# Lucky Reptile Herp Nursery II (2) Temperature Review



## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

Hi all,

We have the Lucky Reptile Herp Nursery II Incubator and always hear really bad things about it so we decided to do a bit more in depth testing of it. We did this because we were interested how it actually did perform rather than going on hearsay and also because some of the eggs we have this year are more sensitive than others we have had in the past so it was more important than ever that we know what was going on in our incubators.

So, what did we find?
Well firstly the data!


























Series 1 Top shelf external
Series 2 Top shelf internal
Series 3 Middle shelf external
Series 4 Middle shelf internal
Series 5 Bottom shelf external
Series 6 Bottom shelf internal

So as you can see there are 3 graphs. The first showing all 6 temperature readings we took. 2 measurements for each shelf one in a box (typical of the ones we use for incubating) and one external to the box. The graphs show an hours worth of fluctuations (though we recorded much more) after allowing time to warm up, with readings taken every second. The incubator display was set to 34°C (93.2°F). In terms of the sensitivity of the probes used they are accurate to within ±0.25°C The second 2 graphs separate out the internal box temperatures on each shelf and the external temperature readings on each shelf.

The data taken external to the box shows that (as is commonly known) the display does not reflect the true temperature. We found when set to 34°C the maximum temperature reached was 32°C on the top shelf with the lowest shelf peaking at 29.75°C and the lowest shelf dropped to 27.8°C meaning it varies up to 6.2°C from the set temperature!!!

The Lucky Reptile Website gives their specs for comparison if anyone is interested.
http://www.luckyreptile.com/products/145/en/pid1,33379$pid2,7777535$pid3,7773952/products.html

Just a side note; you can see we cycle approximately every 40 minutes but ours is in a cabinet so has a fairly constant environment external to the physical incubator. This may be different if your incubator is in an open room/different environment.

Inside the boxes (graph 3) the temperature fluctuations are much smaller (as you would expect) and the differences between the shelves are still approx the same as the external temperature readings ~ 3°C at maximum temperatures and 2.5°C at minimum temperatures. When reaching the maximum temperature the curves of the internal probes are much smoother rather than the spike that you see with the external probes.

Anyway just thought people would be interested in some data about the Lucky Reptile Herp Nursery II.....Enjoy! :2thumb:


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## merv1988 (Dec 26, 2008)

Thats wierd i have never seen a thread with data logging of incubators on here and then 2 in one day lol. I dont know if you have seen this but heres the data for my home made incubator using 2 sensors positioned on different levels and different sides with a 5 min log interval over a period of nearly 2 days with it in my reptile room that fluctuates massivly through the day as most heat turns off at night
http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...20-pictures-my-fridge-incubator-complete.html


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## powerpuffruth (Apr 2, 2012)

So spatte would you recommend it x


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## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

Would be interesting to see the results of our data logger in your incubator as i'd be very suprised if it doesn't fluctuate at all? Any idea how accurate your data logger is?




merv1988 said:


> Thats wierd i have never seen a thread with data logging of incubators on here and then 2 in one day lol. I dont know if you have seen this but heres the data for my home made incubator using 2 sensors positioned on different levels and different sides with a 5 min log interval over a period of nearly 2 days with it in my reptile room that fluctuates massivly through the day as most heat turns off at night
> http://www.reptileforums.co.uk/foru...20-pictures-my-fridge-incubator-complete.html


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## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

For eggs that are less sensitive to temperature fluctuation it would be fine but if you have very sensitive eggs probably not. LR say it is good for incubating eggs at different temperatures in the same space but i would definitely recommend putting your own reliable thermometers in to set the temp before incubating as it was quite surprising how far off the display was from the actual temperature!



powerpuffruth said:


> So spatte would you recommend it x


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## powerpuffruth (Apr 2, 2012)

Corns and hoggies eggs x what do u reckon x


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## graham40 (Dec 19, 2011)

This a really interesting thread. 
So from looking at the graphs the top shelf is the most accurate in terms of fluctuation but the temps seem the lowest. Strange as heat rises. 
But to be honest with these low end incubators this is what to expect really. For incubating more presise things that need at absolute perfect temp all the time then your going to have to dig deep. 
One last thing to say
:2thumb: sticky :2thumb:


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## graham40 (Dec 19, 2011)

powerpuffruth said:


> Corns and hoggies eggs x what do u reckon x


If the op has never incubated these how will they know. The key now you have this brilliant info do some research into the importance of steady temps of what you want to breed then make a decision on what you find


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## merv1988 (Dec 26, 2008)

ThermaData logger TDF datalogger
thats the data logger i use accuracy is +-0.5 so although its not quite as sensitive it still pretty damn good


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## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

graham40 said:


> This a really interesting thread.
> So from looking at the graphs the top shelf is the most accurate in terms of fluctuation but the temps seem the lowest. Strange as heat rises.
> But to be honest with these low end incubators this is what to expect really. For incubating more presise things that need at absolute perfect temp all the time then your going to have to dig deep.
> One last thing to say
> :2thumb: sticky :2thumb:


Oops well spotted! I have labelled my key wrongly! It should be as follows so the lowest shelf has the smallest fluctuation and the top the most and it also has the highest temperature! I can't correct the original post unfortunately so i'll post the corrected key here:

Series 1 Bottom shelf external
Series 2 Bottom shelf internal
Series 3 Middle shelf external
Series 4 Middle shelf internal
Series 5 Top shelf external
Series 6 Top shelf internal


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## graham40 (Dec 19, 2011)

spatte88 said:


> Oops well spotted! I have labelled my key wrongly! It should be as follows so the lowest shelf has the smallest fluctuation and the top the most and it also has the highest temperature! I can't correct the original post unfortunately so i'll post the corrected key here:
> 
> Series 1 Bottom shelf external
> Series 2 Bottom shelf internal
> ...


Makes more sense lol
This is brilliant I have to say. So a quick question how were the temps after that hour that are shown. Did they follow the same path pretty much or did they differ


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## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

The temps just showed a repeating pattern achieving the same high's and lows.


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## bunglenick (Feb 24, 2013)

I would love to see more of these kinds of tests on incubators. I have seen the lucky reptile one on a lot of online stores along with the exo terra.
And of course lots of fantastic DIY projects like the one mentioned in an earlier post.

If anyone else is able to test their rig like this then I'm sure there would be a lot of interested readers.


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## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

bunglenick said:


> I would love to see more of these kinds of tests on incubators. I have seen the lucky reptile one on a lot of online stores along with the exo terra.
> And of course lots of fantastic DIY projects like the one mentioned in an earlier post.
> 
> If anyone else is able to test their rig like this then I'm sure there would be a lot of interested readers.


If anyone is interested in testing their own equipment in this way we could quite easily share how we home made our data logger with an Arduino and a few electronic components?


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## spatte88 (Jun 29, 2009)

Just a bit more data for you to peruse! This shows a deli cup, a similarly sized sandwich tub, and a insulated sandwich tub. We insulated the tub with styrofoam. Each tub was placed on the same shelf and using the same probes at the same set temperature. We just wanted to see how different containers would stabilise the temperatures for the eggs inside them.


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