[Guide] How to Make a Wooden Saucer

[Deleted]

[Guide] How to Make a Wooden Saucer

As promised, here is a step-by-step guide to making your own wooden saucer!
It's quick, easy and your degus will love it!

This saucer is going to be in my hallway, so my degus will be supervised and will not be allowed
to chew it, that is why I have used some spare OSB from my cage-building. The one I have in my
cage is kiln-dried pine and safe for chewing.

Materials

• 1 piece of wood, at least 50 cm long and 10 to 15 cm wide. If the saucer is to be in the cage,
  the wood should be kiln-dried pine.
  
• 1 SNUDDA rotating tray from IKEA (or something similar): link (1)
  
• Option 1: 1 SOARÉ place mat from IKEA (or something similar): link (2)
  
• Option 2: Coarse sand paper.
  
• Strong glue, universal or for wood
  
• 3 nails, approx. 24 mm long.
  
• Alternative 1: 4 screws, approx. 24 mm long.
  
• Alternative 2: 4 nails, approx. 24 mm long with large heads.
  

Tools

• Hammer (3)
  
• Saw (not necessarily the same type as this one – a bigger one would be easier) (4)
  
• Measuring tape or similar (4)
  
• Alternative 1: Electric drill, with drill and bit that fits the screws (5)
  

There are two alternatives: one if you have an electric drill (which I recommend) and one
if you only have a hammer. Please read through the whole guide before starting up!

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Guide

Time: Approx. 90 minutes.

• Step 1: Begin by measuring two pieces of wood (6). One should be 40cm long, and the other 10cm.
  Use the saw to cut out the pieces (7).
  

• Step 2: Place the small wooden piece straight on the floor and balance the longer piece on top
  of it like shown in the picture below (8). This will be the base.
  

• Step 3: Nail the two pieces together at an angle using three nails (9).
  

• Step 4: Put the revolving tray on the floor with the underside up. Place the base in the middle of the
  circle and the middle of the whole plate (10).
  

• Step 5, alternative 1: Using your electric drill, drill 4 holes through the base and into the moving
  part of the tray (11a). Then use your electric drill to screw the base to the tray (11b).
  

• Step 5, alternative 2: Use 4 nails to attach the base to the moving part of the tray (11c). This can be a
  little difficult because the moving part of the tray is pretty sturdy. NB! Use nails with larger heads
  than in this picture!
  

• Step 6, option 1: Use strong glue and coat the underside of the place mat, but avoid the edges (12a).
  Your degus will eat the edges! Attach the mat to the top of the revolving tray.
  
• Step 6, option 2: Instead of using a place mat, you can simply rough up the surface of the tray using
  coarse sand paper (12b). This will give your degus grip enough to run.
  

• Step 7: (if you chose option 1 above).Turn the whole saucer upside down and put something heavy on it (13). This will make sure that
  the place mat is properly glued to the surface of the tray. Leave it under pressure for as long
  as specified on the glue bottle (usually around 10 minutes).
  

• Step 8: Rejoice! You have now made your very own wooden flying saucer
  

Here is a video of my first saucer in action:




Good luck with making a saucer of your own!

[deguconvert]

Thank you for this guide, Storm!! You've done an excellent job with it, and I think anyone can put it together with such plain and simple instructions. May have to have a turn at it myself! Well done!

[jenowuk]

This is fab! We got a saucer for our goos, but only one of the four liked it and we went back to wheels. But a wooden one has better possibilities than the shop bought plastic.

I love the video of the saucer in action. Your goo is a speed freak! I love the way they get up to speed running, then stop in the middle so it flies around with them sitting in it. LOL

[Kins]

I am so making at least one of these at the weekend, think I may have to order those bits from IKEA now!

How exciting, excellent guide, thanks Stormsong!

[malteser60]

Can't wait to get home and be able to see the images! My work's firewalls blocks all youtube, images, etc!

[Deleted]

Thank you all, glad you found it readable I had some trouble with the words concerning
tools and stuff, but hopefully my somewhat direct translations work
Feel free to post pics/vids of your finished saucers as well!

jenowuk: The degu in the video, Elune, can do this for hours and hours It's a miracle her balance is still
intact!

[mhb]

Fantastic guide - thank you.

I have just ordered all the parts to make our three terrors one.

[aquila]

We got everything except the place mat* today, and will be constructing this weekend! I'm loving the guide; thanks!!

*We got a rectangular shaped one, and will cut it to size.

If you had to estimate, what is the angle you used?

[Deleted]

I think it's about 80 degrees in the top and 25 degrees by the floor, but I'm very bad
at these things

[fred]

Well, if one angle is 90 degrees, the sum of the other two has to be 90 degrees The angle has quite an impact on how they run on it. I found it useful to initially wedge a block of wood under it to find the best angle.

