home made Pygmy stanchion

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Elmer Hawkins
5 years ago
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1 home made Pygmy stanchion Here s the home made Pygmy stanchion Jer made for me a couple of years ago. It would look «prettier» if made out of all new materials, but it works just as well made out of what-all we had at hand. <grin> This one was made from new lumber, old lumber, left over stair rails <g>, roofing shingles (great on both the ramp and the stanchion base), bits and pieces and a very few nuts and bolts. One short piece of lightweight chain is required. It literally sets up and comes apart with no tools required whatsoever and can be stored flat or on end. In order, the pics are (in case we need to refer to them) #1 Full view with saw horse legs #2 View with side rail on right (shows ramp) #3 View with side rail on left (Finnegan in head stall - age 5 months, for comparison) #4 Close up of head stall - open #5 Close up of head stall - closed Most of it fits together tightly simply by the old «drop into the slot» method, where the bottom of the head stall drops into cut out slots at the front of the base - and the base itself (I should have taken a picture of the UNDER side of it) has wood cross bars spaced exactly underneath it so it sits snugly on the saw horses. No tipping or slipping. The ramp has a lip on the underside which catches firmly on the back end of the base so it won t fall off even if you end up struggling with an uncooperative goat. You ll notice, if you look closely, there are raised edges all the way around the base, which keeps a goats feet from accidentally slipping off the edge. The side rail, which keeps the goat from moving away from you (or falling off), can be easily and quickly switched from one side to the other, depending on which side you are working. The long piece of wood with blocks on each end in picture #2 is used to cover the holes in the base on whatever side the side rail isn t sitting in. Does that make sense? If you have questions, please contact my hubby, Jerry, at frosty@customcpu.com He has copies of all the pictures (in the same order as you received them) and I am sure can answer your questions a LOT better than I can. <grin> It may not be the fanciest trimming stand ever built, but it sure is a handy and very useful one. -Deb Deb Frost / snowgoose Spring Promise Pygmies Meadow Lakes, Alaska dfrost@customcpu.com

2 As Deb s said I put ours together with scrounged materials so I m actually glad she didn t take any pics of the bottom and show off it s cobbled together construction. <grin> I also didn t make any kind of plans when I built it, just a couple graph paper sketches as I went so I didn t have to try remembering particulars. I m depending on the pictures being self explanatory enough I ll only need to clue you to the necessary particulars of making a double swing arm device work and some of the little tricks I used. The platform is basically just a piece of plywood with a 2" x 4" frame for rigidity. To make the pockets for the side rail I simply ran a 2" x 2" lengthwise on the underside just inside of holes cut in the plywood deck and blocked them in with short 2" x 2"s, making sure the holes were a little larger than the 2" x 2" stakes. The only real trick is accurately measuring the holes so the side fence is interchangeable side to side. The safety board is just a strip of plywood wide enough to cover the stake holes with short 2" x 2" stakes to fit in the holes. The sockets for the neck squeeze were made after I finished the deck and squeeze; almost the last thing I did in fact. They re made essentially the same way as the stake pockets for the side fence except I used 2" x 4"s under the deck for additional strength. The head squeeze takes more hammering from the critters than any other part so it needs to be stronger. All the moving and socketed parts of the thing need some clearance to move, I sandwiched a piece of poster board in each joint where clearance was necessary. The one exception is where the deck sockets to the sawhorses; I made these as close fitting as reasonably possible. The stand is socketed to the el cheapo sawhorses with more scrap 2" x 4"s on edge. I intended to add catches so the stand couldn t fall off the sawhorses but the 2" x 4" sockets are deep and it s been solid enough I haven t needed to. You may need to though, a tight bungee should hold it all together just fine. It is also much more secure on reasonably flat solid ground, of course. The only real difference in this stanchion and more common ones is the neck squeeze. Normally there are two vertical arms, hinged at the bottom forming a «V» which is pulled tight and latched. What I have never liked about this kind of squeeze is two fold. First if an animal jumps up it loosens and they can get away or come to other grief. Secondly and worse still is if an animal looses it footing it can fall and choke. A fallen animal can exert enough force against a «V» squeeze to make it almost impossible to release the catches and rescue them. If you re using a «V» squeeze I d recommend keeping a pair of heavy wire or bolt cutters handy to cut the catch in an emergency. The mechanism I used is common where you need to keep a moving part parallel with another. No matter how an animal moves, the squeeze board remains parallel with the opposing vertical frame post. It will tighten if the animal tries to jump up but the pressure is against the side of it s neck and hits the really unpleasant stage long before it begins to choke. This seriously discourages jumping up against the stanchion. If an animal looses it footing and falls it can slide down to the deck without the squeeze board tightening, in fact it will loosen slightly but not release. There s also the matter of strength; this particular design is deceptively strong and is more than a match for a panicked full sized goat, it s just not large enough for one. All in all I think this is a much safer and more secure stanchion squeeze than the «V». Regardless, the «V» stanchion has been in use for probably for thousands of years and works fine. The pics don t show there are actually four swing arms sandwiching the pivot side of the stanchion s vertical post and the squeeze board. Regardless of the actual number of swing arms this mechanism is refered to as a «double swing arm». The swing arms are paired on the stanchion to act as guides to keep the squeeze board aligned properly. The vertical part of the frame used as the pivot for the swingarms is sandwiched between the swing arms as is the squeeze board. The squeeze board moves between two, paired horizontal cross members, top and bottom. Paired swing arms and paired cross members makes the squeeze board smooth moving and very secure structurally. It would take some extreme action from a very strong animal to knock it out of position. The trick to making a double swing arm work is precise measurement and accurate drilling, the actual distance between holes isn t important, making sure they re all the same is CRITICAL. To do this simply stack the swing arms and tack them together with a couple nails, then mark and drill them all at once. A drill press is best, though if you re

