The Third Door

On the coop.

Can a coop have 3 doors? Apparently.

(hr tag goes here, in the old days)

Okay, so, it's been almost a year?

yeah, well, , , For one thing, the last 3 or 4 posts I made here disappeared, and that was disheartening, as I am unable to re-compose something once I've finally finished it. One of those posts was all about installing the Woodstock Soapstone woodstove, with cool pictures of how I moved that gigantic monster off the truck and into the house on my own. I was quite proud of that. Buddy of mine used a crane to move his. :)

Anyway, A lot has happened, T moved in, we put up a greenhouse, I took a job, then moved to another job which I like better, and so on.

But today's topic is chickens, , again.

The Box Arrives!

So, I should have done this a year ago, but I finally up and ordered a "Pullet Shut" door for the coop from the good folks at www.chickendoors.com. Seriously, with a name like that, how could one go wrong? I looked a lot of designs, and ideas, concepts, and this seemed like one of the best thought out products out there. Sure, there are plenty of DIY approaches, most of them good, and some of them really over the top, using Arduino controllers, and all that. All that indecisiveness I was experiencing by not being able to decide what was exactly the best approach has had me going out to the coop at least 2x a day, with very rare exception, and causing me endless angst in the form of waking up late in the evening wondering if I really locked up the coop, imagining horror scenes of our little coop being transformed into a abattoir run by psychotic murderous raccoons in a blood frenzy. Anyway, a friend up the valley a little ways lost some of her birds to raccoons a little while ago because she didn't get home in time to lock them up for the evening, and that was that. I needed to deal with this, and share it for others, so that others can learn, and make their own call.

Open the box!

And it's just like Xmas! Lots of packing peanuts to get all over the "shop" (aka, living room).

What's in the box?

The door. Solid aluminum frame, solid aluminum door, what seems like a worm gear drive motor, brass hinges, and controller. I also opted for the 'electric eye' (remember those?) daylight sensor. I'm honestly skeptical about this function, but they assured me that it 'just works'. So, we'll see.

The open door

The instructions say to open the door, you need a 12v source, which is true. I used a battery charger. Gotta open the door to mount it.

So, the task begins:

existing door

So, the old door was actually spot on for width (11") which was nice. I had to frame in the top and bottom a bit for a good fit. This door has served well, proven to be pretty raccoon/opossum proof.

Skeptical Chook

So, with a bit of framing, the door is installed. The chooks, otoh, are not sure about this, no, not sure at all.

Now to hook it up.

Charge controller

So, this is the old charge controller from the original Solar Powered Chicken Coop. It has served me well. I've been pestering the folks at Midnite Solar to make a similar utility mppt charge controller for a while now, and it looks like they might do it.

It has a tap for load, as well as the PV input and battery. At some point, I'll add an actual load center, as I just inherited a bunch of marine grade DC load centers surplus from the Nomadness refit. At that point I'll add a small inverter, as well as some work lights. But, seriously, it is just a chicken coop. A small inverter would be handy for working out on this end of the property. Anyway, ,

Done, , sorta

Well, some more wire management is clearly in order. If you click on the pic for a larger image, you can see the sunlight sensor up on the ridge. Further, you can see the massive overkill PV panel mounted on the low storage roof.

Anyway, that's it for now, we'll see if it works tonight.

Parting Shot

In closing, This 3rd door was built to the tunes of Dan Reeder.
So if you want to click on the images for a better view, you may also listen for a fully immersive experience, you must imagine the delicate olfactory essence of chicken and the heat of the day.

 www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBaSTozYLdI



Update:

It's night time. Fireflies just came out, Chooks have been roosting for some time now. Long days, they head in early. later in the year, they are out 'till dark. Just as advertised, soon as the fireflies came out, and the bats sortied, the door closed. It stays closed for 1 minute, then opens for 10 seconds, then closes for the night. Just in case some recalcitrant hen doesn't want to go in just yet.