How to Build a Simple Bird Feeder – Perfect DIY Project for Beginners

Not too bad at all. What's happening everyone? Welcome back to the workshop. Hope you're all doing well. Now in this video we're going to make a really simple bird table slash bird house on a stand for the garden with some feeders in it. Now this is a nice simple project. I've kind of designed this to be as easy as possible to make. So it's a really basic one but it turns out really well with a little bit of paint on it. Every single angle on this is 45 degrees so you can set your miter saw to 45 degrees and cut away. You don't have to worry about any complex angles. I'll take you through the entire build. It's super simple so if you've never made anything before in your life you will be able to make one of these. So nice and simple. In an upcoming video I might do a much more complex version but for this one we're going to keep it nice and simple. So let's crack on and build ourselves a bird table. 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It'll even tie into your accounting software at the end of the year making that a bit more streamlined as well and as you guys know time is money. So definitely check it out. I will leave a link in the description below. There's a 14 day free trial no strings attached. You can play around with the full job management platform see how it works for your business and there's also a promo code MANINSHED that will give you 50% off for your first three months. So remember if you're on the tools all day and you struggle with your office work check out TraderFoy. It'll really help you out. Now let's get back to the project. Okay so let's crack on with this project. Now the whole point of this is to make it as easy as possible so that anybody starting out making something can put one of these together. So we're going to try and keep it to a small few power tools. I will be using my miter saw but not much else so if you have a miter saw you can make this. Now I'm going to be using 2x2 or 50x50. It's really 45x45. This is some pressure treated timber. You could take some 2x4 or 4x2 and rip this which would give you two 2x2s as well. That's the cheaper way to get all the material for this but I'm going to assume that you guys don't have access to a table saw or a large bandsaw for ripping long boards so I recommend if you don't just go to your local hardware store or builder's providers and get yourself a bit of 2x2 pressure treated stock. So that's going to make most of our frames. All our cuts for our frame are going to be at 45 degrees so we can set our miter saw to 45 degrees and cut away. Now I'm going to get on and make this and show you how it goes together as I'm making it. It's extremely simple and I'll give you a few dimensions as we're going. We're so let's do it. First thing I want to do is cut the four legs so let's go and do that. Okay so the first thing I want to do is cut the four legs. Now anytime I'm cutting multiple pieces and I need them to be exactly the same length I always set up a stop block. That's the best way to do it. Now the legs we're going to be cutting are going to be 400 millimeters or 20 inches. So I just like to drop my miter saw down, just lock it in place like that and then I can measure off the blade. Now we're going to be cutting these at 45 degrees so we need to bevel this guy over to 45 and we need to measure that way. I'll show you the quick and easy way to measure off your blade when it's at an angle. Let's do that. Okay so if the blade was at zero degrees I could just measure straight off the blade, put a mark at 500 on my table and set up my stop block right there. But we're at an angle of 45 degrees so it's not going to be in the same place as if I measure off zero. So what I like to do is just take the stock that you're going to cut, whatever size that is, you can just run the blade up against it. Now there's the point that I'm measuring from right here where it makes contact with the blade so I'm just going to measure off that up 500 which is right here. Put a line right there and now I can put my stop block right on that line and I know that I'm going to be exactly 500 from the end of my miter to the end of my miter or the end of my 45 to the end of my 45. So let's get on and cut all these. So before I start making noise here I'm just going to cut two miters in each of the legs, two 45 degree cuts either end of the leg. So my first cut is going to be going in this direction, I want my second cut going in the opposite direction. So that just means I have to flip the timber over to put in the second cut and then my two miters will be going in opposite directions. So let's get on and do that. Okay so I've cut all our pieces for our stand. There are my four legs all at 500 millimeters, the exact same length. We have a 45 degree cut on both ends. I've also just cut the brace pieces for the legs. These are 300 millimeters or 12 inches. I'll show you how these go together now and our main stand or the main pole stem, whatever you want to call it, upright for our stand. I cut that at 1.3 meters and that should give me the exact height that I need. So let me very quickly show you how all this goes together. Okay let me very quickly explain how all this goes together. So here's our upright, our post, here's our four legs and here are our brace pieces. Now I'm going to cut a half lap joint in both of these and they are going to go together in a cross formation just like that. They're going to sit inside one another nice and flush right at the center and then we're going to screw