Home made stands
 

I was wondering if any one has any plans for making Home made tree stands ?? if you could let me know and maybe post Pictures it would be great thanks

RE: Home made stands
 

They do say..... if you build it you will fall. I make my own ladder stands out of pressure treated lumber, I don't expect too many yrs from them though. Ladder' are pretty self exlanitory and I think you want plans for a hanger......sorry don't have but good luck and make sure its safe.

RE: Home made stands
 

If your planning on building a ladder stand, you should consider buying one first. If you plan on making it out of lumber, you are going to want to make sure it is pressure treated. With the price of lumber these days, it might not cost a whole lot more to buy one. You can get a 16'-0" ladder stand for around $80 at a lot of places. The advantage of buying one is

1) safer
2) last longer
3) lighter, easier to put up, down, or move

Just a thought.

RE: Home made stands
 

I want to see people start building they're own bows! That's safer in my book!

RE: Home made stands
 

Everything you need to know right here:

http://www.xsorbit4.com/users/buildabow/index.cgi

RE: Home made stands
 

All I have are home made. I own my own land, so I dont have to worry about moveing them or other people screwing with them. I simply get 1 inch square tube. You can get it at a metal store, it runs about 15 bucks for a 25' joint, primed. I just set in my shop with my chop saw and welder and make them how ever I want. I use 3/4 inch ply wood to make my seat. They work great, and you can make a stand for about 15 bucks each. There are so many ways to make them, let you imagination run wild. You will be surprised at how many ways you will come up with.

RE: Home made stands
 

this is what I know...As trees grow..the nails stay in and what ever the nail is holding gets pushed out and eventually...well i think u get it...not a good idea

RE: Home made stands
 

yep, Kamil is right there....and sometimes if you leave a stand in a tree with any kind of nylon or cloth belt fastening it to the tree the squirrels might chew it up....use chain if you are leaving it more than 24 hrs. i make all my own portable all-lumber stands that are pretty spacious(35"x25" aprox) and weigh in at around 12-14 lbs....but there are a million ways to skin a cat.

RE: Home made stands
 

I have done all that in the past and now with age and wisdom I would recommend commercially built ones. I have 3 ladder stands that I bought last year on sale for $74.99. Rivers Edge 15' deluxe. We harvested 4deer out of these stands last year.I also bought 4 hang ons on sale at Cabelas for $50 each that we are very happy with.I also have nice Summits; climbers and hangons. I like lots of stands on my deer deer hunting places as I can hunt the wind this way and also never overhunt a stand. Save yourself a lot of aggravation and protect your safety and just buy commercial ones.

RE: Home made stands
 

Hmmm, I am going to disagree with a few people here.
I have hunted out of homemade treestands on my own property for 12 years now. I have yet to fall (obviously), have a part fail, or have anything else bad happen. (Note me knocking on wood here). Alot of it is inspection and maintainence. I am constantly looking over my stands, and if something dont look right the part is replaced or the whole stand is rebuilt. Time consuming, you bet. Money consuming, no doubt. But there is something really satisfying about building your own stand, especially when it is huge, contains three trees, and can seat three people.
A ladder stand I have never built, all of mine are supported by, well, I dont know the technical term for them, but they are beefy. I use the biggest nails possible, and make sure that the pressure treated lumber is not comprimised in any way. Just gotta make sure you do things right!

RE: Home made stands
 

To attach my wood ladder stands I use 8" lags and 6"ardox, I agree I feel more satisfied when I take a deer out of one of my home made stands. Its a chore to put them all out but worth it in the end. None of my hunting companions have stands and they all use mine........ I tell them its at thier own risk(they are all bigger than me) If you are going to build your own----overbuild for safety. I'm 170lbs soaking wet and my broth-in-law is 280lbs on a good day, I build them for him so they are most definately safe for me.
I don't like to use any plywood it turns to ice after it snows.I use pt fence boards (1x6 or smaller) sitting on top of either 2x6 or 2x8's the ladder is 2x4's. Very few nails,I used screws for almost everything. Thesestandsare like rocks.... heavy and solid. I don't like heights but feel pretty safe at 16' in one of these. I've got one that I leave on a friends farm (permanent placement) and will take a pic next time I'm out, need to check it anyways maybe a little scouting/maintenance trip is in order.

