Need some REAL ANSWERS about thermometers!! Please help!

[gckiddhouse]

I am soooooo frustrated!!!!!!!

DD and I made a homemade incubator. We didn't have a great hatch the first go round, so we have tried to work out the bugs and are trying again. This time with pretty expensive eggs!!

I have come to realize that an incubator, whether store bought or homemade, is only as good as its thermometers are accurate.

The temperatures in my first hatch were fine all the way through, but the results of my hatch indicate that the temps were too high which means my thermometers were lying to me. We only got 6 chicks out of 25 eggs. The first chick to hatch was early and didn't absorb its yolk sack completely. It died a couple of days later. Several were shrink wrapped. It just wasn't good.

This time, I have a Springfield, 3 acu-rites, and 2 liquid types, an engineer's temp reader (not sure what it is really called), and a meat thermometer which we calibrated, but I am not sure it is holding its calibration. They ALL say something different!!!

Sometimes they are telling me that the incubator is 4 degrees hotter on one side than the other! Can that even be possible? I have a fan in there, the air should be the same! Right?

Also, I have no idea if the hygrometers are correct. I did the test on one of them, but the results of my last hatch would indicate that my test didn't give me true answers.

So, what do you all do? How do you know you can trust your thermometer? I have heard that everyone throws away the thermometers that come with their bators, so what are you using?

I am really hoping to bring these poor eggs that I payed good money for to a decent hatch.

I will appreciate your advice. I set them on Tuesday. I know it takes a day or two to level out the temps, but it isn't looking good. Please help me...

Here is my bator and most of the thermometers

 

[Teach97]

depending on where you r fan is yes you could still have temperature fluctuations...not sure where it is from the pictures...I would have put it smack dab in the middle of the lid myself.

I have both the furthest to the left and the top center bator one...talking about thermometers...are you checking for spikes (highs andlows recorded?)

My bator does ot take that long to level out...it appears as though you are having temp swings that might be the issue

 

[bigstack]

I just went to lowes and got a wireless hygro/thermometer. Looks kinda like yours on the bottom left. I hatched out 57 of 67. First timmer too. I know its Just beginners luck. The most important thing I have learned from every one is DO NOT keep adjusting the temps! If its a degree high or low Leave it be! Especialy if its just a spike. My bator would spike up to 102 for bout an hour then settle back down to normal. Then a day or so later it would run 1 degree low. But over all it is the average that counts. If the temp keeps going up or being turned down non stop bouncing all over, it is stressful on the embryo. You have to figure the hen does get up some times. so as long as its not over 104 or low for longer than a couple hours let it go. You will kill your self making tiny adjustments every 15 minutes. I just got it set 24 hours early. put the eggs in and waited for 2 days to let the bator and eggs stabilize. then made 1 adjustment and left it alone. It Mostly ran 98.9-100.7 a few times it would get up to 102 or down to 98.2 but not for long!!!


Just put 1 in and go! Just pick 1! I know it isn't the answer you wanted, sorry!

Good Luck and God Bless!

 

[gckiddhouse]

Quote:
Okay, so the fan is directly above the light. It is actually under the hatching tray. So it is blowing downward. The light is in the center, too. Did I do it wrong? There really isn't room on the hatching level for the fan. The last hatch, the fan was on one side blowing at the light (which has a foil tent over it). But we definitely had one side that was hotter. This time, it keep changing. But I can't tell if it is really hotter or if it is just the thermometers. Before we put the eggs in they all said roughly the same thing within about .6 of a degree. Now they are all over the place. Can't figure it out. I am afraid I am going to lose the whole hatch before it gets started.

I do have a foil tent over the light. I am considering removing that. The light will then have the fan blowing right on it. I just didn't want it to get too hot in the middle. But right now it is coolest in the middle. I actually don't have eggs in the middle because of that.

I just don't want to make any huge changes that will really cause problems...

 

[Buck77]

If you want a good thermometer get the spot check from Brinsea. It is about $30 including shipping but you can either save money or be constantly frustrated. Everyone seems to agree that it is fairly accurate. It only reads temps in a narrow range so maybe that is why it is cheaper than the ones that measure over a wider range of temps. If it is as accurate as it claims to be it is dirt cheap.

 

[bel]

Cant say anything good about those accurites, bought one and ended up returning it to walmart because it was ridiculously way off (and slow). The cheaper springfield was more accurate, but the second one we bought isn't, however both seem to be accurate on humidity (and both are also slow to show temp changes).

The brinsea spot check, and the GQF analog type thermometer that sticks through the side of the big incubator seem to be the most accurate thermometers we have, so we are using them for temps and the springfield for humidity.

 

[gckiddhouse]

Quote:
Okay, I would agree that the springfield seems more accurate than all the others. I am glad to hear that someone else seems to have the same feeling. I have read on several threads that the springfields are pretty accurate. The accu-rites seem to suck badly! I have 2 right next to each other right now and one says 104.4 and the other says 100.4. WTH!! The Springfield on the other side of the bator says 95.9.

$80 worth of eggs. I can't imagine how they will possibly survive.

It is kinda too late for me to order a thermometer. I can go to walmart or another store today, but I have to either get this right or give it up. I can't deal with this for the next 3 weeks only to watch a poor hatch, or chicks with problems.

It was perfect before the egg went in!!!! Ugh! I am just about in tears. This is madness!

 

[Penturner]

First, I am amazed at how much posting goes on in this group, and how very little information any of it contains. So I feel for you. even the sticky threads that are intended to make the basic information is not close to complete.

So here is what I know about thermometers.

