agreed. It is much easier. I really wanted to do the whole thing from scratch as much as possible though. I'm a millwright by trade and love to tear things apart and build things as well. I was just hoping that someone had tried this before. I searched the archives and know some have, they just didn't go into too much detail. I suppose I'll try PMing them individually. Oh well, thanks for looking!

 

[aprophet]

most toasters are 1500 watts it almost sounds like you need 1/7 of the nichrome that is in a toaster in the litigious society that we live in I Imagine most folks are hesitant to give advice that could burn a house or barn down if you google the electronic sites and get familiar with ohms laws it ain,t that hard. P = I X E
Ohms law can also be expressed as I = E/R look for people that sell nichrome they usually have engineering data on their sites.

http://www.electrical-design-tutor.com/ohmslaw.html