My DIY Chicken Coop

[Dduell2]

Signing on to your thread to watch your progress. I love seeing projects made with pallet wood. Looking forward to seeing more pictures as you continue your build.

I have broken down many, many pallets. I noticed in one picture that you use the circular saw method to cut off the pallet wood planks. I do that a lot, too. But it leaves those tail ends of wood with nails in them...

View attachment 4143488

Of course, there are many ways to clean that up, but my favorite method is to use a flat blade screwdriver or chisel and tap the wood to the left and right of the nail head along the direction of the wood grain. That splits the wood into pieces which you can easily remove leaving nothing but the nail heads. Then, I use a long crowbar with good leverage to remove the nails. Sometimes those spiral pallet nails are also glued into the wood. That makes it hard to remove them without a good crowbar. Well, I need to use a long crowbar to make the job manageable.



I am wondering what hardware you are going to use for your build. Since you probably got the pallets and salvaged lumber at free or discounted prices, you will probably spend most of your money on the hardware.

I am partial to using screws for most of my builds. To save money, I use a lot of inexpensive drywall screws. They work great for most of my projects, but it you get into longer screws, then I have to predrill the hole or the drywall head might ream out. Deck screws with Torx heads are better, but they also cost about 3X the price of drywall screws.

Sometimes, for structural long screws, I will just get some long lag screws and drive them home with an impact wrench...

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I see you already attached your 4X4 legs, but lag screws are perfect for that purpose. They just cost more money. Fortunately for me, I salvaged some pallets that had those lag screws in. Of course, I saved every one of them and used them in new projects. Saved a lot of money. Depending on the thickness and length of the lag screw, you can pay $1.00 or more each for them.

Anyways, love to read about the small details of a build to find out what works and what does not. Looking forward to more posts.

Those couple of pallets I had previously cut with a circular saw to get some panels for a project my wife wanted to try. That is why I decided to use them first to disassemble. And yes they were a pain in the but to take apart! Lol

Also, im pretty sure you are correct in the fact that most the money I will spend will be in hardware...

These are the screw I decided to get for the 4x4 posts. They were about $32 per box.

We got our baby chicks yesterday so I will be starting a thread of our journey with the birds as well.

Thanks again!

 

[Dduell2]

So we picked up some baby chicks on Saturday! Here's my story for that if you're interested at all!

Thread 'Dduell2's Chicken Journey' https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/dduell2s-chicken-journey.1667051/

Thanks for looking.

Til next time...

 

[Dduell2]

What a Sunday! Did a little grocery shopping for the week then came home and did some chicken coop building!!

Took these 4 pallets and removed and moved planks to make a solid wall. Then took the slats off the "inside" of said wall.

1 down!

2 down

Then I removed planks and cut down the frame to what should be the correct size to be wall number 3.

As long as my measurements are correct it fits and looks great. I measured where my first planks will start on that frame starting with the edge of the outside wall.

Next I will put planks on the frame to make it a solid wall and go from there!

Thanks again for looking!

Til next time...

 

[gtaus]

These are the screw I decided to get for the 4x4 posts. They were about $32 per box.

I know how expensive that hardware can be. I don't know what sources you have for free pallets, but I have been lucky enough to find some pallets assembled with Torx head screws and/or lag screws. I take those pallets just for the hardware I can salvage because I know how expensive those screws and bolts are.

The best thing about some of those pallets using screws instead of nails, is that I can disassemble them with my impact wrench in no time. Much better than having to arm strong everything with a crowbar trying to get out the nails and pry boards apart.

...then came home and did some chicken coop building!!

Looks like things are coming together fast. Nice job.

 

[Dduell2]

I know how expensive that hardware can be. I don't know what sources you have for free pallets, but I have been lucky enough to find some pallets assembled with Torx head screws and/or lag screws. I take those pallets just for the hardware I can salvage because I know how expensive those screws and bolts are.

The best thing about some of those pallets using screws instead of nails, is that I can disassemble them with my impact wrench in no time. Much better than having to arm strong everything with a crowbar trying to get out the nails and pry boards apart.



Looks like things are coming together fast. Nice job.

Yeah I am mostly getting cheap crappy skids for free but they are practically brand new. It's definitely not been fun having to strong arm all the boards and nails. Lol

Thanks!! Gotta build as fast as I can with what time I have. Starting overtime at work this week, so we'll see how much I get done during the week