Farm Innovators 2250 Modifications

[Palogal]

I am about to start "Round 3" in my farm Innovators 2250 Circulated Air incubator. My first 2 hatches were less than 50%, largely due (I believe) to the wide variance of temperature zones within the incubator (97.3 in "front corners" to 102+ near the turner motor).

I enlisted the technical assistance of my techie husband to study the issue. We have mounted a computer power supply fan and a rheostat (to control the fan speed) on the upper portion of the incubator. The orientation of the fan is a little different than we saw in various articles and youtube videos, but we were looking for the best way to dissipate (and utilize) the heat from the turner motor. It does cause the loss of one incubator spot.

I'm really excited to report that all thermometers/hygrometers are within .5 degrees, 3% humidity after 24 hours. We are going to set eggs this weekend. Happy to answer any questions about this project--happy hatching!!!

 

[Palogal]

Happy to report an 83% hatch rate from the modified incubator.

 

[UThobbyfarmer]

That's great! How many eggs was that with? Post some pictures of your new chicks.

Love the modifications. I have this incubator too and consider it just ok. Over the years I've learned it's quirks and adjusted my hatching accordingly. I've hatched probably close to 200 chicks in it over the almost 3 years I've had it.

I love the Farm Innovators still air version. Highly dependable and under $50 shipped. Can't beat that.

 

[ka-doodled]

For a quality plug and play quick little fan hack, google on up "AC Infinity Multifan" for various sized fan options with a 3 speed rheostat built into the 6 ft. USB cord. I believe most hobby styro style incubators use fans with cfm's under 20 cfm, down to 10-ish cfm's which is too low and slow.
A rheostated fan is a good hack to subtly increase air circulation with an eye on less is more, creating the happy medium, just enough to stabilize the micro-climate your creating.
I think the farm Innovators 2250 onboard fan is probably a 60x60x25 and is easily replaceable, I do suspect, if you go nerdy on the subject. Wire the old connector to that new 2 wire 12v fan that was just replaced and it will plug right in again and function, better hopefully.
An old post, but maybe this info will help others.
Happy hatching y'all
K

p.s.
I pulled the fan out of the 2250 and the name and numbers on it are poweryear.net , py-6020L12S , a 60x60x20 in size rated at 24 cfm.
These are pretty low quality chinese fans that have leaking grease coming out of my noisy fan.
Dual-ball bearing fans are recommended for applications that require horizontal mounting and these would apparently be of an unsuitable lesser quality, shame on the design engineers, they need to upgrade the vital mechanisms to an obvious better quality, the incubator manufacturers should be embarrassed.
No repair parts available and will gladly sell another machine as your solution when a vital component does eventually malfunction.

The ball bearing fans are of longer life and better performance than the cooling fans of sleeve bearing and hydraulic bearing, however, sleeve bearing fans are of lower noise than ball bearing fans in the early stage of operation. The sleeve bearing types are of much lower cost than ball bearing types.