Hen Housing Design Project, Volunteers & Suggestions Welcome

[DanHibbert]

Hello Poultry Keeper Forum,

Firstly, I previously posted this request on other forums just over a week ago now. I am now trying to reach more people by spreading across several forums. There may be a number of you who have read this already on another site so I will apologise now for the repeated post

Let me introduce myself, my name is Dan and I am a Product Design Engineering student at Loughborough University. Having farmers in the family I am no stranger to keeping chickens, from collecting the eggs on visits to the farm at a young age to getting involved with my parents more recent chicken keeping (which is now in danger of becoming a small holding - sound familiar?) I would say I have got the basics covered.

So what brings me to this forum?

For my design project this year I have decided to look into the design of chicken houses. Now with my own experience of chicken arcs, DIY shed conversions and building small houses from scratch I know that everyone has their own range of experience with different types of housing and that the majority of you would have had ago at making your own at some point.

For this project I have decided to focus on designing a product to accommodate 2-4 chickens which would be aimed primarily towards first time chicken keepers. The idea behind this is that a single household could keep 2-4 birds using my product to produce enough eggs for the household and enjoy the benefits and experience of having fresh eggs straight from their own garden. I feel that the enthusiast / smallholder market is more likely make their own or buy /convert larger product to meet their specific needs but may be interested in a smaller product for those occasions where a broody hen needs to be separated, inheritance of a handful of birds from neighbours, trailing quail keeping and the various other antics that happen on occasion.

As you will probably know, for hen keepers looking to buy hen housing, there is a lot of choice; from kit builds, arcs, miniature hen houses and converted sheds to really high end, purpose build products. In my mind I want to particularly target the potential chicken keeper who likes the idea of keeping their own birds for eggs but, without the correct guidance, background knowledge and experience, would be overwhelmed by the options available on the market.

In addition to my own experience I am eager to see how everyone else has provided shelter for their own birds. At this stage I am gathering initial research to identify the strengths and weaknesses of existing poultry housing. I am looking for anyone who is willing to discuss their current arrangement of hen keeping. Your poultry keeping can be on any scale, I am not just interested in the small scale back garden keepers. All interest and assistance is welcome at this stage.

I am interested in hearing your opinions on my project and I am keen to travel to meet you and your hens in person as part of my research. I am based in Loughborough and I am willing to travel to meet people in the Midlands area. I am willing to travel up to around an hour each way to meet any volunteers; if you’re a bit further out but are keen to help I might make an exception.
Please don’t be put off by the thought of being asked millions of questions and having to fill in lots of paperwork, I am not going to be giving out huge questionnaires.

If you are happy to volunteer it would be great if you could;

• Show me around your current hen accommodation arrangement
• Run me through your day to day routine regarding your chicken keeping.
• If you are happy for me to do so it would be very beneficial for me to take notes during our discussion and possibly some photographs.
• Have a short chat around some poultry related issues.

If you are interested in showing me round your poultry setup please send me a personal message on the forum and I will get in contact with you to establish dates.

Don’t despair if you are unable to help out with the visits but want to get involved with the project, I will be updating you all with my progress and there will be the opportunity for you to contribute in the later stages of my project research.

Thank you for reading,

Dan


Further to my initial post:

This early step in the project is to get an idea of "customer needs". Before I start producing my first concepts I am trying to get a feel of what current users of existing chicken housing products (brought or homemade) require in terms of function and the details on their daily interaction with their chickens and chicken houses.

This project makes up a part of my penultimate year of study as a product design engineer. Whilst the design of the end product is important it has been stressed upon me by my supervisor that it is important to work through and get experience of the entire design process. The scope of the project extends further that just producing the prototype. Amongst other things, this process will include life cycle assessments for proposed designs(an evaluation of the products cost, not only financially but in terms of energy used from the manufacture to the products end of life), an evaluation on design for assembly & disassembly, detailed design drawings and most importantly at this stage is research.

For this initial research stage I am trying to get unbiased input from people who already keep chickens and discuss what works for them and what needs to be improved on. The best way for me to do this is to get an idea of what housing users supply for their chickens, either by meeting volunteers in person or reading summaries posted online.

Sorry for the long post…

 

[wendywoggles]

Hi Dan and welcome to the forum.
Sounds like a big project you have on, be prepared for a lot of conflicting ideas on what is best, because a lot of the time it boils down to personal choice, funds available, and space.

We've had chooks for about 3 months now and have learned an awful lot from forums like this one. If we'd known 3 months ago what we know now we would have done some things differently. But we didn't know so we live with our choices.

We are in Cumbria so a bit too far for you to travel, but I am more than happy to help you. I can supply you with photos of our 'evolved' set-up.

Here's a few of things I now wish my coop had had, or that has and I'm pleased with.

