Chicken water heater

My faithful old chicken water heater failed after ten years. I'm sure you've seen them galvinized pan with a silicone pad heater underneath. I considered the light bulb underneath a pan but really wanted the reliability of the old design and didn't really want broken bulbs in the run. When I went to the feed store and saw that they were over 40.00 now I said no way. The silicone pad is used for warming engines and batteries in cold weather and are available in a parts store or off of Amazon for about $20.00. They are thermostatic and available in different wattages they have sticky on them already. Any old pan with a flat bottom would work I've used a new one here 6.00 again at an auto parts store. the 1.25 inch hole allows the plug head to pass through the side a Chevy valve cover grommet protects the wire $1.00. You coul let the plug just pass under the pan lip if you wanted. Probably not necessary but the directions tell you to run a bead of high temp silicone around the edge. $27.00 I have a new heater but if I used an old pan I'd have a new heater for $20.00.

thanks for the tip

Good idea, I just bought a new one, works good, if it stops ill try it this.

Great ideas!

Here's been our problem though- we want off the grid and even 100watts could be a problem one day. So, using the Rocket Mass heating design, the chimney should one day run under the animal's watering tanks.

The time the heat is needed the most is during the day, so only a morning fire would be needed, and, what is so great about the rocket mass design is the chimney can run in a covered mass a long enough distance to melt all the animals troughs....even the ones outside.