that on to the end of our post just like that. So if we look at this in a kind of a side view, they will be on just like that and our leg will go on to the side. So you just slide this guy down until the 45 touches here and touches on the brace piece and we can screw that in there and in here and the other leg on the other side will do the exact same. Now you can just screw the two of these guys together just like this, however if you do that you're moving the bottom 45 degree away from the post. So just to give you a demonstration that if I was to pull that down it means these two legs then would have to sit further down the post in order to make contact with the brace piece. So you would have to cut those two legs a little bit longer. So if you're not going to cut the half lap joint and you're just going to screw these together you will have to allow for the two legs that go on the bottom of this to be that bit shorter because they will have to move down in order to make contact with the 45 here and onto your post. It'll all make sense now in a minute. Let's get our half lap joints cut. Okay so I have my half laps marked out. I'm going to take out exactly the width of one of these pieces halfway down in the exact center on both sides. Now I have to make sure that I do the top of one and the bottom of the other so that it's going to sit together like this. Don't make the mistake of taking the top out of two pieces otherwise they end up going together like this and the angles will be wrong. So always mark your waist and just pay attention to what you're doing and another good tip as well when you're doing joints like this where you're joining two pieces together use the actual thickness of the piece of timber to mark out your joint. So I just put a I got a center mark on this piece, lined the both of those up and that gives me the exact width of the piece that I need to take out. So using kind of relative measurement and then you can't really go wrong and I know that that guy has to sit exactly in there. Now I'm going to be using the trenching feature on my miter saw to do this. You could use a handsaw cut down there and chisel this out. There's loads of ways of removing this stock. I'm going to use the trenching function on a Okay so I'm going to do some trenching cuts with my miter saw. So my miter saw has a depth stop so the blade can now look no longer go any further than that. I have it set to exactly half the thickness of this piece. Now there's a couple of things just to be aware of when you're doing trenching cuts on a miter saw. One thing is that the blade is obviously circular and the lowest point of the blade is here. So when that's all the way in the lowest point is here. It's a good bit out from my fence. So if I was to put this piece up against the fence the lowest point would only reach maybe a quarter of the way into this timber and it would not give me the correct depth all the way across the timber. So you have to use a piece to go against your fence to keep this out so that you're getting the full depth of cut all the way through the piece. That's one thing to remember and if you do that you have to make sure you have a piece with two perfectly parallel edges so that everything stays perfectly square. Another thing is that there's a little bit of flex in the mechanism of a miter saw. So even though I have the depth stop set I can still push that a few millimeters past because there's a flex in the mechanism. So the harder you push the less accurate you're going to be. So just let the saw come down sit on the depth stop and just push it in. Don't force it down. Don't really try and push this down because it will give you loads of inconsistencies. So that being said let's get on and cut this. Okay so our half laps are done. Nice and simple on the miter saw. Just a little bit of trenching. So they just click together just like that. Nice and simple. So that's the brace for our legs. Now I've just put an X here. I've marked the exact center. I've drilled a pilot hole straight through. I've marked the exact center of the base of our upright or post. I've just drilled a little pilot hole in that as well and we're just going to screw the two of these together. So I'll put this together with a little bit of wood glue and then we'll drive a screw through the whole lot and screw on our base or our brace pieces for our legs onto our post. Let's do that. Just a little bit of glue on this. I don't need too much. Just glue that together. Nice big screw then through the whole lot up through there just like that. That's happy days. So there is the base now of our post and upright with the leg braces on. So now we can start attaching the legs. Now to attach the legs it is nice and simple. So I just want to rest my leg on my brace piece so I get that sitting nicely on the 45 just like that and then this 45 recut should fit nicely against our post and those two are sitting quite nicely like that. So now what I'm going to do is I'm going to mark the top of this with a line like this. I'm going to square that all the way around just to be 100% that when I put on my other legs that they are all going up to the same line and that we can iron out any little discrepancies that we have. Just make sure all the feet are sitting on the floor at the exact same level. So to attach this it's going to be the same thing it's just going to be a screw through here and a screw in there. Nice and simple. We'll drill a pilot hole again so that we don't risk splitting the timber. So I'll get on and do that. It's just a bunch of screws so it's