[moletteuk]

I made one a few weeks ago, one of my goos really likes it. A couple of suggestions are to try a few of the lazy susans in the shop and pick a good free spinning one. You don't really need the mat, I just sanded mine and then heavily scratched the top with the tip of a saw. Also, if you mount the saucer on the flat piece of wood first, you can hold it or prop it temporarily for the goos to try to find the best angle for running - it's quite critical, too steep and they will have difficulty gripping, not steep enough and they manage to run to the top!

[aquila]

Will try some experimental angles before doing anything permanently; thanks for the tips!

I tried previously to extract the bearings from the Ikea turntables and use them vertically on regular running wheels, but my goos were too much for them and they ended up breaking. I think keeping the bearings horizontal will be much better, and I'm excited to give it a try.

I even made sure my DIY cage will be able to fit them!

[mhb]

Made my one at the weekend - looks brilliant.
However my stupid thickets cage isn't wide enough to put it in there!
Will be introducing them to it this week and making sure the DIY home I build for them is big enough for it to be a permanent fixture.

[aquila]

Feb 27, 2012 9:26:12 GMT mhb said:

Made my one at the weekend - looks brilliant.
However my stupid thickets cage isn't wide enough to put it in there!
Will be introducing them to it this week and making sure the DIY home I build for them is big enough for it to be a permanent fixture.

This is a P@H thickets cage?

With some negotiating, the saucer can fit. I have a P@H cage and fit my wheel in it. Try putting it in through the door diagonally and push. You'll need to exert a bit of force, but it will fit.

I ended up using whatever angle Stormsong used, with the same lengths of wood. It works BRILLIANTLY and my goos LOVE it. They won't get off now.

It took them a few days to figure it out, but I put a stuffed animal hamster on the wheel and pretended it was running. After seeing this, the boys got on and now it's a hit. Both of them use the saucer simultaneously with one running at the top and one running at the bottom.

It's truly wonderful; highly recommended. Thumbs up to Stormsong!

We're already thinking of making a second one so the boys won't have to share.

[Deleted]

Feb 28, 2012 22:40:16 GMT aquila said:

I ended up using whatever angle Stormsong used, with the same lengths of wood. It works BRILLIANTLY and my goos LOVE it. They won't get off now.

It took them a few days to figure it out, but I put a stuffed animal hamster on the wheel and pretended it was running. After seeing this, the boys got on and now it's a hit. Both of them use the saucer simultaneously with one running at the top and one running at the bottom.

Awesome! So glad they like it. My two new girls are in the process of figuring it out now,
perhaps I'll try demonstrating it to them like you did with yours ^^

[deguconvert]

@ Aquila . . . I LOVE that you used a stuffed hamster toy to demonstrate the saucer you made, and that your degus completely UNDERSTOOD what they were seeing. That is so perfect!! I might have to build one now and give that idea a try myself. I'm so happy it worked out so well.

[mhb]

Feb 28, 2012 22:40:16 GMT aquila said:

This is a P@H thickets cage?

With some negotiating, the saucer can fit. I have a P@H cage and fit my wheel in it. Try putting it in through the door diagonally and push. You'll need to exert a bit of force, but it will fit.

Yes it is.
Oh right, I will have a go at that then tonight, although I am thinking the interior mods that I made when I created the double decker palace will need some rearranging to accommodate.
But I'm not sure about leaving it in there permanently at the moment though as it will take up a great deal of space on the floor.
The DIY cage I have carefully planned will have a level dedicated to it (ie the only 'toy' on that one) so they will hopefully stop kicking one of the three out of the wheel.
Currently they like to run in pairs and the third one always jumps in and kicks at least one out!

Feb 28, 2012 22:40:16 GMT aquila said:

I put a stuffed animal hamster on the wheel and pretended it was running.

That is the funniest thing I have heard!

[Kins]

Question for you stormsong...

It looks like the lazy susan is readily available, and reasonably priced, on eBay (thanks mhb).

I have a question though. As far as I can tell the above lazy susan is varnished? Is this correct? Would it be safe if the goos were to chew it?! I just know my 2 'little' goos will try their best at having a good old chew. I really would like to make a few of these for my boys as the plastic flying saucers are less than ideal, but have to do at the moment.

Thank you in advance! They just look so fab!

[fred]

They don't normally ingest the wood they chew, so the bit of varnish shouldn't be any problem. My girls have significantly changed the shape of their disc without any ill effect.

A note of caution when ordering a lazy susan form ebay or similar. When you go to IKEA you can chose one than runs nicely, and not all do. So you may have to fiddle with the bearings (or whatever the technical term is).