RE: Home made stands
 

I hunt a property that has a few permanent stands, but I RARELY use them. Others do, but not me. I may be making this up, but I think the deer notice a change when someone is in it. Maybe not, but that's my theory. I just think the deer become conditioned to avoid permanent stands.

For the time and money it takes to build a good stand......why not buy a comfortable climber, say a Summit or such, and be more versatile, stealthy and not educate the deer.

RE: Home made stands
 

right on, i have noticed plenty of deer skirting stands like that...in fact a tactic i have used with some success is hang a stand 50-100 yrds downwind, conditions permiting, of a permanent stand (with stand owners permision to avoid hard feelings)...i think it is mostly just how you use the stand though, spook some deer from a stand and they watch it.

RE: Home made stands
 

You know mobo, we could build permanent platforms and put our Double bulls on them. or we could just

RE: Home made stands
 

Probably the safest I've ever felt in an elevated stand was while hunting from a buddy of mine's home made ladder stand , it was built by an uncle and solid as a rock . The roof could have been a little higher off the floor , but it had a great view and was fairly cozy on windy days .

Just the same though , I ordered this today:
15' ladder stand




These will be ordered for it shortly:
Leg levelers

I'd like to get at least two more to set up on my home property , and at $140combined anddelivered to my door I can see hitting a little overtime to make it happen . My grandkids are itching to hunt and their Daddy would never trust home made anything . It would also give me the advantage of safety with semi-portability for "away games" .

RE: Home made stands
 

Kev, I now have 3 ladder stands and they sure are nice and safe and comfortable. They are also the quietest way to go IMO. They are also not limited to a certain tree diameter. I attach mine to huge trees that are bigger around than me and this camos you well.

RE: Home made stands
 

hardcore.......I get the pickup cab!!!!! I called it first!!! I get it!!

RE: Home made stands
 

I have a friend that make's his own stands, he make'sthem out 3/4 inch plywood and light conduit ( I hope that's spelled right ) anyway he has his own plan.
When he get's one done he will test out in his back yard to make sure it's safe and strudy to support himself.
Then he will take out & put it up.

RE: Home made stands
 

Have to agree with what most have said on just buying one. If you want to build the homemade stand right, you're going to spend just as much as you will on a nice store bought one. But if you feel a special satisfaction in making your own, I guess I can see why you'd want to. The biggest advantage to me in making your own would be customizing the shooting platform. I like to have a lot of space to stand on to feel comfortable when shooting from a treestand. I actually contemplated building my own ladderstand out of 4x4 post supports, 2x6 platform framing, and heavy duty hardware but a friend suggested looking at the loggy bayou bowhunter ladder stand. It has a larger platform, or at least one large enough for me to be comfortable while shooting standing. Its not much more than $100 if you can find it on sale.

RE: Home made stands
 

I make all of my own stands, whether its enclosed 4x8s, ladder stands, tripod stands, hang on stands, etc. I don't use the same plans more than once. I open up the Cabelas archery catalog, pick out a stand that I like and then I make it giving it my own personal touch. My stands get hung by chains, and never get taken down.

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I wouldn't bother. You can get cheap stands on sale for @$25 and get several. Put them up a couple of months ahead of time and you can be more able to deal with different wind directions.

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Here are two of my home built stands set next to each other for a nighttime pig hunting setup. This setup is only about 10 feet up and 18 yards off thepig pipebut hasproduced 7 hogs so far.

Frame is 1" square tubing, platform is expanded metal, seat is rope wound back and forth through two arms. These are very comfy stands, but the tree has to be straight. My homemade ladders stands are VERY stout, made out of 1 1/2" tubing and 15' tall, but I don't have a pic of them here.

RE: Home made stands
 

Here's a link to the type of stand that I would like to have....
I'd like to build something like this for myself, but time being more important than the money, I'll prolly just buy a ladder stand.

http://www.gametamers.com/TS32.html

RE: Home made stands
 

buy a cheap ladder stand for $60and modify it i put a old mover seat on one and enlarged the platform. It is do comfortable

RE: Home made stands
 

ILbowhunter, how did you enlarge the platform?

RE: Home made stands
 

I'm a builder buy trade and as much as i use wood at work with the price of on the increase you can buy a hang on stand for about as much as it would cost you to build. If you are giong to build one, make sure you use treated lumber and galvanised nails or srews, you woun't have to replace them as often but you will need to ckeck them as you would a brought one.