PLEASE HELP: Different temperatures in my homemade incubator

[tayfuntay]

Hi to all.

I made my incubator, last year i had some chicks but more than the half of the eggs died.

So my problem is the temperature i can't set it to degree because the four of my termometers indicates different temperatures.









So just look now the electronic ones the one on the left 40degrees celcius the other 38.5 and the normal termometer; the left one 39.5 and the right one 37.5.

So what should i do. I even bought a regulator (the third pic i don't know the exact name sorry) but it will make me mad.

Please Help...

 

[Ridgerunner]

Calibrate your thermometers so you know which one to believe. It’s not at all unusual for thermometers to be off that much due to manufacturing tolerances.

Rebel’s Thermometer Calibration
http://cmfarm.us/ThermometerCalibration.html

I'll throw this one in just to complete the set.

Rebel’s Hygrometer Calibration
http://cmfarm.us/HygrometerCalibration.html

 

[tayfuntay]

ok thanks i will try

 

[tayfuntay]

But what why is there a difference between the non digital ones?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Because of manufacturing tolerances. Different thermometers are manufactured to different tolerances. Some go to great efforts to make sure each and every thermometer measurement is correct to within one thousandth of an inch. Some are happy with 1 hundredth of an inch. Some measure the liquid that goes in much closer than others. There is a difference in price. But all of them can possibly be off some. Look at yours. Calibration allows you to get a handle on that.

I've seen as much as 9 degrees Fahrenheit difference in the same make and model of thermometers on the hardware store shelf.

 

[tayfuntay]

Ok, was looking the vids for calibrating but i dont have the cable for the termometer and m termometer doesnt have a plug in to insert the cable. I didnt understand it.

 

[HatchCraft]

If you have a fever thermometer to compare against at 100 degrees , you should be within 1 deg . This is more than close enough to hatch eggs. The picture show a fever thermometer compared to a 6" photography thermometer in an insulated cup of warm water.

 

[tayfuntay]

Ok thanks a lot. So if the "baby" termometer is the same as the glass termometer its ok, but if its not the same, what should i do, just know the difference and act like that?

 

[HatchCraft]

Note if the glass thermometer is reading high or low , then adjust the incubator temp accordingly.

 

[lazy gardener]

I used a fever thermometer, and an old fashioned mercury medical thermometer as my gold standard, then put in a large, easy to read red dye thermometer, and did the math, so I could easily read the big thermometer, and adjust accordingly. ie: if the medical thermometer read 100 degrees, and the big thermometer said 98.5, I knew that I could keep the thermostat set to keep the temp at 98.5 by the big thermometer, and it would actually be 100 degrees. I used a home made incubator with a fan, dry hatch. Kept the temp at 100 degrees, and had 5/6 healthy chicks hatch, with one quitter early on in the incubation. I recommend that you spend about a week working to get your incubator stabilized, and perhaps put in some water bottles = to the anticipated volume of the eggs so that you won't be calibrating an empty incubator. I'd also recommend that once you add the eggs, you wait, and don't mess with the temperature until it is stabilized, because if you increase the temp during the initial warm up, you'll be going crazy micromanaging the temp swings. also, as the embryos mature, they'll start putting out some of their own heat which will require some temp adjustment. Happy incubating!