Blink Mini Birdhouse Camera
May 22, 2024
Blink Mini Birdhouse Camera
Long before I made the Blink Mini Bird Feeder Camera setup I wanted to make a birdhouse with a live camera. I actually experimented with making one probably 5-6 years ago with a Raspberry Pi camera setup but abandon the idea after I couldn’t get the Pi to connect to the WiFi where I need to put the actual Birdhouse. I have since upgraded my internet with multiple routers so now I can get WiFi anywhere in my yard so it’s finally time…
…plus I have multiple houses on my shed but after 25+ years some have taking a beating from squirrels, raccoons, and time itself… so they need replacing.
The design of the birdhouse will basically stay the same as those have worked forever. The house will still be built from wood but all of the camera mounting components will be 3D printed from PETG.
Here is a cut away version of the overall design of the birdhouse. It would have been real easy just to put the camera inside the birdhouse but I wanted easy access to it without bothering any birds.
Some standard design features of the birdhouse are… the front being able to hinge open for clean out, venting along the top of the door as well as venting holes in the sides. This one will have plexiglass side windows to let more light in for the camera. (If there is not enough light the camera will go into night mode with IR LED’s and the videos will only be in black and white). I did added printed window guards over the windows to keep the birds from flying into them. I will also be adding a brass entrance guard so hopefully nothing can chew this one up like on the old ones.
In the initial design I though I might need to change the focal point so I though I could attach the camera to the cap and be able to adjust the focal length by just turning the cap which would move the camera up or down. I then decided just to make the camera tube separate from the roof cap so the whole tube could just move up and down if need be. I could later glue it in place or use add on spacers to set the right focal point. I’m not sure if any of that will be needed but time will tell. I should have went and redesigned the cap with less threads because as of now I need to pre-wind the camera cable backwards before installing the camera and screwing on the cap. (I’ll fix things in the next version.)
This is what it will look like inside. If it needs to go lower I can print a longer tube. More than likely it will need to be raised though, which will be easy to do with an added spacer under the camera tube cap.
The camera wire runs out the back of a groove in the cap… this should keep it water proof.
The main cap also fits into a groove in the back plate of the house to also help keep water out of the house.
The Build
To start… I am recycling this old 3/4″ pine shelf for the wood for the build of the birdhouse.
This is the rough drawing I will be working from.
Using a Circular Saw I cut out all of the pieces out of the shelf and sanded off the paint from what will be the inside of the birdhouse.
I’m not going to go into the full build of the house but the only tricky part was cutting out the roof groove in the back plate. The depth stop on my Circular Saw is broke so I just used the side piece roof line as a guide with a hand saw to make a bunch of notches then chiseled out the rest.
The groove after sanding… it’s not perfect but good enough.
Here are all the pieces after drilling out the main entrance, windows, and vent holes. The camera tube hole in the roof is sloppy but no one but the birds will ever see it once assembled.
After gluing and nailing everything together it just needs one final sand before paint.
I did a quick paint job with rattle cans.
While all that was going on I got all of the 3D printed parts ready to go.
I also printed out window frame guards and super glued some plexiglass to the rear of them.
Next I put a bead of silicone around the edge of the plexiglass.
The window assemblies were then screwed to the house.
I also put a bead of silicone on the roof and groove to mount the Camera Roof Cap.
Once screwed in place it should be pretty water proof. (I also painted the Roof Cap white just for a little more added protection against the sun and elements.
The brass entrance guard was then screwed to the front door.
Two #8 x 1″ Stainless steel screws affix the door to the house, these also act as a hinge point…
… to allow the door to open for cleaning proposes.
A single screw at the bottom secures it closed.
With the birdhouse assembled… now it’s time to install the actual camera.
I did go back and design a spacer (red piece) to raise up the camera just a bit. This spacer also acts as another layer of waterproofing. Now there’s no chance for water to run down the camera tube and leak in between it and the roof cap. Any water that is shed off the camera tube cap will now run down the spacer and to the outside of the roof cap.
