Nine chicks hatched. See picture in post# 26.

[tracecom]

Set 16 RIR's at 4:00 PM CST March 4, 2011

The title says the important part. The rest of the story is that the eggs are set in my homemade incubator. The enclosure is an Omaha Steaks shipping container, the thermostat is all electronic unit, the heater is also solid state, the turner is controlled by a microprocessor. I designed and built all the electronics and wrote the code for the microcontroller, so I have lots of reasons to be anxious for the next 21 days.

Think good thoughts for my 16 eggs in West Tennessee. They are off to a good start with the temperature at 99.9 and the humidity at 64%.

 

[DanEP]

Tracecom it sounds like you've got a pretty good setup going, but your humidity may be a little high. Most people run their humidity at 40-50 for the first 18 days and then raise it to 60-65 for the last 3 days of lockdown.


Good luck with your hatch Dan

 

[tracecom]

Quote:
Yes, it's a little high. The problem is that the humidity in the room where the incubator is (and where I am) is 46%. If it's still high in the morning, I will take the water container out. Thanks.

 

[tracecom]

I opened a vent hole and the humidity is now 53%; temperature holding between 99.8 and 100.0.

 

[10 point]

good luck

 

[tracecom]

This morning, the humidity is stable at 45%. My homemade turner worked flawlessly at 10 p.m. and 4 a.m.

 

[tracecom]

Just candled after five days in the incubator. Have 13 of 16 definitely developing and 3 that I am not yet sure about. Two and a half cups of water had evaporated; I replenished the container. Temperature stable at 99.7 to 100.0; humidity 45 to 53%. Automatic turner working just as designed; turns the eggs 180 degrees every six hours. (The eggs are on their sides.) So far, so good!

 

[tracecom]

Recandled the three suspects today (day 9.) All three still looked clear, so I removed and opened them: definitely not developing. Did not recandle the other 13. Added two cups of water to reservoir. Temperature holding steady at 99.7 to 100.0; humidity varying from 45% to 53%. Homemade auto turner working like clockwork turning the eggs 180 degrees at 9:00 am, 3:00 pm, 9:00 pm, and 3:00 am. (I reset it after DST started.) Looking good so far.

 

[tracecom]

Today (day 18) at 4:15 pm, I removed the automatic turner, refilled the water reservoir, added a wick to bring up the humidity, candled all 13 of the eggs, unblocked the viewing window, and increased the ventilation. During this 10 minute process, the temperature in the incubator dropped from 100.0 to 81 degrees, but after 5 minutes, it's already back up to 92. All of the eggs had good air pockets in the big end and were otherwise almost impossible to see through; I think all 13 are developing properly.

Who knows? I might have chicks in three more days.

ETA: Here's a picture. The humidity is at 69% (there's already a little condensation on the glass) and the temperature is back where it should be. Three of the eggs are almost out of sight below the window.

 

[speckledhen]

Hope all that went into the hatch mode actually pop out of there for you!