DIY Thermostat + Incubator
I was putting together my own incubator, I thought it would be fun to make the thermostat myself too. I hooked up humidity/temperature sensors to a Raspberry Pi and programmed it for some simple temperature and fan control. Now I know most of you will be dubious, and I personally was too. But I've thoroughly tested this incubator all summer. We hatched 3 batches of quail eggs with great success! These birds hatched in about 23 days at 100 degrees and 50% humidity. This is quite different from ball pythons but the temperature control was good. This success wasn't without some mishaps though... Early on in my testing, I accidentally soft boiled one batch of quail eggs. Due to a bad line of code, the temperature went up to about 140 degrees for 3 hours. Whoops. I've since fixed that and it won't happen again. What's extra cool about this thermostat is it posts temperature stats and live footage of the incubator online every 3 seconds so I can constantly check it and not have to worry lol
Here's the current setup. I'm running it for a month or two while I wait for my first ball python clutch :)
https://i.imgur.com/C1BuM6S.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/urm986F.jpg
Re: DIY Thermostat + Incubator
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Ax01
very cool! so u have an incubator cam as well? that lil Raspberry can sure do alot! i wish i were smrt enough to do something like that.
Edit: could u put up an actual DIY/How to if it's not super complicated?
Yeah, I had a dinky little Pi cam running for my quail eggs. It had its ups and downs. Shoots some decent 480p footage and I got to watch a baby quail hatch while I was at work but it's pretty draining on the Pi itself and has poor visibility unless the room is super bright.
The full DIY is a bit too complex for me to write up from the top of my head right now. But basically the Raspberry Pi is hooked up to the fans, camera, sensor, power relay and is connected to my online dashboard. The flexwatt is plugged into the relay. The sensor checks the temperature every 3 seconds and the Pi makes sure it is within the set threshold. If it's too hot, the Pi sends a signal to the relay and shuts it off. If it's too cold then it gets turned on. Through the dashboard, you can check temperature and humidity stats graphed within the last 12 hours. You can also see the live footage, change your set temperature or manually turn the relay on/off. It also sends warning notifications to my phone should something go horribly wrong like too high/low of temperature or sensor malfunction.
