Author Topic: Homemade Incubator (Read 6113 times)

The Relic · « **on:** April 06, 2009, 03:25:31 pm »

has anyone had a go at making one of these. small scale for about 15/20 eggs.

carl · « **Reply #1 on:** April 06, 2009, 03:42:50 pm »

In theory it should be simple enough. box with heat source and insulation abillity to maintain a constant temp of 37.6c at eggs core. in practise i have tried and failed, partly due to a power cut and partly due to a cold snap and a warm spell, throwing the temp off. probabley better getting a secand hand incubator that works, fan assisted, thermostat, auto turner is best bet. thats what I did and now i hatch more chicks than i really need, as i can't get it into my head that this inncy works well.

The Relic · « **Reply #2 on:** April 06, 2009, 03:47:47 pm »

yea seem to be cheap enough second hand. save all the sleepless nights hoping it wont go on fire and time wasted seeing if the contraption hatches eggs.

rustyme · « **Reply #3 on:** April 06, 2009, 04:02:20 pm »

yep... I made an incubator out of a yogurt maker, the type that has six pot shaped depressions. and a clear lid. It worked fine for small numbers of eggs. I then made a bigger one , about 24" x 24" x 24" . It had 3 shelves , each about 22" sq and would take hundreds of eggs down to just one or two. The heat was supplies by a row of light bulbs in sockets fitted to a wooden batten on the bottom of the incubator. The bulbs all sat in a tube made from old tin cans with holes for the bulbs , this acted as a heat difuser and above it I fitted a water tray , remember the old paraffin greenhouse heaters ?, well like one of those . I adjusted the heat by putting in a dimmer switch and then just adjusted to suit. I hatched a good few thousand pheasant eggs as well as duck, chicken , guinea fowl, goose eggs all into the many many hundreds. I got a very high hatch rate , the only problem was turning the eggs by hand , but I didn't mind the work . I once hatched about 300-400 guinea fowl eggs ....I opened the door and I ended up with all of them running everywhere...it took hours to catch the little buggers , they are just like little bumble bees !!! If I remember correctly , it cost about £10 to make (it was 30 odd years ago !!) but I made a lot more back from it just from the pheasants alone. It is easy to make them really and you can make them to what ever size you want .

cheers

Russ

carl · « **Reply #4 on:** April 06, 2009, 04:05:51 pm »

russ, this is why we like your posts. have you thought of publishing a downsizers guide to all things mechanical and ethical/

doganjo · « **Reply #5 on:** April 07, 2009, 12:45:51 am »

I just don't think there can be anything that he hasn't tackled or made

rustyme · « **Reply #6 on:** April 07, 2009, 01:41:24 am »

re: tackled , anything that catches my interest .
made ,anything that can be made by hand (but sadly not money !!) although to prove I could do it , I did make a very good copy of an antique rectory table some 30 odd years ago . I made it from an old bit of a broken table. I gave it to my mate who's broken table I made it from . He took it to an antique shop to see if it would pass muster and sold it to them , as an original.....hehehe .
He broke the law not me ....but I did get £60 quid out of it though ....

Brown furniture isn't worth anything now though ....lol

cheers

Russ