making homemade incubator?

[bigmac1]

well i want to know how to make a homemade incubator, i plan on using a mini fridge but what can i use for heat inside? i have seen many people use flex watt heat tape will that work and of course i will be using a thermostat and for humidity what will work to keep humidity up? thanks in advance.

 

[ewstokes]

I use a night light bulb but heat tape works great too. You should put a small tupperware of water in there for the humidity. Also you should drill a 1 inch hole for air flow.

 

[bigmac1]

would the inch hole be enough air flow, i was thinking of also adding a computer fan in there to ventilate all the heat properly would that also be okay. what would happend if there was no air flow in the incubator?

 

[ewstokes]

they wouldnt be as successful. they need air flow just like any other animal. one inch hole should be plenty

 

[bigmac1]

wouldn't just the air of me openi g to check on the eggs once in awhile be enough air because wouldn't a hole make the tempe and humidity drop

 

[ewstokes]

Not at all. I have a one inch hole on the top of mine. I also made it out of a mini fridge. My humidity is high enough and my temps are at 84 degrees. As long as you have a thermostat you can make the temp where it needs to be. I will post pictures of it around 11 pm Central Time Tonight.

 

[bigmac1]

ok i want to see the picture and how you have it set up because i want to do this pretty soon but thanks for all your help, and the heat bulb you use is that better than going with the flew watt heat tape.

 

[midnight_962002]

Hey bigmac

There are a couple of us on here that built something similar. A couple years ago I built one out of a wine bottle fridge that I got off of CL. It is big enought to hold as many eggs as I plan on producing in the near future and holds the temp perfectly.

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Here is the link to the post I made.

I wouldn't want to use a light bulb in my incubator for a couple of reasons. The first being that it could probably damage the eggs. The second being that bulbs tend to burn out and with the added humidity I would think it would burn out more. The flex watt heat tape is good stuff and will last an extremly long time. But, it takes a longer time to warm up and when it gets the incubator up to temp it takes longer than the coil I use to cool off.

Anyways good luck

Ernie

 

[bigmac1]

So you would recommend me not to use the flex watt? And for ventilation what should I do the other poster told me to make a 1 inch hole what should I do there? Thank

 

[midnight_962002]

You don't really need a vent. It will allow the heat and the humidity to run right out. If you get a good temp controller you won't have to worry about it. The flew watt is good. But, it is my belief that the heat coil is much more effiecient, faster, and better than the flew watt.

 

[ewstokes]

Here is my incubator. It works 100% perfectly.

 

[bigmac1]

Thanks for the picture what kind of thermostat are you using? And what is the humidity in there? It looks good though but I'm probably going to use flexwatt heat tape with a comptuer fan to circulate the air but don't know what thermostat to use

 

[ewstokes]

Any thermostat works. It just takes a while to get the exact temps. I use two digital thermometer/humidity monitors.

 

[midnight_962002]

It looks simple enough. What are the bricks at the bottom for and how often do you need to fill the water?

 

[bigmac1]

thats what i was wondering what the bricks were for? so any thermostat works like a zoomed or the other brands that make a thermostat or does it have to be those digital ones?