just a screw in here and screw in here and screw on the other three legs and hey presto there we go. So I'll do that and when that's all done we jump back in. Okay guys so there's the stand for our board table now all done good and solid. It's a nice classic kind of board table design. Nice and easy those half lap joints bracing the legs and everything just cut at 45 degrees just to one angle and that's all we have to do. Now it's standing at about 1.5 meters so the legs are 500 millimeters the brace piece is 300 millimeters and our upright post is 1.3 meters 1300 mil and that puts the whole thing standing then at 1.5. So now it's just a case of put a table on this and build a little house. Let's do that. Okay so we're making the board house top for our board table. Now I've just been and cut a piece of half inch plywood this is 400 by 400 squares that's roughly 16 inches by 16 inches that will sit on top of our post just like that and then I cut another bunch of 45s just like our legs and our brace pieces only these ones are 200 millimeters or eight inches and they will fit on just like that. One on each side so we'll have four of those in total exactly the same way as we put the legs on and they will help to support our top so there'll be four brace pieces holding our top on just like that. Now let me show you how the board house is going to go together. Okay so for the assembly of the board house it's going to be nice and simple again I'm using whatever I have to hand in the workshop this doesn't have to be a masterpiece it's just a nice simple woodworking project. So again we have our 400 by 400 base for our table then I've cut some 2 by 1 lats and they are just going to go around the outside just like that just like a mitered frame around the outside that will just give us a little lip all the way around so that the board seat doesn't fall off the table. Then I've cut some more of the 2 by 2 this is cut to 250 millimeters and again it's just 45s and they're going to sit and be our four posts for our roof just like that so again very very simple. Now I've run out of 2 by 2 so I split the 2 by 4 like I said at the start of the video you could do this I've just run it through the bandsaw again make sure you have enough 2 by 2 when you're doing this project and they are just going to sit again everything is just 45s and they will sit just like that and be a roof support. So that's essentially how the frame is going together we'll brace with a couple of pieces around in a square as well and a piece across the top and then we put two more pieces of plywood on top of that and it'll be happy days so let's start to get some of this assembled now and we'll build as we go. Okay so the first thing I want to do is put my 2 by 1 lat mitered frame around my tabletop so it's just going to sit on it just like that I'm going to use some staples in around the side with a bit of glue to hold this all together so it's going to be pretty easy so we'll do two sides at a time so I'm just going to run a bead of glue just along the plywood we don't need too much we'll be stapling it as well and down this side just like that that's it there and then we're just going to put some glue on our miters just like that lovely and just continue on like that. Okay so that's our tabletop assembled we have our mitered frame from 2 by 1 lat around the plywood again it's just a case of keeping all the birdseed from falling off now on the back I've just joined the corners to get the center point right here I've drilled a hole and I've put a countersink bit in it right here so I'm going to drive a screw through that down through the center of our upright or our post to get this on and then we'll attach the brace pieces let's do that. Okay so I've just put a screw straight down through the center hole straight down to the center of our post I just have my laser level set up it's just quite handy for aligning things so I've matched the center of my table which is right here you can see the laser is hitting it and it's hitting right in the center of my post so that way I know my top now is not twisted left or right and that is perfectly aligned with the post so everything is nice and square I use laser levels a lot in my woodworking I find them fantastic for just doing things like this it takes seconds to line projects up they are quite handy so that's good now we can get the brace pieces on underneath let's do that okay there are our brace pieces for our top one in it's just a case of four pilot holes and screw the top or our table to the brace pieces there's just a couple of pilot holes and a couple of screws okay next thing is going on is the four posts for the house so again I've just drilled a pilot hole there I'm going to put a little bit of glue on this set them down and screw these from the bottom so a little bit of glue on the bottom and on the sides set them in there just like that make it screw down okay so it's gonna be much easier to build the rest of this if I take it off it stands a little bit high up to work on so it's gonna be easy to put it back on the table so it's marked here and here so I know that it goes back on this way around and all the screw holes will line back up so pop the five screws take this back off and we can build the rest of the house on the table okay guys we have the roof trusses in place now here's another nice little use of the laser so no measurements required to put these guys on there's just a 45 degree cut and a 45 degree cut again everything on the miter saw has 45 degrees and 45 degrees only so I've measured the