This is the Blink Mini Camera that I will be using.
It just drops into the camera tube and the wire is wound backward about 5 times. This will straighten out as the cap is screwed on.
He is the rear exit for the camera wire.
For now the camera tube just slides into the roof cap but I will probably retain it in place with a screw later on.
Here is the finished birdhouse almost ready to be mounted but first some testing.
This is the camera in night mode. The front of the camera actually faces the left side of the box so I can have the main entrance in view.
Day time view… I stuck a little turtle figure in there to see what it looks like. (keep in mind these are screen grabs).
Before I can mount the bird house to my shed I need to deal with the power problem… the bird house is on the outside while the power is on the inside of the shed. While the cable is nice and thin and would fit through a 1/8″ hole that I could drill through the wall it has a USB plug on the end. This means the hole has to be a minimum of 5/8″ so I need to design a through wire grommet that will still be waterproof while fitting that hole size.
This is the design I came up for the Grommet.
The grommet is a two piece design that will clamp around the camera cable while allowing the plug to fit through a 5/8′ hole in the shed wall. The nut is split to fit over just the cable and the piece on the far left acts as both a tool and a retainer to keep the nut from spreading while tightened.
Here you can see how the cable enters from the rear which will be inside the shed, while exiting out the bottom of the grommet on the outside of the shed. This design should keep water from running along the cable and back through the grommet.
This is what it will look like through the wall on both sides.
Here are the printed parts before clean up.
First the cable gets wrapped around the filler piece.
Which when installed in the main grommet sandwiches the cable in place.
After inserting the grommet through the wall (not shown) the plug can be feed through the nut and retainer.
Which when threaded onto the grommet will hold everything together.
Now I just have to wait for new residents… (Being the end of May it might be to late in the season for any birds to be starting new nest though.)
June 8th 2024 = First open house… a sparrow pop in for a look. Then on June 9 & 11 a different sparrow also came around for just a look. (not shown) These might just be from the old neighboring birdhouse that survived. I was going to put this new house in the middle of the shed but as I climbed the ladder to remove the old one a bird flew out and almost scared me right off the ladder. I ended up leaving that house up seeing as it was being used still.
June 11, 2024 = This guy actually did a walk through. (I believe its a House Wren.)
July 24, 2024 = Had a sparrow seriously checking the house out multiple times today. I think he was even measuring for flooring and window treatments.
I thought he was actually starting to move in but in the end I think this was just the bird from the neighboring bird house because he didn’t stay. Probably won’t have any real action until next season at this point.
Blink Mini 2 Version
September 3, 2024
I picked up the new Blink Mini 2 from Amazon because I wanted the ability to take a picture every hour once birds start building a nest and Amazon took this feature away from the original version. I deciede just to make another bird house becuase I needed to replace the 2 other old ones that were on my shed. Plus it turns out this new camera is slightly bigger so I need to print a new camera tube anyway.
The viewing angle of this camera is wider too so the camera tube had to be longer to stick down into the birdhouse to keep the side windows and front door vent out of the frame.
While I was at it I added an inside flange just to cover up the roof hole so no bugs could get up in there. (I did have some wasps coming in and out of the original house.)
Another upgrade was to frost the windows and make inside guards to hopefully keep the babies from trying to get out through the side windows.
To help keep wasps and moths out I also added a screen guard to the door.
Hopefully this will keep them from crawling in from the roof.
I also added a printed top guard to keep any water off the top of the back piece to increase the birdhouses life span. (everything is secured with silicone.)
I also made a plug cap just encase I ever have to remove the camera tube for maintenance.
Here is birdhouse number 2 ready for it’s new family. (this one replaced the center house that was still in use last season.)
I put the camera in the opposite way on this one just to be able to tell the footage apart.
I did make a third replacement but there is no camera in that one. (I guarantee that one will get used first. 🙂 )
Bird Nest Build (45 Days in 15 minutes)
The action in the bird house started sooner than I imagined, I thought for sure nothing would start happening until next spring.
To be Continued … next season.
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