My home made chicken plucker video and new video ,take a look pg 4 - Page 2

Oh great, just what I need, another silly project lol. But you guys made me realize that although I don't have a drill that plugs into a wall, I do have an old electric motor from an ancient compressor. I like it cause the thing is low RPM. Which of course can be speeded up or slowed down with different sized pulleys. (I typed pullets. LOL)

I'm working on a tub-style plucker too. I have a design mocked up in Solidworks, but I need to finalize a few key dimensions yet before ordering parts. I'm going to use a farm motor with a speed reducer and get the feather plate plasma cut nearby. I will weld it directly to a hub and mount it directly to the speed reducer.

 

I'm shooting for 175 rpm (like Featherman uses) with the outer tub made from a 55 gallon drum. You can get fingers online for $100 for 200 of them. A motor will run about $120 (for a Chinese 56C flanged motor) and $110 for a 10:1 speed reducer. The rest of the parts are standard lumberyard stuff like electical switches and framing material. 

 

I hope to have a unit on a quality par with a Featherman for about the cost of a whizbang.

looks pretty cool

 

only thing i would add to it is a back splash gaurd as feathers seem to be flying backwards and away from the bin

 

 

 

personally i prefer skinned chicken so a plukker is no good for me but still a great little tool you made there

 

 

edit:

 

i forgot to mention, first rule of DIY rotary tools is always have the rotor turning at the safest direction that means towards you

 

that way if you get caught as you almost did you wont loose a finger or harnd as the rotor will trow your arm back to you rather than suck it in

 

as i saw almost happen to you in video

 

 

with that said the splash gaurd willl then need to be changed from beind to infront as feathers will also come towards you

 

 

Edited by Habibs Hens - 4/13/12 at 4:05pm

Those chickens in the sink look YUMMY!!!!! Do you have a thread telling how you made your plucker??
 

I'm not 100% positive but I think that the fingers are rotating toward her, not away from. 

 

if you watch the first few seconds just as the drill starts it goes down which means its rotating away from her

 

its hard to tell though and in theory the drill in forward mode should rotate towrds her unless the drill is set in reverse

Looks real good.  MUCH better than plucking by hand if you have a lot of birds to do.  

 

I just finished building a whizbang.  bought a kit off ebay for (I think) $375.  Worth every penny.  We slaughtered 14 roos last weekend.  The plucking took about 30s to 1min per bird and they came out looking like they were from the grocery store.  Used to take an hour per bird to make sure they were clean enough.

 

Decision process for building the plucker:  

 

Me to my 13yo son:  "Son, I just bought another mess of chicks and we will be slaughtering them in the spring"

 

Son: "I'll be busy that day dad"

 

Once was enough for the rest of the family.  This time the whole process was painless.

 

Montyhp

talkimng of using a motor intead of a drill

 

a good idea would be to use a orbital router they are small and compact and fast

 

and best thing is if you unscrew the plastic housing you can then build it into the plucker frame work

 

and move the on off button as its just a normal switch on a bit of 110v cable [240v in uk]