An element of our wildlife management plan includes supplemental food sources. Along with static seed feeders, Selena and I have also had on old converted deer corn feeder set up of a couple of years. With it’s age, as well as the height, we decided to replace it with a new feeder, as well as adding another, further in the “Back 360.”
I researched a number of feeders and chose the American Hunter feeder, which I found at a nearby Atwoods, at $74.99, reduced from the usual $79.99. This feeder is available from other sources
The feeders were easy to assemble, and easily hold a 50 pound of bird seed. As these are deer corn feeders, I had to modify the outlet, so that bird seed doesn’t spill out as wind moves it off of the spinner plate.
This was easily done with the neck of a soda bottle, and I’m going to show you the entire assembly process, as well as the modification I made.
Upon opening the box, I found the parts neatly stashed inside. Nice packing job.
Removing the lid reveals the timer/motor unit (Labeled Box) and the leg brackets (Brown Box).
I removed these from the bin sections, and set them and the large box aside. Opening the timer/motor box and the leg bracket boxes, using the bed of the 4 Wheeler as my work bench.
Parts are bagged for protection. The three leg brackets will be set aside, to be installed later.
The timer / battery box cover is easily removed by spinning the knob located on the bottom of the cover.
Notice the five brass circles? Those are the batter contacts. Why five? Well, the center is for the positive terminal on the battery, and the other four allow the battery to be inserted in four orientations. They all work the same, it just makes for quick installation of the battery.
This is THE simplest way to mount a battery that I have ever seen, but one HAS TO USE the spring terminal batteries. Positive terminal to the center, then and the negative terminal registers, no matter which side is facing up, down, sideways, etc.
The battery just slides in and registers against the terminals, and in the bottom of the battery holder. SO SIMPLE.
Now, the next task is not so simple; hooking up the solar panel charger.
Notice the jack in the photo above, the one for hooking up the solar panel charger? The cover plug is to the left, and this will work, if one has the right solar panel charger. They were not available at the store I bought the feeders at, so I bought a universal charger, that has alligator clips on the charge leads. That’s why this phase isn’t so simple.
I bought two of the universal solar panel chargers, as the dedicated panels were not in stock. For $19.99, they were worth the trouble of coming up with a way to wire them to the battery.
I cut the alligator clips off, then stripped back the insulation about 1/2″ to access bare wire.
To feed the charger wire into the timer / battery box, I removed one of the corner covers (Purpose Unknown, as nothing noted about them in the instructions.) These covers are held in place by screws, accessible from inside the timer / battery box cover. I enlarged one of the screw holes to feed the charger wire through.
Now that the charge cord is thread through the cover hole, it has to be prepped to attach to the battery. This was done by stripping insulation, about 1/2″ from the end of both wires. The exposed wire was then twisted.
Gently pull up on each spring terminal, and insert the bare wire under each spring. Red goes to positive and black to negative. This securely attaches the wires to the battery, allowing the solar panel to keep it the battery up.
After hooking up the charge cord, I placed the timer / battery box and spinner aside, so I could assemble the feeder housing.
I placed the housing assembly parts on the 4-wheeler bed, and separated the two housing sections, that were nestled together.
These will be assembled with nuts and bolts.
Locate the section with the nut recesses and place the other section aside.
Press the nuts into the recess. The fit is fairly tight, so I used a closed pocket knife handle to press each nut in. A couple by thumb, and I had to find an alternate method.
Now that all the nuts are in, place the top section of the bin in place. It has to be aligned a certain way, but it’s easy to figure that out.
Now, screw all the bolts in place. I used my trusty DeWalt impact driver to speed the task and set them just tight enough.
After all the bolts are snugged up, your storage bin should look like this. Now grab the top, register it in place and twist it securely shut, for now.
With the bin complete, set it aside. It’s now time to modify the spinner outlet, so seed doesn’t just pour out with any breeze or wind.
The feeder outlet was modified using the neck of a soda bottle. My choice? Diet Mt. Dew, but any standard 16 ounce bottle should work, as long as it’s plastic. 😀
The bottle has to be cut to fit, and this takes a bit of trial and error. Cut it about a 1/2″ above the label. That seemed to work for me.
Once that’s done, the threaded neck of the bottle has to be cut too. I cut at the plastic top ring, the one that snaps off of the cap when it’s removed. Although I show using a knife, the bottle is too thick to cut with it.
I grabbed a hack saw to make the actual cut. A coping saw would work too.
Check the fit of your modified bottle, it should look like the photo below.
Once the bottle is cut to fit, it’s time to install it. This is easily accomplished with a hot glue gun.
Run glue completely around the neck of the feeder outlet and place your bottle in place. Give the glue a little cooling time before installing the bottle neck. If not, the bottle neck can warp from the heat. I know from experience.
Time to set up the solar charging panel for installation. Earlier, I took care of modifying the wires so that the panel would connect to the battery. The mounting bracket needs to be installed now.
Locate the parts and lay them out. The t-shaped plate needs to be screwed to the panel.
With the feeder neck modified, and charger mount in place, it’s time to set the feeder up. We loaded everything in the back of the 4-wheeler and headed to the locations.
Once at the site, I located the leg brackets that plug into the bottom of the storage bin. There is no up or down, so just grab them and shove them into each pocket, as far as they will go.
Now it’s time to install the pole legs. There are nine total, but we only used 6, so we wouldn’t have to go any higher than needed with bags of seed. The pole legs plug together, with buttons locking them together. These then simply slide into the leg brackets.
Once the legs were installed, the feeder was stood up, and I moved on to installing the spinner/control/battery box.
After programming the unit (I went with the quick program of 6:30 am and pm) I buttoned the unit up and installed it on the bin. It installs by simply twisting it in place.
Last thing to do? Mount the solar charge panel to a leg, aligned with sun path, using the included U-Bolt.
Once everything is mounted, programed, and the bin filled, the feeder will broadcast seed twice a day, for turkey, birds, and ground critters.
We’re really pleased with these feeders. The quality is great for the price, and we expect them to do the job for a long time.
Keith, the K in The SnK
