Daughter and I have been working on this one for a while and it got shelved for a long while when we moved, summer too hot, non laying hens...well lots of reasons LOL So I was given this cooler a couple of weeks ago and my crazy hens decided to finally lay after I started them on fermented feed...so we had to get to work and here it is. Mini dry erase board on top for notes and times to turn the eggs.
Designed so you shouldn't have to open it for anything..except maybe the fan quit and needed to be replaced..hope that doesn't happen!
Basket with wire attached so eggs can be "turned/tilted" , just raise one wire at a time then lower the basket, then switch and raise the other side.
The fan is from an auto store and plugs into cigarette lighter but I bought an adapter (Radio shack) for it so it can be plugged into wall outlet.
40 watt bulb with lamp "guts" plugged into reptile tank thermostat. So far it is keeping the temp perfect!
Water wiggler in the egg basket with probe inside it is connected to small digital thermometer (aquarium store) (This replicates the internal temperature of the eggs so it is very important to have it at the same level as the eggs and this thermometer is the one we base our ideal temp settings on)
Shelf liner stops the eggs from rolling toooo much and also gives the new hatched chicks something to stand on and they wont fall through the too big gaps in the plastic basket, which I cut down in size to make sure it cleared the edges of the cooler and everything else in there. With the water wiggler in there I could only fit 8 eggs in..but that's ok for me as I don't have room for a gazillion chicks anyways
Wire bottom 2 inches up from floor and cage around the light and fan for safety.
Funnel has a tube attached so water goes straight into bowl.
I also made a ziplock baggie of water to fill in the space under the bottom wire as it holds the heat in better than just air.
.
Designed so you shouldn't have to open it for anything..except maybe the fan quit and needed to be replaced..hope that doesn't happen!
Basket with wire attached so eggs can be "turned/tilted" , just raise one wire at a time then lower the basket, then switch and raise the other side.
The fan is from an auto store and plugs into cigarette lighter but I bought an adapter (Radio shack) for it so it can be plugged into wall outlet.
40 watt bulb with lamp "guts" plugged into reptile tank thermostat. So far it is keeping the temp perfect!
Water wiggler in the egg basket with probe inside it is connected to small digital thermometer (aquarium store) (This replicates the internal temperature of the eggs so it is very important to have it at the same level as the eggs and this thermometer is the one we base our ideal temp settings on)
Shelf liner stops the eggs from rolling toooo much and also gives the new hatched chicks something to stand on and they wont fall through the too big gaps in the plastic basket, which I cut down in size to make sure it cleared the edges of the cooler and everything else in there. With the water wiggler in there I could only fit 8 eggs in..but that's ok for me as I don't have room for a gazillion chicks anyways
Wire bottom 2 inches up from floor and cage around the light and fan for safety.
Funnel has a tube attached so water goes straight into bowl.
I also made a ziplock baggie of water to fill in the space under the bottom wire as it holds the heat in better than just air.
.
