Ron made his way West to one of the most beautiful cities in Texas, San Antonio. Ron paid a visit to Kathy Hoskins who needed a little help building a new cage for her pet iguanas. Kathy's three sons Patrick, Ben and Evan had enough pet iguanas to outfit a zoo, five in all, but their old home was getting a little shabby and they needed a new one.
Click Here For a list of what
you will need in order to complete this project.
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1. Draw up a plan:
- The first step, as with any custom building project, was to draw up a plan for the cage. Ron suggested that they would build five frames, each to be covered with a heavy-duty screen material. These screens would be used for the top, bottom, sides and the back of the cage.
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- On the other end they would install a hinged door complete with a slide latch.
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- After Ron explained the plan, Patrick told him that they would actually need two cages instead of one because they needed separate compartments for the males, who tend to fight with one another during mating season. Now with two identical cages in mind, they used the drawing to create a cut list. All the pieces of the cages would be constructed from 2 x 2s but they needed to count how many pieces they would need of each and length.
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2. Cut wood:
- With their cut list as a guide and plenty of wood to cut, each of the boys got a turn on the miter saw.
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- The first step was to assemble the five frames by joining together the 2 x 2s with simple butt joints.
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- They stacked all of the cut wood, putting all the same sizes together. On the ends of each piece, they numbered the lengths. That made it easy to find the ones they needed.
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3. Frame assembly:
- They used both glue and screws to create the butt joints that held each frame together. They used waterproof polyester glue that was very strong and great for anything that might get some moisture on it.
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- After gluing each joint, they drilled pilot holes and drove in screws.
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4. Door assembly:
- They put together all of the frame panels; top, bottom, front, back and end. The other end was left open for a door that they were going to construct a little differently so it would be stronger. They used what was called a lap joint to construct the cage door. To create the lap joints they needed to cut notches on the ends of each 2 x 2. These would then be overlapped, glued and screwed together.
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- Ben used Ron's Japanese handsaw to cut half way through the 2 x 2.
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- Patrick then ripped along the grain and down the end of the 2 x 2 until he met Ben's cut.
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- They checked to make sure the two pieces formed a flush joint.
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- Then they glued and screwed them together.
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5. Attach screen:
- They laid the first frame down on a large work surface to attach the hardware cloth with a vinyl coating on it. It was simple to attach this screen material but it was important to make sure that the edges were kept straight as they worked.
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- They used a staple gun to drive staples every four inches right where two wires cross. They took care to keep the screen as taut as possible as they moved down the frame.
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