Unstable room temps with a Hovabator 1602N - idea's?

[scoopy82]

I have just bought a Hovabator 1602N - because it was a bargin, BUT I'm now thinking I should have saved that money and saved a little more and got a bator more suitable to my needs. The temperature inside my house can swing a fair deal, we have freezing frosty mornings and the afternoons can be full sunshine and lovely and warm and as I'm not home during the day - I dont worry about stabilising the temperature inside. Even if I pick the most stable room in the house I am still worried it wouldn't be stable enough. And I wont be able to be around much to tweak as needed. I have a separate electric thermostat that I bought for my home made bator, and I was wondering if anyone thought it would be possible to plug the hovabator into it and put its probe inside the bator to help it be more stable? Does that make any sense? Or could I build a cabnet/box and put the bator in that and then hook the other thermostat up to hold a stable temperature around it? Thoughts anyone?

 

[rickdigschicks]

Hi Scoopy82,

Were you planning on replacing your old bator with the hovabator or using the hovabator to expand? How stable was your old bator?
If it was more stable I would say go back to that one and keep the hovabator for a backup. When I first got into breeding reptiles I ran into the same
issue with the thermostat on the hovabator. You should not have a problem plugging your hovabator into the better thermostat. Just turn the hovabator stat up
higher than the external one. If you have the type with the fan you can always disconnect that from the bator and wire it separately. If your
temperature extremes are that drastic then I would try putting the whole thing into a larger box then wrap that box with blankets or foam insulation.
Make sure to add some holes for ventilation. Maybe try putting the whole thing into a closet or something like that. The temp would not fluctuate as much.

Good luck.

 

[scoopy82]

Thanks rickdigschicks

I ended up buying the hovabator as I needed a turner and my home made bator was too small to house any store bought turners, the hovabator came as a package complete with the turner. I just didn't think I would be able to regularly turn them by hand. The electric thermostat isn't as fine tuned as I would have expected but is probably good enough to do the job. And I did get the fan kit for free and had already planned to wire it separately just so i have control over everything independently. The hovabator is currently in my ensuite - I'm paranoid about it starting a fire so thought keeping it on tiles would help, otherwise I would put it in the wardrobe or pantry, dont know if I'm game enough to do that yet. Spose I should do a search about bators causing fires . . .
Anyway thanks for your advice, think I will try plugging the whole bator into the elec thermostat and if that doesn't work I'll have to build a box - at least if I'm clever enough i could design it so it could double as a brooder!

 

[Denninmi]

Yes, build yourself a larger insulated box to surround the Hova-bator. Here in the States, they sell large four x eight foot sheets of insulation foam in various thicknesses and R values. Those would be ideal -- lighweight, relatively strong and rigid. You basically could just about put it together with only some heavy duty tape and some removable method of holding down the cover, perhaps self-adhesive velcro.

I would make it quite a bit larger than the Hova-Bator, and also be sure to make a few air holes in a couple of places to allow oxygen exchange.