THE Brinsea Octagon 20 Eco Thread; Hatches, etc. (PICS)

I'm sorry, but you're going to have to say that again translated for dummies. my incubator has two water channels. I have a dozen duck eggs in there, laid out evenly. Here's a link to the thermometer I have. It's a cheapie, but I can't really afford to spend $40-$50 on one. Someone said in the reviews they used it for incubating eggs.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004PBB1JE

Thanks for everyone's help on this!

OK--just realized that you are hatching duck eggs and they do require a higher humidity.

All hygrometers (that's the humidity sensor) should be calibrated (checked for accuracy) so you know that they are reading the humidity correctly. For me, it seems like the digital ones (show an actual number you read on an screen) are less accurate than the analogue ones (they have a dial that you read) and can be off by a lot.

To calibrate a hygrometer, you can use a wet bulb method which I find harder, or a wet salt method which is much easier to use. In a nutshell, you are dampening salt and putting it in a container (I use a shot glass) along with the hygrometer you are testing into a sealed chamber (I use a 1 gallon zip top bag). Wait 12 hours and read what the hygrometer says it thinks the humidity should be. It should read 75% humidity. If it reads lower then you know it is off by the difference---ie if it says it reads 45% and it should read 75% then it is off by 30 percentage points at that humidity. Here is a link to the wet salt method: http://www.cigarpass.com/calibrating-your-cigar-hygrometer/

I did not have luck getting the humidity up with anything in the toughs themselves. I found that putting sponges in vertically held in place with plastic needlepoint canvas that I cut down to size sandwiched between two bars spaced just right was really effective. A sponge sandwich: bar-needlepoint canvas-sponges-needlpoint canvas-bar. I use this at lockdown and created two chambers but you could just as easily put it off to one side and have it on an edge. I fill a 60 cc catheter tipped syringe (you should be able to get them at feed stores) with water so I can squirt the water in quickly, but I am sure you could use a water bottle and pour slowly so you don't get water on the eggs.

Here is a photo at lockdown. I have another cross-mesh in the bottom chamber--ignore that. The main one is the one to look at. There is one sponge that is cut in half lengthwise with the pieces set diagonally and then another 1/4 size one in the middle. The sponges seem to stay wet about 2 days then need to be wetted. The main problem is that it takes up about a row of space so you can't load it up fully.
 
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Here's a pic of my incubator. It's in a different room than in the picture. I had to tie the meter in because I couldn't figure out where to stick it.
 
Thanks for that info, dretd. I'll try the salt method.

Its worth a try anyway--who knows, you may be stressing out about the humidity when it is really just the hygrometer being off.

I really like the sponges set vertically like that--because of the large surface area and the fan blowing directly down on them the humidity with both sponges wet plus the two trays easily gets to 70% for lock down. You could only wet one sponge and see if that gets to your desire humidity. Oh, with the really high humidity, it will cause the temp to drop by about 1/2 to 1 degree so just be aware of that and may need to tweak the temp ever so slightly. It works to my advantage at lockdown when I want to drop the temps a titch.
 
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The meter is is a ziploc with the salt. It's saying 70% already and it's only been in there about 1 and 1/2 hours. When I was taking it out of the incubator I put my hand in and it felt really humid. So what could be wrong?
 
I feel so stupid. Last night when I was putting the meter back in, I realized the whole time I hadnt been putting the back left corner of the lid on properly! No wonder the humidity was such a see-saw! It's staying much more stable now, and I had to open the vent a little to let some humidity out! Thanks for everyone's help on this!
 
I feel so stupid. Last night when I was putting the meter back in, I realized the whole time I hadnt been putting the back left corner of the lid on properly! No wonder the humidity was such a see-saw! It's staying much more stable now, and I had to open the vent a little to let some humidity out! Thanks for everyone's help on this!
Thanks for posting that. I have done that before, and forgot about it. That is easy to do with the Octagon
 
I know this is an old thread. But, could you explain how you use shelf liner during lockdown? Thanks
On day 18, before you lockdown for good, take all of the eggs and dividers out, then line the black tray with the shelf liner before putting the eggs back in. You don't have to do this, but it does give the new hatchers something to get a better grip on than the slick black tray
 

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