Hey all! I wanted to show off the coop we built using an IKEA bunk bed. No one in our house is very carpentry savvy, so we wanted something with a preexisting frame we could be fairly confident wouldn't shake apart in a light breeze. Because of quarantine, the coop is still currently missing its nest boxes, but I will update the post once we install it.
We didn't have a real plan besides a vague idea and the pictures from this post on IKEAhackers as a guide, but below are a few progress pictures and the (almost) finished product.
We used the Mydal bunk bed as the frame, two large pieces of pressure treated 3/4" plywood cut to size for the various doors and the floor, some leftover bed slats from an old IKEA queen platform bed, plastic UV resistant roof panels, and will be installing a Trofast toy storage unit with some shallow bins once our local IKEA calms down as the nest box. The whole coop was painted with outdoor paint, since the Mydal frame is untreated pine.
When building the frame of the bunk bed, IKEA's instructions have you starting out on the short sides. Instead of spacing out the head rests and foot rests where they were supposed to go, we drilled new holes in the frame and installed them all on the bottom of the left side and the top of the right side. The gap on the left side is where we plan to install the nest box, and the gap on the bottom right is the poop door.
We then built the full frame, but only installed one side of the "top bunk" so we could have a slanted roof. We installed half the bed slats on the "bottom bunk" to have something to rest the plywood floor on. The plywood on the floor was cut to size and then wrapped in a pond liner for easier cleaning. The pond liner wraps around the edge where the poop door is. We then nailed four of the twin bed slats vertically into the far side to brace the upcycled queen bed slats that turned into the back wall. Since they didn't reach all the way across, we covered the gap with hardware wire.
We cut down one of the long top railings for the bunk bed and screwed them into the inside to brace the angled roof.
In this picture you can see where we used the leftover twin bed slats (cut in half) to make the front wall. The gap will be the door. You can also see where the slats don't quite reach all the way across the braces in the middle, so the door will also have something to brace against when it is closed. We have installed chicken wire ventilation up top and in the gap in the back. Upon reading further on this forum, I realized this was a mistake and I will need to replace it with a hardware cloth once my ladies are ready to live outside. I also plan to reinforce the gaps where the bed slats didn't quite fit or where we didn't measure the sides because we don't know how to do anything right with hardware cloth.
On the poop door side, we screwed in a perch made out of a tree that had died in our yard.
We cut the plywood to size for the doors and installed them on hinges. The locks are vertical on the egg collection door because that was the only way we could make them secure--otherwise the doors just swung out and didn't catch on the lock. We will probably install some kind of hanging catch for the poop door to hold it open while we clean.
Here the roof is also on. It was screwed into the top edges of the bed. We used 4 SunTuf polycarbonate roof panels (26"x6') in the cheapest color and 6 closure strips got us all the way across the top and bottom.
Finally, we screwed in the leftover "bunk bed ladder" pieces on the front door to make a chicken ladder.
Let me know what you think, or if you have any questions! I know it's not as fancy as some of the coop builds but we had a great time making it and hopefully soon it will be the home for 3 (and later up to 6) chicks.
We didn't have a real plan besides a vague idea and the pictures from this post on IKEAhackers as a guide, but below are a few progress pictures and the (almost) finished product.
We used the Mydal bunk bed as the frame, two large pieces of pressure treated 3/4" plywood cut to size for the various doors and the floor, some leftover bed slats from an old IKEA queen platform bed, plastic UV resistant roof panels, and will be installing a Trofast toy storage unit with some shallow bins once our local IKEA calms down as the nest box. The whole coop was painted with outdoor paint, since the Mydal frame is untreated pine.
When building the frame of the bunk bed, IKEA's instructions have you starting out on the short sides. Instead of spacing out the head rests and foot rests where they were supposed to go, we drilled new holes in the frame and installed them all on the bottom of the left side and the top of the right side. The gap on the left side is where we plan to install the nest box, and the gap on the bottom right is the poop door.
We then built the full frame, but only installed one side of the "top bunk" so we could have a slanted roof. We installed half the bed slats on the "bottom bunk" to have something to rest the plywood floor on. The plywood on the floor was cut to size and then wrapped in a pond liner for easier cleaning. The pond liner wraps around the edge where the poop door is. We then nailed four of the twin bed slats vertically into the far side to brace the upcycled queen bed slats that turned into the back wall. Since they didn't reach all the way across, we covered the gap with hardware wire.
We cut down one of the long top railings for the bunk bed and screwed them into the inside to brace the angled roof.
In this picture you can see where we used the leftover twin bed slats (cut in half) to make the front wall. The gap will be the door. You can also see where the slats don't quite reach all the way across the braces in the middle, so the door will also have something to brace against when it is closed. We have installed chicken wire ventilation up top and in the gap in the back. Upon reading further on this forum, I realized this was a mistake and I will need to replace it with a hardware cloth once my ladies are ready to live outside. I also plan to reinforce the gaps where the bed slats didn't quite fit or where we didn't measure the sides because we don't know how to do anything right with hardware cloth.
On the poop door side, we screwed in a perch made out of a tree that had died in our yard.
We cut the plywood to size for the doors and installed them on hinges. The locks are vertical on the egg collection door because that was the only way we could make them secure--otherwise the doors just swung out and didn't catch on the lock. We will probably install some kind of hanging catch for the poop door to hold it open while we clean.
Here the roof is also on. It was screwed into the top edges of the bed. We used 4 SunTuf polycarbonate roof panels (26"x6') in the cheapest color and 6 closure strips got us all the way across the top and bottom.
Finally, we screwed in the leftover "bunk bed ladder" pieces on the front door to make a chicken ladder.
Let me know what you think, or if you have any questions! I know it's not as fancy as some of the coop builds but we had a great time making it and hopefully soon it will be the home for 3 (and later up to 6) chicks.