center of the table here and here line the laser up with that and then once the center of the laser or laser hit the center of my apex front and back I knew that these were perfectly aligned so I just drove a screw straight down through the posts on either side and it's happy days indeed now there's only a brace piece to go in the middle and it's just a case of turn this guy up on edge just turn it 45 degrees so that it lines up with the roof screw here screw here and that's the roof done okay guys it's time to put on the roof again nice and simple it's just a couple of pieces of plywood remember we're keeping this one nice and simple and basic we might do a fancier designed birdhouse in another video where there's lots of joinery and even roof slates and all the good stuff but this is the basic model so it's nice and simple all we're going to do is cut the square you don't have to do any 45s or anything for the roof so you're stop this one right at the apex and this side you're going to cut a little bit longer so it's going to be longer by the width of the board and that one is just going to come up so I can catch it in my hand just like that and it's going to sit over this one so you can see they now meet perfectly so this board comes over this board and sits perfectly flush with it along here so that means you don't have to do any 45 degree cuts in here or long rips it makes it nice and simple so it's a case of glue this now a few staples in it staple this and it's almost ready for final assembly a little bit of sanding and then we'll get the finish on it okay guys it's a couple of days later I'm back at this project now I want to get it all painted up and help preserve this now I haven't glued it together or screwed it together yet so the top is still not fixed on it's just going to make it easier to paint and I also want to pay particular attention to the end parts of my pressure treated timber obviously pressure treatment doesn't go all the way through the wood so when you cut it you're exposing wood that's not pressure treated and we want to pay particular attention to the feet make sure we get some preserver on that because they would be in contact with the ground and that's the first place it's going to rot so this is definitely something that's going to have to be painted every year or maybe twice a year in order to help keep it especially the plywood because none of that is pressure treated and I'm just going to be using some of this it's Ron Seal decking stain I really like the color of this I use it in my planter video build where I built in the built-in seat in the two planters and I really like the color of it so that's what I'm going to use so I'll crack on get this all painted up and we'll jump back in and it's almost finished alright guys there we go all painted up the project is just about finished and I'm really happy with how it turned out so it's made essentially from scraps that I have around my workshop and we have ourselves a nice little bird feeder table slash house that looks pretty good I like really like that stain it's a lovely color I really liked on the planters and I really like it on this now as well so a super simple board table to build now I've just added a couple of screws here and there for hanging bird feeders off so again you can hang whatever you like on this you can just use it and put some bird seed in the center of it here or you can hang feeders and stuff for smaller birds and squirrels I've just put a little hook inside in it as well for a bird feeder it's kind of as you just fill it up and it's one of those self-feeding kind of ones the nuts just keep falling down as the birds eat it and that one is great for smaller birds so yeah there you go turned out pretty well indeed okay guys so there we go another project complete and hopefully you've enjoyed that one and hopefully you've got something from it again I kind of designed this so that it would be super easy to make and if you've never made anything before in your life you would be able to make this you can make them as complex and as extravagant as you like but this is just a really basic simple design a little bit of plywood a little bit of two by two a couple of 45 degree cuts and you are good to go a little bit of glue a little bit of screw and that's all you need now like I say you can add tiles to the roof you can add felt to the roof there's loads of stuff you can do I might make a more complex one of these with loads of joinery and even a slate roof if that's something you guys would like to see let me know in the comments below and I'll be sure and get that in an upcoming project but for now this is going to go out in the garden my daughter really wants one of these so now she has one it's winter time is coming so it always gets harder for robins and stuff to find food in the winter so it's always nice to have a bird feeder out in your garden for the winter months and that's exactly what this is going to do so if you like the guys give it a thumbs up comments and questions below as always I try to get back to everybody let me know what you think of it or what you would do differently I'm always interested to hear your take on things as well and thanks as always to everybody over on patreon who could help support the channel much appreciated guys so that's it links to everything as always below in the description I'm going to get out of here now and I'm going to get some bird seed fill these up and get out in the garden and I'll leave that little bit to my daughter so there we go guys until the next one take it easy