Digital. you can never really trust a digital thermometer. here is why. digital thermometers depend on little electronic components and the resistance or lack of resistance they have to electricity. these little components basically change how they work when they get hot. drop a digital thermometer in a 100 degree incubator and it is not going to be right, even if it was right at 76 degree room temps. Exception: a probe style device that keeps the body of the thermometer out of the heat. that is the basic idea of why digital therms are freaky at best.

So what is reliable? Liquid thermometers. I lay a liquid thermometer next to the digital. the digital is easy to read but if I do not like what I am seeing I can confirm it by the little extra effort it takes to read the liquid. the liquid is always right.

So how do you know that your liquid is accurate. two ways. buy expensive and name brand or buy only when you can compare the ones you buy to each other. the ones that read the same are the ones you want. For example I went to Wal Mart when they had just gotten a new stock of $2 aquarium thermometers. of six there where 4 that all read the same temp. I bought all of them. When they read 99 degrees is it really 99 degrees? I donno, don't care. I will explain later. what is important is that they all agree. I then bought a couple of digital things for $8 each and they also agree with the liquids. even at that at times my digital will read as mush as 2 degrees different then the liquid laying right next to it. More on this in a bit also.

Response time, exactly what it sound like. when you ask a question the answer always has a response time. that is the length of time required for the answer to be given. The question always being asked of e thermometer is "What is the temp RIGHT NOW"
well you are not going to really know unless you allow for the thermometers response time. This is the time required for the sensor in the thermometer to react to the temperature it is in. most people are very familiar when waiting to get their sick child's temperature. We seem to forget about it when getting the bators temp. but basically keep in mind you are reading what the bator temp "Was" not is however many minutes ago the thermometers response time is. My liquid thermometers are pretty consistent at 30 seconds response time at any temperature variation. what this means is that I can place the thermometer in a box that is 70 degreees. turn on a 90 watt light bulb that will raise the temp in that box to 100 degrees in 2 minutes. 2 minutes and 30 seconds later my liquid thermometer will read 100 degrees and stay there. in comparison my digital will shoot all the way up to 104, then slowly fall back to 98 then rise again to eventually read 100 degrees. this could take as much as an hour. So the response time of the digital is not only much slower, it varies in length depending on how much of a temperature change it went through. more on this in the next paragraph.

Sensor. a thermometer does not tell you the temperature of the entire incubator. it only tells you the temperature of a very specific and almost always very small point. that point is the sensor. The sensor on my digitals are on the back upper right corner when viewed from the front. on a liquid it is the "Bulb" on probe styles it is the very end of the probe. wherever it is know where the sensor is on your thermometer and take care to keep anything from effecting it sensing the air in the incubator. this means heat coming off eggs, egg racks, the floor the wall the body of the thermometer itself will all effect just what temperature the sensor is reading. this is part of the reason the digital has such a wild swing when temperatures change. the body of the thermometer actually absorbs heat and gets hotter than the surrounding air. it then cools very slowly in comparison to the surrounding air. so it can take a long time for a digit to give a true reading. if int he mean time you have been adjust the stat opening the bator and basically creating further temperature changes, well you get the idea. the digital has no real chance of catching up.

Now a little more on that very small specific spot that the thermometer senses. is it the same as every other spot in the incubator. No not at all and never will be. can an incubator read a 4 degree difference from one side of the bator to the other and still be functioning correctly. yes. it may no longer be subjected to radiating heat from walls near the light bulb or other heat source. heat is not like water that pours in and fills ever nook and cranny, it is sucked up by everything around it, it is sucked up faster by some things than others the air will be cooler next to something that sucks up heat fast than it is near something that does not. In my case my digital will read 100.1 degrees when the carton it is setting on is tilted one direction and 3 degrees lower when tilted the other direction. the liquid laying right next to it reads the same steady temp.

This then leads me to the final point I need to go back to. Why did I not care if the thermometers read a real 99 degrees when exposed to 99 degree air. because I am not interested in the thermometers telling me when I have 99 degree temps. I am interested in them telling me when I am on track to a successful hatch. if I get successful hatches when my thermometers read 99 degrees so be it. but it may be that my thermometers will read 105 to get successful hatches. if your hatch showed signs that they where to high temp. then keep them at a lower temp reading on your thermometers. your thermometers then become tools that are of great value to you. It is possible to some degree to monitor the development of the embryos as you go along as well, but this is not easy. but at the very least you can get some info as to the accuracy of your thermometers by candling at various stages and try to determin if the embryos are developing correctly for that number of days. But in the end the true accuracy of your thermometers will only come through hard earned experience with them. never expect the tool to do the work of the crafts person.

I hope some of this has been helpful.

 

[Teach97]

I would change the fan to blow away from the light...draw the heat off the light and spread it...you would be taking advantage of the natural movement of air and helping (speeding) it along. currently you are forcing hot air down over the light for it to simply rise back away from it...try this change...i also would play with temps way before I ever put eggs in...if you aren't getting constant temps why waste the eggs?

also...what are you using for a thermostat? what is the range on it? and where is it located?...especially in relation to your thermometers

 

[gckiddhouse]

Penturner - Not only was that helpful, but I think THAT should be a sticky!!

I have searched a ton of threads on this same topic and they are never more than 1 page with answers like "sorry, wish I could help" or "order this really expensive one". You were right about there not being much information!

So, THANK YOU!!!

I will go get another couple of liquid thermometers (that read the same temp) today. I will stop freaking out!! Everything you said makes a lot of sense. Even the springfield digital, which I think is fairly accurate, did shoot up to 105 when I first put it in the incubator. It eventually settled down. I have a liquid therm. in there, but I wasn't sure if it was right or not. I have been putting it near a digital to see if it agrees with the digital. That has been helpful.

Will be sharing this link on my hatching thread.

Thanks again!!