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The Hatch: AUtomatic Chicken coop door by CowTech
Over $5500 raised on Kickstarter!
Introducing the first fully automated chicken door on the market with temperature and light controls, a direct drive locking door, lighted adjustment area with magnetic access door, automated No Hen Left Behind system, and optional Solar/Battery off-grid kit.
No more stressing about coming back late at night, or having to find someone to lock up your chickens when you leave for a few days. You no longer have to brave the elements to visit the coop at night when the weather is poor. The Hatch does it all for you.
How It Works
After 2 years of design we are presenting a door that is not only feature rich, but incredibly simple. While the door offers a manual up/down option, the open and close times can be totally automated, without having to set complex timers or a long instruction manual to read through.
The doors will come calibrated with our optimal light and temperature settings to ensure your door opens and closes at night and in the morning, and won't let the feathery flock outside if the weather is too cold. If you do want to adjust the settings, just turn the three control knobs, its a simple as that!
Unlike other doors on the market, the Hatch uses a direct drive system with a geared DC motor and a leadscrew that guarantees an open and close. Most other types hang the lightweight door from a string that winds up and down to open and close. The Hatch will power its way through ice, snow, debris, or any other blockage to ensure that the door closes and protects the chickens at night. Furthermore, the 3/16 solid Plexiglas door locks down with over 40 pounds of force, so even the craftiest of predators could never lift it up to access your precious birds.
The door will stay closed, even with 40 pounds of leveraged force!
Chickens run on an internal clock based on sunlight, not the clock on the wall. So why would you want your door on a timer? Not only do you have to constantly change the timer as the daylight changes, your chickens will want to observe their internal clock for bedtime, not the ticking time on the screen. With our light sensor, you don't have to adjust anything for changing daylight conditions, and your chicken's internal clocks will mesh perfectly with the sun and the sensor.
Lets be real, chickens aren't the brightest critters on the planet. They don't always know enough about weather to know if they should go outside and play or stay inside. So we implemented a user adjustable temperature cutoff to be sure that if it's too cold, your chickens stay inside and don't go out where they can freeze their feet and combs.
In every flock there are those stragglers that just can't seem to get with the program and don't go inside with the other birds. For these fine feathered friends we include the No Hen Left Behind system on every door. After the door closes, it will wait 20 minutes, then open up briefly for 5 minutes to allow any stragglers to enter the coop, before closing down like an impenetrable chicken fortress until morning.
If you want total control over the door, you can set it to manual mode and use a simple switch to run the door up and down. In case you want to adjust your temperature and light cutoffs or actuate the door as night falls, the control area is backlit with bright LEDs. All the controls are accessed through a sleek and convenient magnetic door that seals tight when closed.
All the doors are build to operate from a standard 110v wall socket, drawing less than 1/4 watt of power. However, if you want to run your door off-grid, we offer a solar panel and battery add on with a 3W panel and 4.5Ah 6V battery that will run your door for 4 days without a bit of sunlight to recharge the system.
The Hatch is build to last using 3/4 in. PVC plank for the edges that won't chip, fade, or peel, and 3/16 in. Acrylic for the front, back, and door. It's extremely durable exterior design is complemented by a quality DC motor with built in gearbox, a stainless steel leadscrew that will never rust or bind, and automatic PTC fuses that act as circuit breakers and will automatically reset if overloaded, so no blown fuses to mess with. The door is water proof in any weather and the circuit board is double fuse protected and sprayed with a silicone conformal coating for additional waterproofing.
Growing up on farms and ranches we know what it means to build something strong and to last. We incorporated these same principles into the Hatch, and will stand behind our promise of quality should there by any complaints about the functionality or build quality of the unit.
