A microcontroller-based research instrument for performing thermoluminescence (TL) and fractional glow technique (FGT) measurements in the range from room temperatures up to 500 °C has been developed. The key features of this system are the wide range of linear heating and cooling rates (0.005–20 °C s−1), precise temperature regulation, simplicity of construction and low cost. Details of the heater design, hardware, firmware and software are discussed along with sample results of FGT applied for the MCP-N (LiF:Mg,Cu,P) TL detector.