I'm beginning to think that Fate doesn't want me to have chickens. All of my hens were killed by a critter in early Novermber. So, I have a Brinsea mini advance, but it only holds 7 eggs. I tried to hatch my hens' final eggs, and they all died part way through. Turns out the incubator had something major wrong (like the main circuit board or something like that). Got it repaired though. Won an auction here for 9 eggs, and was shipped 12 (there was post office drama there). I borrowed my neighbor's ancient Brower 945 incubator for the 5 extra eggs, and offered to toss in three of hers while I was at it. Two of my shipped eggs began weeping yesterday, so I tossed them. Last night, I went to turn the eggs in the Brower before bed and discovered the temp was only 70 in there. It's been fine two hours earlier! Realized the heating element went out on it. I stuck the eggs in my oven (which I turned on for 5 min, then turned off, just to get the temp in there up a little bit). Accidentally dropped one of my neighbor's eggs. It got a little crack, which I repaired with wax, but I'm not sure if it'll survive or not. Meanwhile, my dh managed to rig up a lightbulb to the incubator and so I have a MacGyver fix for that for now. Moved the eggs back in there, and it's been holding steady. I have to admit I'm not at all sure that the eggs in the Brower will survive. And because the whole thing has just seemed a bit star crossed, I'm not sure if the hatch will be at all successful. I may try candling tomorrow night, just to try and give me hope. In the meantime, I've found a wine fridge for $20. I think I'm going to see if DH can convert it to a cabinet incubator for me.
a large heating pad works well for a homemade source of heat for a 'bator as well... its mild, not capable of radical spikes in temp and its steady. I wrapped one around a plastic box with towels inside and managed to keep a fairly stable temp as long as it was not opened too long.
One of my incubators died on a cold night and I did not realize it till the next morning. The temp was down to 80* and half of them still hatched so don't give up
I just had to pull five eggs. 2 blood rings, 3 non developers. It happens, but I can understand your frustration. Hang in there. I'll never buy another Brinsea just for the reason you explained though.
Well so far, the repaired Brinsea has been fantastic. We have a fancy laboratory calibrated thermometer in there and it's declared the Brinsea dead on (once we calibrated the incubator). I've been pleased with the lightbulb solution on the Brower so far. It's been much steadier and less finicky than the dying heating element was. Now I'm just having trouble not candling the eggs. This is a common enough problem for me though.
