Automatic chicken coop door flaw/idea

[keaton85]

So I'm going to build one of the automatic car antenna chicken coop doors this summer.

Although I found a flaw in a sliding door design. If the door slides up and down from the movment of the antenna then if the power ever fails the antenna would bring the door up and open!

Have any of you run into this?

My idea to fix this would be to make a sliding door that goes left to right. That way if the power fails the door would close shut. I would much rather have my chickens stuck outside instead of being trapped inside with the door wide open!

Also I have a UPS unit that could go online with it so if the power did fail then that would be used as a backup.

 

[keaton85]

Ok I must be challenged in some way haha. If the power went out the door would be stuck no matter what!

Anyway, I came up with a better idea. Run the whole system off of 12V batteries with a solar panel. That will solve the power ever failing and it will be a stand alone unit.

So I will probably use a sliding door with a car antenna, two small 12AH 12V batteries, a timer and a 10W or so solar panel. I will have to do some power calculations to make sure it will run for a few days if its cloudy!