Got me a 55 gallon feeder, and figure I will get a pulley for it to mount to a branch extending out from the tree. But I will also need a winch mounted to the bottom of another tree to crank it up. I noticed that the boat winches' crank handles would hit the tree and not work and wanted tips on how to do this. I could lag a 2x8 to the tree with its edge hanging past the side of the tree, and bolt the winch to the 2x8 portion that is at the tree's edge so the crank would work. Or is there another type of crank available, and where could I get one? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I don't have a four wheeler to pull the feeder up via the pulley.

I don't know about setting one up on a tree; there are no trees big enough where I hunt, but one of the guys on our lease bought a crank up feeder from the place I have linked below. Go to their page and take a look at the crank up feeder. This may give you some ideas.

http://www.magnumhunting.com/

I know about those tripods, but I have bears so it won't work for me. I need to get it higher and on something more stable than a tripod. When the feed gets low, it is light and can easily be tipped over. So I have to mount a pulley on a tree branch and a winch on a tree somehow and make that work.

Doug,
On our lease we have done it a couple different ways. One, lag a 2x4 or 4x4 (depending upon amount of clearance you need to crank the winch handle) to the tree first then attach your boat winch. Two, Quad Lok tree stands (here in NC) makes a metal bracket designed for this very purpose. I'll see if I can track down there website
Hope that helps.
heel

heel,

I would appreciate that information, since it might work better than lagging a 2x4 or 4x4 to a tree. If I have to do the lag, I will. You say it works? I was thinking I'd have to mount the winch to the side of the lagged piece of wood, so that the handle cranks to the side of the tree instead of hitting it. Are you saying that the wood will give it enough clearance so that I don't have to worry about the handle being to the side of the tree?

Thanks for the advice!!!

DougMD

I did a feeder set up just like you are describing using a boat wench. Luckly, there was a decent sized limb about 4ft off of the ground and I just sawed it off and mounted the wench to the stub......that was the easy prob to solve....LOL

I attached some pullies to a big limb about 18 ft off the ground, ran my cable through the pullies then over to the wench. Filled that 55 gal drum up with almost 300 Lbs of corn, and started cranking. I was cranking for a while and the barrel had barely lifted off the ground......so I really laid into it .......when I next turned around the barrel was still only about 3 ft off of the ground but the end of the limb was almost touching the ground....LOL ......I had to lower the barrel back down, climb the tree and link cable to two other limbs above the main one before I could get enough support to pull up that 300 lb barrel of corn and even with the pully system, it still took quite an effort to crank that puppy up. All in all, it turned out to be quite a pain in the rear.

Now, I simply anchor a couple of 2x6's between two trees at the desired height and hang the barrel from the 2x6's. The barrel is fixed position. I don't have to lower it up and down. I made a ladder out of 2x4's and just leave it leaning up against one of the support trees so it's out of the way. When it's time to fill the barrel up, I just move the ladder over by the barrel & climb right up. I get corn in 50Lb bags so it's no big deal to lug one of those up to barrel height. As a matter of fact, it's a lot easier than cranking that barrel up used to be...LOL

Hope this helps.......Good luck with your feeder!

firstshot

Be sure you select low-stretch rope. When I hung a feeder last year and used a pulley system, I pulled it 10 times and it had not moved off the platform I had built for it. I replaced with some line from a marine shop at $.79 a foot. Now it up off the ground, See... http://www.advanceddesignsinc.com/images/Feeder.jpg

I see, Hawgnman. I have another 16 gallon feeder whose rope doesn't have to be so tough. I might need a cable for the 55 gallon one, though.

Firstshot, I would consider fixing it at my preferred height using 2x6's nailed to two trees and doing it like you say, but my feeders are a pain to get the lid off of (Game Country), unless they are on the ground so you can swing the cable attachment to both sides of the feeder top out of the way. Otherwise, we have a hard time getting the top off. I'd hate to have to worry about that as I am 15 feet in the air on a ladder with a 50 pound bag of feed in my arms! By the way, what load capacity or gear ratio, etc. did you try when you used the winch? Do you suppose if I used a 1,400 pound winch on a 300 pound feeder it wouldn't be so hard to crank?

Thanks fellas!

DougMD

The winch system makes a lot more sense for the Game Country feeders if the lids are hard to get off. I was primarilly refering to the 55 gal drums which usually just fave a metal band that holds the lid on and is tightened down with a bolt & nut. I just put in two "eye bolts", one on each side about 6" below the top of the barrel. Then put two eye bolts in the 2/6's MUCH further apart & connected with wire cable. The cables run from the barrel eye bolts to the eye bolts in the 2x6's at about a 35-40 degree angle. That way the cables do not get in the way of taking the lid off. Oh yea, to attach the cable to the eye bolts in the feeder, I used those links that you can unscrew and remove so that I can take the barrel down if I need to. (I don't know what they are called, but they are C shapped and the part that you unscrew closes the link)

You'll probably be just fine with the 1,400 Lb winch. I guess it depends on it's gear ratio. I had just used the smallest, least expensive winch I could find (probably my first mistake...LOL). I don't remember the load rating but obviously the gear ratio must have been next to nothing, because it was still a chore to raise that 300Lb barrel even with the pullies.

By the way, I highly recommend using cable for your 55 Gal drum!

Good luck & let me know how it turns out.

firstshot

Thanks for everything, I will keep you posted, but it won't be until the late summer when I get it up and running... I noticed they have double pulleys that hook onto an eye bolt and claim to help a winch lift much more easily, but I don't understand how that could be. They are essentially a pulley, but simply are attached to a hook with nothing special that I know of to make it more efficient than any other pulley. Oh well...