incubator heating prefrence

[rcsmurf6942]

hi all my name is matt im from maverick enclosures and im looking for your help im looking into building and selling incubators for all you breeders out there now plz understand this is not a forsale or order thread what im doing here is abit of research into what breaders would prefer

now my problem is by the setup i was thinking about using i found on the net which is using heat lights in the base of the incubator with a shelf above with a thermostat probe coming through the top of the incubator wich is a tryed and tested way to setup by weighing and mixing up 50/50 vermic to water in a container with a lid on it with a few holes for humidity build up within the container and not the whole incubator


setup to is very sim but it is using a heat cord on the back wayy with a routed grove into the timber with hear transfer tap holding the heat cord in place


now i understand that with the heat cord you would be able to have more shelves in the incubator as aposed to setup 1 which could limit you to one or 2 shelves as the incubation area would be smaller


so if you could plz give me ideas in regards to this as im trying to solve my own little problem and not succeeding


thanks matt

 

[Bigchewy]

Type in search incubator above on the right hand top

 

[Umbral]

My eyes are bleeding.

 

[Ramsayi]

What is your actual question? As far as heat sources go it is much of a muchness as all you are doing is heating up a box after all.

 

[Snowman]

If your asking what kind of heat source to use, then I doubt you will have much luck selling incubators that you make.
I just use heat cord on a pulse proportional thermostat. I've found small fridges and old foam boxes from the fruit and veg shops work equally well. Cost to set up a foam box is $0 for the box, $20 for the heat cord and $100 for a thermostat. Job done.

 

[CheekySod]

hes trying to see whats best and what people find works dont be rude, i think heat lights would blow comming on and off all day with a thermostat and could be the end of your clutch over a cold night. heat mat/cord sound nice

 

[Mr.James]

Heat cords and heat panels. Stay away from bulbs & timber boxes. Old fridges & plastic insulation materials are the best long term products.

 

[mad_at_arms]

What is your actual question?

+1

My eyes are bleeding.

Thread started at 03:16am - drunken ramblings?

 

[RSPcrazy]

I've used purchased incubators, homemade foam boxes and homemade fridge incubators. But the one I've found works the best, is a double walled timber incubator I made.

The insulating part in the fridge, is the foam, not so much the plastic. So with my knowledge of timber being a great insulator of heat, I went ahead and made this incubator with 12mm plywood on the inside, 16mm foam, 16mm melamine on the outside, heated on every wall but the doors with two 80w heat cords and controlled with a proportional thermostat. This incubator fluctuates by only 0.2 degrees over a 2 month period. It's got 3 layers of insulation, instead of just the foam and some thin plastic.

I use heat cord instead of any other form of heating, because it heats up and cools down very quickly, doesn't blow and can be evenly distributed over the entire incubator, ensuring every tub is at the same temp.

I tested all my incubators outside, to see if they would work properly in the constantly up and down outside temperatures. The fridges worked fine in the colder periods, but when the outside temps went to high, so did the temps in the incubators.

The foam boxes didn't work all that great in the cold or heat of the outside weather.

But this double walled wood incubator worked perfectly in both the freezing cold and stayed at the proper temp in the hot weather as well.

Its only downside in my opinion, is it's extremely heavy. It's a big incubator, has no fan, but every inch of the inside stays at the same temp.

I'm never going back to fridge or foam incubators. I've had to many problems with them in the past.

By the way, I first got the idea to try wood, from a friend who uses a melamine incubator for his Green Tree Pythons, and he has a 100% hatch rate. Except his incubator is just one wall of melamine. I added the plywood because it holds heat much better then melamine.

 

[Justdragons]

Cheers RSPcrazy, Im Going to start on mine tonight i think..

 

[Snowman]

hes trying to see whats best and what people find works dont be rude, i think heat lights would blow comming on and off all day with a thermostat and could be the end of your clutch over a cold night. heat mat/cord sound nice

Would you pay for and risk your precious eggs in an incubator built by someone who has no experince in heating incubators? If so you are braver than me! If he was just asking for himself then it would be different as to asking with the idea of marketing home made incubators.

 

[rcsmurf6942]

It's not that I'm not experienced with heating them I've been building them and selling ten off and on for the last 2 years and all mine are made out of 25mm thick mdf which holds the heat well and I was just wondering what others out there prefer to use as I'm wanting to go more main stream with them if there is a market for them I have a lot of success with my little one which I built 5 years ago for my Gecko eggs and have never had a drama the main question was what do you as breaders prefer heat cords or lights as my one is using lights and as I've said never had a problem but I thought hay lets ask others out there and all I get is 2 or 3 people reading the thread properly and the rest being rude and trying to put me down I'm not deterred by ur comments I'm more than ever inspired to make it even better so to all u nah Sayers thanks but no thanks and to those who have helped thanks so much

 

[killimike]

It's not that I'm not experienced with heating them I've been building them and selling ten off and on for the last 2 years and all mine are made out of 25mm thick mdf which holds the heat well and I was just wondering what others out there prefer to use as I'm wanting to go more main stream with them if there is a market for them I have a lot of success with my little one which I built 5 years ago for my Gecko eggs and have never had a drama the main question was what do you as breaders prefer heat cords or lights as my one is using lights and as I've said never had a problem but I thought hay lets ask others out there and all I get is 2 or 3 people reading the thread properly and the rest being rude and trying to put me down I'm not deterred by ur comments I'm more than ever inspired to make it even better so to all u nah Sayers thanks but no thanks and to those who have helped thanks so much

Come on man, you can't deny the plain meaning of your own words. If people actually make the effort to parse your first post, it's clear you were not asking what you now say you were. Unfortunately, seems most of your posts are like your first one....

 

[Jeannine]

im pretty sure that the very first person to build an incubator did so by trial and error and more then likely lost a lot of eggs along the way

everyone HAS to start somewhere, even the experts on this site were beginners at one stage

 

[killimike]

im pretty sure that the very first person to build an incubator did so by trial and error and more then likely lost a lot of eggs along the way

everyone HAS to start somewhere, even the experts on this site were beginners at one stage

Just because I'm already responding in the thread, your reply unfortunately doesn't have anything at all to do with the complaint people have with the OP. Especially not after his revisionism of his last post.

 

[rcsmurf6942]

All it was was a question to all those out there to what they prefer heat lights or heat cords

 

[killimike]

All it was was a question to all those out there to what they prefer heat lights or heat cords

I think you would probably find that the preference is for heatcord, as they have a number of advantages (just IMHO), like ease of installation, taking up less space, less risk of malfunction, greater range of thermostat options etc. That said, plenty of people do seem to use bulbs, for eg see crocdoc's incubation thread on ARF, he had great success with a light-heated bar fridge incubator for years.