Homemade Chicken Plucker II

   After last year’s failure at making a chicken plucker, I decided to try again this year. I went with the tub design, sometimes called a whiz-bang plucker. I’ve been working on it for awhile; slowly gather parts and looking up ideas on the internet

   First thing I started with is a squirrel cage that came from an old furnace blower. Someone gave it to me a long time ago and I’ve used it in different projects along the way. I used it to hold the plate up and give me something to mount the motor to. On one side of the squirrel cage I attached a 16” pulley that I had to order. On the other side, I took the original pulley off and used it as a template. I routed out a circle in a piece of plywood that was the same diameter as the pulley. Then I attached the pulley to the piece of wood with some screws. Using the pulleys edge, I used the router to cut the piece of plywood in a perfect circle. This will make sure the plywood is balance and won’t vibrate when spinning. I reattached the pulley and plywood back on the squirrel cage.

   Next I mounted a motor that I had kicking around the shop on to the squirrel cage . It happened to have the right pulley on it already. You want the plate to spin around 190 RPM, and most motors spin at 1750 RPM. I had to buy the belt that goes in between the two pulleys. Once the belt was attached, I used a piece of wood cut in the shape of a wedge and slid between motor and squirrel cage to adjust the tension of the belt. I then bought a plastic 55 gallon drum, that happen to hold Mnt. Dew before I got it. I cut the bottom off and cut then cut the top third off. To install the rubber fingers, which I ordered off EBay, I drilled 13/16” holes in the bottom of the drum and on the side of the drum. I then pulled the fingers through the holes and they stay there because they have a grove in the end that the edge of the barrel slides into. 
The fingers are ribbed to pull the feathers off as the chicken spins around barrel. Once all the fingers were installed I screwed the bottom to the plate which also helps hold the fingers in as well. I then used laminated plywood I had in the shop to build a box around the motor and squirrel cage, and then wired the motor up to a switch and then a plug. I turned the motor on and used a power planer on the plastic edge of the barrel to make sure it was perfectly round and centered. Next I attached the barrel on and used 2 x 4’s and plywood to support it. Put some old wheels on I had from an old barbecue and some legs and handles, and I was done.

   I had 47 chickens to process this weekend and hadn’t tried it out yet. We are going on vacation soon and had to process them before we left. I was very nervous after last year’s failure and didn’t have a plan B if this didn’t work. After dipping two dead chickens in some hot water to loosen the feathers, I put them in the plucker. Turn the switch on, and after thirty seconds of spinning around the birds came out with no feathers except for a few pin feathers on their tails, which is normal. I was very excited that it actually worked the way I planned it. I was able to process 24 birds in about four hours on Saturday, and finished the rest on Sunday in the same amount of time. I might make a few adjustments later on, but it worked out great and can’t wait to see if it will handle the turkeys this fall.