Chicken bald back

[Joe66]

Hi all

If anyone was still interested in an easy to fit automatic door for the cube I have fitted one to my cube with good results

U tube link below

 

Uses a reliable VSB standard unit and a few odds and ends

If anyone needs more info on how to set it up give me a shout

Joe

[Joe66]

Just a few notes for the opener

 

New u tube video of the door opening here

 

The great thing about this opener is that it retains all the safety features of the VSB unit

If a chicken gets stuck in the door on closing the door will stop and the spring become slack

This will stop the unit until the obstruction moves away and it will then carry on closing the door

 

Also if you need to close the door outside normal hours you can just disconnect the spring of the eyelet and use the door as normal ( you do need to disconnect one of the batteries in the VSB unit though or fit an on/off switch )

 

Materials used

 

Lead weight on the counter weight is just over 1KG

The spring is from an MG midget and is the throttle return spring standard on all models and available from Moss brothers and a number of other outlets

The pulley wheels I got from maplins in a kit of wheels and cogs

Chopping block from pound store

The fishing line is Braided carp fishing line at 20lb breaking strain ( you can go larger )

The little eyelet on the door where the spring and led weight fishing line attaches is a curtain net rail end eye

Counter weight you can just use sea fishing lead weights or anything else

 

Notes

 

The weight should not touch the floor at door full closing

The weight must be able to open the door on its own and a bit extra so its important to get it right or the door wont close properly and just over 1kg seems to do the trick

Different cubes may have more or less friction in the door slide so adjust to suit

I used a bit of spray grease on the slide where the door runs backwards and forwards inside the coop

Mount the spring eye pad on the door as near to the top as possible without catching anything and keep the fishing line as high as possible to avoid chickens pulling on it as they go in and out ( mine works fine but I could put it a bit higher and they never seem to catch on it )

 

Make sure you do very good knots on the lines where they attach to the spring and the eyelet on the door as if you don't it will pull off!!

 

The spring is very important that it has the right amount of tension in its coils to allow the door to open but not foul the wheels

The one I have chosen is designed to do this job millions of times and I would recommend using the one I have used from the MG midget throttle return spring

You can use a small bead on the line to trigger the stop button inside the VSB unit or as I have done made a big knot ( just make sure the knot cant get through the small hole it passes through to make the VSB stop as per the original VSB instructions )

If it does go through the hole the VSB has an automatic overload cut out that will step in to protect the unit but this will mess the door control up and it will have to be re set up