The 6th Annual BYC Easter Hatch-a-long!

[SandraBH]

I'm so excited to be joining this years Hatch-Along! It's my first time hatching. I have chicken eggs to incubate. Yay! Let the fun begin.

 

[LPeaslee]

Just fired up the incubators, time to get the temperature dialed in.

 

[KYTinpusher]

I hadn't planned to join the hatch-a-long this year as my brooders are already overflowing, but my BCM laid their first egg of the year today so I HAVE TO set it to check fertility, right? And I can't set just one - there has to be at least a dozen in there to make sure I don't have any lonely chicks hatch, right? Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it!

 

[bamadude]

[COLOR=008080]Ok, I went through all this trouble to wire a STC-1000 digital temperature controller to my LG incubator, and technically, it is working correctly, but honestly, I am not very happy with it so far![/COLOR] [COLOR=008080] The temperature seems to swing a lot more than it did when using the regular LG thermostat.  I have a Fahrenheit thermometer probe that I calibrated in the incubator, and it has max/min recall, so I placed it in different corners of the incubator and tested the temperature range.  It swings from 97.5º to 103.8º in the same spot over 4-5 minutes!!!![/COLOR] [COLOR=008080] I definitely do not remember having this much of a temp swing before!  [/COLOR]:/

[COLOR=008080]Now I kind of understand why it is happening - I have the digital controller set at 38º Celcius (because 37.5 didn't get the temp high enough), and it has a .3º Celcius "Difference Set Value" before it clicks the heater on, so if I have it set at 38º Celcius, it waits until the controller probe reads 37.7º before switching ON the heater, but it drops to 37.3º while the heater starts warming up the temperature, and then it does turn OFF the heater right at 38º but the residual heat continues to climb until it reads 39.7º C or 103.8º F before starting to drop back down.[/COLOR]

[COLOR=008080]Now this is with an empty incubator, so I assume it will be more stable when it is full of eggs, but do you think I should be worried about the temp swing, or just average out the high & low temps and call it good?[/COLOR]

Hopefully u dont have the model #9300 or #10300. There is no hope for the new "improved" models.

 

[meesh480]

found my eggs but it doesn't look good... Is it possible to rise the eggs off?

 

[JoyfulPromise]

Hopefully u dont have the model #9300 or #10300. There is no hope for the new "improved" models.

No, it is a 9200, and it had the manual little peg to change the thermostat, so I thought this would be an improvement...

 

[PaisyQ]

Bad news: Found out there is something wrong with my Brinsea Mini when I plugged it in to test it out today. It keeps shutting itself off if I touch the power cord.

Good news: Got a new Farm Innovators 4200 when I went into town today

Other Good news: I can now set more than 10 eggs!

Other Bad news: I can now set more than 10 eggs....

Question though; I'm used to the Brinsea; it pretty much did everything for me. The Farm Innovator came with this little thermometer I'm supposed to calibrate, apparently by moving it up and down on it's cardboard backing? Well according to the thermometer I calibrated it to, it's running about 1.5 degrees too high, but it won't move on the backing. Can I just, you know, remember it runs too high, and just subtract when I'm checking temp? Or should I somehow find another thermometer to stick in there?

 

[JoyfulPromise]

found my eggs but it doesn't look good... Is it possible to rise the eggs off?

Oh no!!! That looks horrible!!!

If there are any eggs that are not broken or cracked, I think you could wash them off gently with warm water and a soft cloth or papertowel. I have done that several times when a broody hen has broken an egg and all the other eggs were messy. I washed them all off with WARM water and papertowel, and most of the time they hatched just fine! Won't hurt to give it a try!

 

[jegan]

Set 18 white bearded Silkie eggs yesterday from my own girls. C'mon little ones.

 

[LadyHawkeAvry]

[COLOR=008080]Ok, I went through all this trouble to wire a STC-1000 digital temperature controller to my LG incubator, and technically, it is working correctly, but honestly, I am not very happy with it so far![/COLOR] [COLOR=008080] The temperature seems to swing a lot more than it did when using the regular LG thermostat.  I have a Fahrenheit thermometer probe that I calibrated in the incubator, and it has max/min recall, so I placed it in different corners of the incubator and tested the temperature range.  It swings from 97.5º to 103.8º in the same spot over 4-5 minutes!!!![/COLOR] [COLOR=008080] I definitely do not remember having this much of a temp swing before!  [/COLOR]:/

[COLOR=008080]Now I kind of understand why it is happening - I have the digital controller set at 38º Celcius (because 37.5 didn't get the temp high enough), and it has a .3º Celcius "Difference Set Value" before it clicks the heater on, so if I have it set at 38º Celcius, it waits until the controller probe reads 37.7º before switching ON the heater, but it drops to 37.3º while the heater starts warming up the temperature, and then it does turn OFF the heater right at 38º but the residual heat continues to climb until it reads 39.7º C or 103.8º F before starting to drop back down.[/COLOR]

[COLOR=008080]Now this is with an empty incubator, so I assume it will be more stable when it is full of eggs, but do you think I should be worried about the temp swing, or just average out the high & low temps and call it good?[/COLOR]

I have the same unit, but don't see those swings. I have it set at 37.6 with the temperature probe centered at the far end of the incubator with the probe at egg level. It comes on at 37.3 and shuts off at 37.7, which is about .2 degrees less sensitive than my Brinsea. I used a standard thermometer/hygrometer combo to measure the temperature and found it read about 5 degrees lower. I then warmed up some water in a closed jar in the incubator by the probe and tested it with a mercury thermometer. The mercury thermometer read 99.5F. I had to move the other thermometer up a bit before the reading matched the probe and the thermometer. Prior to replacing the temperature controller, my unit would turn on at 98, and shut off at 100.5F. My suggestion is calibrate with an old school mercury thermometer to see what the average temperature runs.