Photo Of Lone Star Goliad Separated On Pole

[Steve Kroenke]

Photo Of Lone Star Goliad Separated On Pole

The Lone Star commercial purple martin houses are high quality and my favorites. I particularly like the Goliad and have two of these houses. However, I am having a problem with one of my Goliad houses. The Goliad is composed of sections which are stacked on top of each other and they are not bolted together. The reason for this is to allow a person to add sections later on. The cable end of the winch is attached to the bottom section and that positioning should keep all the floors together when the house is lowered or raised. The Lone Star houses do not fit snuggly on the pole and wobble some. This creates a clearance issue and the houses sometimes hit against the pole during windy weather. My Goliad houses make a loud noise when lowered and raised and this appears to be the winch cable scraping against the house metal and house doing the same against the pole.

The other day when conducting a nest check, I was unable to raise the house snuggly against the roof cap. Then I noticed the top floor separating. I tried to lower the house some and the top floor became slightly angled against the pole and then separated from the middle section. The clearance issue described above may be the reason for the top section sticking in an angled position on the pole. Since the house sections fit tightly, the top floor now will not slide into place and is ajar. I can't lower the bottom section for the fear that the top will finally come loose and crash down on the middle floor, possibly destroying eggs. I don't have a tall step ladder to reach the house and reposition the sections. I could possibly use a shorter step ladder and then use a pole to juggle the top section some and see if it will slide back into the place. For now, I am just leaving it alone as the martins have adjusted. I may wait till all the eggs have hatched based on observations of the parent martins making feeding trips and then try to juggle the sections together so I can lower the house. If someone has had a similar problem and resolved it, please let me know what you did!

Next year, I will bolt all sections together on both my Goliad houses to avoid this potential problem again. I also will try to do something to mitigate the noise of the house hitting against the pole and winch cable scraping against the inside metal.

Steve

[Matt F.]

Good info Steve. There was another forum member who had a similar problem recently:
http://www.purplemartin.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2548

I wonder if Lone Star is aware of this?

[Guest]

Be careful Steve! We wouldn't want any broken bones due to a bad fall!

Sue
City by the Sea, TX

[Guest]

Steve, I have the Alamo house, and I think I remember you have one too. I see a wobble in our houses. I have not tried this, and it may or may not relate to the problems you are seeing, but I have been wondering about this. What about installing some nylon discs (small), either on the housing near the bottom inside of the center shaft, or on the pole where the bottom of the house will end up? I am thinking along the lines of those little things made to put under furniture legs. They might take up some of the space that is allowing the wobble, and still slide well enough, and align the house as it goes up or down.
I did change the way the cable enters the shaft from its attachment point on the house. I thought it might cut the little cable on the sharp edges as it makes the bend. I ran the cable inside a piece of copper tubing to shield it, then flattened and bent the tubing to make the corner.
I sure would be interested to hear what you try and how it turns out. Thank you for posting about the real world of martin keeping.

[Steve Kroenke]

Matt,

Thank you for that link. I have talked with Lone Star folks in the past about problems with their winch handle. Several of the handles broke on mine and the Lone Star folks replaced them immediately. Lone Star is a first rate business and would make improvements to their housing based on customers needs. I plan to notify Lone Star about this problem with my Goliad.

Steve

Hey Sue,

I will be careful! I enjoy my mountain biking too much to risk an injury to my legs! Thanks!

Steve

Tidfam,

Yes, I have an Alamo. I have a San Jacinto and 2 Goliad houses. All wobble on the poles. I did buy some of those nylon discs, slide buttons I believe, but didn?t attach them. I couldn?t figure a good way of doing it and they were too thick I believe. On the PMCA Deluxe gourd racks and multi-purpose poles, there are plastic slide buttons installed on the inner sides of the rack/house foundation sleeves. These buttons work perfectly to keep the rack/house foundation stable and reduce noise when the system is raised and lowered. The Trio castle, which is a marvel of engineering quality in my opinion, has an inner down tube that is inserted in the inner center shaft area. The pole goes through this tube and does not touch the house sides. Perhaps Lone Star could incorporate something like slide buttons or down tubes in their design to reduce wobble and minimize noise. We might be able to do something like that and I may try it. I will get my next door buddy, Trucker Bob to help! He knows a lot about designing and building martin houses!

I am concerned about the cable, too. On my oldest Goliad, the cable is actually cutting into the metal siding and I am concerned that this action is also damaging the cable threads. The Trio castle has a small diameter tube inside the inner shaft where the winch cable is inserted. This tube protects the cable against possible wear and tear from friction against the inside metal on the castle. This is another possible improvement I believe Lone Star could incorporate in their housing to protect the cable and reduce noise of the cable scraping against the house.

Thanks for commenting and keep me posted, too, of any ideas you may have to minimize the cable and wobbling problems with the Lone Star houses.

Steve