1) must be as red mite unfriendly as is possible; so not many joins, cracks etc.
2) extendable would have been a good option. but I didn't know that at the time
3) easy to put to gether and to take apart again.
4) on wheel/carry handles/both
5) pophole easy to open/close
6) either a large door or removable side for ease of cleaning
7) perches of the correct size, and in the right place. ie chooks don't like to perch with their beaks jammed up against the coop walls.
8) if 'off the ground' design then the ladder shouldn't be too steep and the space below the coop needs to be high enough.
9) no felt roofing
10) strong enough to keep out the fox


hope all this helps, it's a start anyway.
And Good luck Dan

 

[Marigold]

Hi Dan, what an interesting project. Here in Hampshire is probably a bit far for you but if you're ever going down the A34 south of Newbury let me know, you'd be welcome to drop in. Or I'm happy to send pics of my setup and give any other info you'd like - just p.m. me.
Excellent list from Wendy. I agree with all her priorities, except personally i wouldn't need wheels, though I can see it should be an option. Definitely off the ground, mine spend a lot of time under the coop even though they have waterproof shelter elsewhere in the run, and it means the coop doesn't use up any useful run space by sitting on the ground.
I'm a big fan of plastic houses, both for ease of maintenance and environmental grounds (eg my Green Frog is made from recycled plastic, even the offcuts are recycled in manufacture, will never wear out or need treating with chemical preservative. It's had no redmite problems, and would be much easier to treat if it did get infested.) I think this is the future for chicken coops. I can't think it will ever wear out or need replacing, and could be sold on if not needed any more. I started with an Eglu Classic, which just about held 3 LF, but this year moved up to the Green Frog, which is both cheaper and larger for the price (holds up to 6 but smaller versions are available) and has various other design improvements on the Omlet house, good though they are.
Do let us know how you get on, I'm sure there'll be a lot of interest about your project on here.

 

[wendywoggles]

Oh and ventilation, there are a lot of coops out there that have none at all.

 

[chrismahon]

Hi Dan. I have always built my own coops and am nearing completion of one now (MK4) so for the next few weeks it will still be sectional. I've read WW's list which is a good summary of the basics (we were given a coop with no ventilation -Chinese probably). Never had a problem with felt on the roof because the roof timbers inside are close boarded but mine ticks all the other boxes except extendable -just build another. Have converted a shed and built rearing units which double as 3 hen coops and broody runs, built shelters as well. As a retired design engineer my focus is also on material usage, ease of manufacture and longevity/ repairs. These factors are as big an influence on the design as function is. We are in Staffordshire about 40 minutes from you. My neice is at Loughborough studying co-incidentally. I'll send you a message and you can visit if you like.

 

[Chuck]

I've never found anything better than a shed conversion because you can stand up in it, be inside when it's wet, it can be so easily converted and a pop hole made where ever you want it. At the end of the day, if you get rid of the chickens, you still have a garden shed or a chicken house to sell on.
You can build a pen which can be moved around all of the sides if you cut enough pop holes.

 

[karminski]

i have just made myself a prime shed its 8 ft long by 4 ft wide and 4 ft high its just simply 8'4 ply screwed together as an oblong house it works wanders and has very very few hiding places for mites as the 2'2 in each corner holding the house together has been sealed and then vaselined so nothing can hide in any gaps no matter how small they are i did have mites this year and get maybe 4 - 10 per week now but they are hiding in the crevices of the plastic mail boxes i use as nest boxes but they are soon dealt with although i did need help holding up the large sheet of ply for the back the whole house was literally built by myself only its simple and very easy to clean .

 

[DanHibbert]

Wendy, thank you for the welcome and your useful design pointers.

Marigold, my parents actually live in Hampshire near Alton however I don't think I will be down that way until December time. I have checked out the green frog website and these look very interesting, not only as a competitor to the eglu market, but their alternative arc style design compared to your classic wooden coop.
I will be putting together a questionnaire shortly and will be sending PM's with email details for anyone that wants to share photos and a brief description of their own set-ups. There is a massive variety of hen housing and I am always interested in seeing new designs.

A big thank you to Chris who has been in touch by PM and will be contributing to my project research.

Chuck and Karminski, thank you guys for discussing the benefits of the shed style coop. During my site visit last weekend, all three of their structures were the shed coop type for the reason that they preferred being able to walk in and having space to clean under cover in all weathers.

Does anyone have a shed type coop which can be moved rather than sit in a fixed location? I guess the size of the shed makes this difficult.

 

[chrismahon]

Our first coop was almost a 6' x 4' shed moveable -until it rained. The increase in weight was unbelievable, as you will find out Dan. The old chicken sheds looked a bit like old wooden railway goods carriages (and probably made from them) -on cast iron wheels so they could be moved. But to do that you needed a tractor.

Selling good quality 8' x 6' sheds in my local timber merchants for £400 +VAT which when divided and modified equates to a small shed and a 12 bird coop. Best put the nest boxes into the shed bit though, otherwise messy feet collecting eggs. Big mistake of mine with the last one.

 

[tygrysek75]

Hi I had biuld one during summer for my chickens it is actually on the forum here http://poultrykeeperforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=4240 so you can have a look if you like.I had used mostly leftovers materials after putting up log cabin .If you need more pictures I'm happy to provide them.
Good luck with your project 17

 

[DanHibbert]

The old chicken sheds looked a bit like old wooden railway goods carriages (and probably made from them) -on cast iron wheels so they could be moved. But to do that you needed a tractor.

My Grandma has one of these old sheds for her chickens on the farm. We had a guess that its at least 60+ years old so I'm not sure I would try moving it now but the wheels are still all there.
When the harvesting equipment was not as efficient at collecting the grain on of the farmers would tow the shed to the field that had recently been cut and this spilt grain would sustain the chickens for a few weeks.

tygrysek75, Thanks for linking me to your post. Your coop looks great, If i need more photos or info I will drop you a PM when I start focusing on specific areas.