3 careful a hand drill will work. Do the same thing when drilling the pivot post and squeeze board. The combined length of the swing arms and the width of the squeeze board must be either more than the width of the gap between the vertical posts of the stanchion or come against a hard stop. If it gets too close to horizontal it can lock up. (cam over) Either: Make the swing arms long enough the squeeze board contacts the opposite vertical post before the swing arms reach horizontal when fully closed. OR, position the top swing arm so it contacts the top cross member and prevents (camming over) As you can see in the pics the squeeze board is pretty long, this is because it must stay within the paired horizontal cross members of the stanchion frame in all positions. If it came out from between the cross members the whole assembly could swing back and forth and cause problems. The vertical stanchion posts and squeeze board need to be the same thickness, I used 2" x 4"s for all three. I used 1 1/2" wide strips of 1/2" plywood for the swing arms and 1/2" x 3"+/- plywood for the horizontal cross members. As I recall, there s about a foot gap between the vertical posts and the swing arms are about 11" between holes. The top swing arms contact the top cross members preventing cam over. As I recall the distance between holes in the vertical post and squeeze board are around 8". I didn t actually measure any of the holes. What I did instead is tack two swing arms to the vertical post and squeeze board and move it all up and down to make sure it moved freely and didn t lock up. When everything was adjusted and working properly I marked the hole locations for drilling. After drilling I trimmed the excess length from the swing arms. I used 3/8" x 4" bolts, nylock nuts and four «wide» washers per bolt. The combined thickness of my vertical post and two 1/2" plywood swing arms is 2 1/2". I placed washers at all contact points; under the bolt head, between the posts and swing arms and under the nut. The washers are to reduce friction and strengthen the contact points at the bolt heads, nuts and swing arms. The unthreaded section of 4" bolts is just longer than the combined thickness so the nut bottoms out before causing friction. The holes are 7/16" so the bolts can move freely and also to allow for any deviation in hole spacing. Let me make this perfectly clear if the holes are differently spaced the mechanism WILL lock up. Swing arm holes MUST match and vertical post/squeeze board holes MUST match. You also want to use the nicest pieces for the squeeze board and the opposing vertical post; no splinters and sanded smooth. These two boards will be against your animals neck and you don t want any injuries. I considered padding them with carpet scraps or something similar but decided smooth wood would allow them some movement with the minimum irritation. I hope this will be clear enough to construct your own stanchions. Still I know just how difficult it is to understand text instructions and will be happy to answer any and all questions you have. If I need to produce dimensioned drawings with my crappy ancient TurboCadd program I ll go nuts. I ll do it of course but I ll be crazier than I already am. <grin> Of course if anybody has an old AutoCad release to trade I ll do it joyously and owe you something blacksmithish on top of it. <hopeful grin> Frosty If it ain t forged it ain t real. Wrought iron is. The FrostWorks Jerry Frost [frosty@customcpu.com] Meadow Lakes, AK.

4 Gee, I hope Jer's explanation didn't confuse everyone as much as it did me. <hehe> I'm not real good at understanding the technical aspects. Actually, in reading over both my notes and Jer's, the one thing we both seem to have left out is the use of the chain. Did you notice? It attaches permanently to the inside (closest to the goat) movable arm of the head squeeze (as Jer likes to call it), right at the upper bolt. You also need to drive a nail into the far corner of the top bar, leaving about 2" sticking up. Snip off the "head" of the nail so it's just a metal stick, then by using a cheap, small link chain, you have the final "holder" to keep your goat in place. Once the goat's head is through the opening, you simply pull the chain to snug the wooden bar up against the goats neck and slip the link holding it in exactly that position over the headless nail. Wa laa. Snug but not tight - and if you have an emergency and need to release the goat quickly, all it takes is one hand to lift the chain off the nail. The head squeeze falls open on it's own and the goat is free. I love the safety factor this gives. :) Let us know if this set-up works for you - and if anyone actually builds one, we'd love to see a picture. :) As a courtesy, we do ask that you give credit to Jerry and Deb at Spring Promise Pygmies in Alaska (along with our address in case anyone has questions) if you pass our pygmy stanchion plans along to anyone else. Thanks! -Deb & Jer (Frosty) -- Deb Frost / snowgoose Spring Promise Pygmies Meadow Lakes, Alaska dfrost@customcpu.com "Friends are quiet angels who lift us to our feet when our wings have trouble remembering how to fly."

5 #1 Full view with saw horse legs #2 View with side rail on right (shows ramp) #3 View with side rail on left (Finnegan in head stall - age 5 months, for comparison) #4 Close up of head stall - open

The deck has a 2 x 4 (measureing 1 1/2" x 3 1/2") on edge as an external frame.

6 #5 Close up of head stall - closed The dimensions are: A = 32" = 80 cm. Measured from the bottom of the deck. The deck has a 2 x 4 (measureing 1 1/2" x 3 1/2") on edge as an external frame. It also serves as a rim extending above the deck. B = 60" = 1.5 m C = 27" = 67.5 cm D = 20" = 50 cm. Measured from the top of the external frame. E = 8 1/2" = 21 cm Measurements B & C are outside dimensions.

Shop-Made Miter Clamps

Shop-Made Miter Clamps *Editor s note: In the photos showing the table saw, the blade guard has been removed for clarity. I try to be as self-sufficient as possible, so I like to manufacture my own tools whenever I can. I designed