KATroutman13
Member
As I said in one of my prior posts, I bought this Jones Dog Box for a song from a fella in New Jersey. He used it for labs and based on the size of the dogs in the photos he sent, they weren't fitting in my box. He had a new one on order and needed to move this one quickly, so everything aligned just right for me. While I'd certainly prefer to have a brand new box, after some sweat equity, time, and about 657,000 cuss words, fairly poor aluminum welding, she's ready to rock and roll.
What you can't see is that the box is now (or will be after two more pieces being added) insulated in the bottom, top, and front. I added interior lights and a flush mount water fill. Additionally, the box came with a water tank, but the tank did not gravity flow, it only worked off of a pump. So, I elevated the water tank underneath the boxes so that it will gravity feed and plumbed it in a manner where the pump will provide a pressurized water source for spraying out kennels.
As you will see from the photographs, when I bought the box it was technically a 6-hole, but it had those two massive holes in the back that really served very little use as they were too big for a bird dog to ride safely and comfortably and it wasted a ton of storage space. These boxes are designed as value units for municipalities' animal control -- not for bird dogs. So, I decided that I would turn it into a more traditional 6-hole topper.
I started by tearing out the divider in the rear as well as the sheeting covering the frame, the "trap" door and the sheet on the other side, giving me a clear path back. I then built a frame using 2 inch rectangle aluminum tube with 1/8" side walls. I was able to weld the 1/8" material somewhat successfully but also built support brackets that were riveted to the existing frame, just in case. I then decked the floor with .063 aluminum sheet. I was very surprised when I got on it how sturdy it was. I spent a lot of time on that deck doing a lot of moving around and it held my 200+lb body without issue. I placed leftover 2" rectangle tube as a "lip" on rear to keep items from sliding out.
After that I re-did and added the electrical. the original electric had the switches at the front because his dogs were too big to fit in there and it ran underneath the boxes itself, which worked okay, but left a lot of "loose" ends in the bottom of the box, didn't allow for easy grounding for the lights, etc. So, I moved the electrical into an existing square tube that ran the length of the box and put drops in for all of my lighting and fan to a place where dogs wouldn't have a chance to chew on the switches. I removed the large rectangular "conduit" in the front box as well.
Then it was insulation and sheeting of the interior boxes and adding LED interior lights. Each of those are 2 inch lights I purchased from Superbright LEDs. I had them in my prior wooden box and they took a lot of abuse and always lit up when there was power to them and their depth was just right for these boxes, after insulation and sheeting. The interior sheeting covering the insulation is .040 aluminum. It won't be incredibly dent resistant, but will do the job, is significantly cheaper than the .063, and doesn't add near as much weight (at some point the guys I use to help me load and unload it are going to say no).
What you can't see is that the box is now (or will be after two more pieces being added) insulated in the bottom, top, and front. I added interior lights and a flush mount water fill. Additionally, the box came with a water tank, but the tank did not gravity flow, it only worked off of a pump. So, I elevated the water tank underneath the boxes so that it will gravity feed and plumbed it in a manner where the pump will provide a pressurized water source for spraying out kennels.
As you will see from the photographs, when I bought the box it was technically a 6-hole, but it had those two massive holes in the back that really served very little use as they were too big for a bird dog to ride safely and comfortably and it wasted a ton of storage space. These boxes are designed as value units for municipalities' animal control -- not for bird dogs. So, I decided that I would turn it into a more traditional 6-hole topper.
I started by tearing out the divider in the rear as well as the sheeting covering the frame, the "trap" door and the sheet on the other side, giving me a clear path back. I then built a frame using 2 inch rectangle aluminum tube with 1/8" side walls. I was able to weld the 1/8" material somewhat successfully but also built support brackets that were riveted to the existing frame, just in case. I then decked the floor with .063 aluminum sheet. I was very surprised when I got on it how sturdy it was. I spent a lot of time on that deck doing a lot of moving around and it held my 200+lb body without issue. I placed leftover 2" rectangle tube as a "lip" on rear to keep items from sliding out.
After that I re-did and added the electrical. the original electric had the switches at the front because his dogs were too big to fit in there and it ran underneath the boxes itself, which worked okay, but left a lot of "loose" ends in the bottom of the box, didn't allow for easy grounding for the lights, etc. So, I moved the electrical into an existing square tube that ran the length of the box and put drops in for all of my lighting and fan to a place where dogs wouldn't have a chance to chew on the switches. I removed the large rectangular "conduit" in the front box as well.
Then it was insulation and sheeting of the interior boxes and adding LED interior lights. Each of those are 2 inch lights I purchased from Superbright LEDs. I had them in my prior wooden box and they took a lot of abuse and always lit up when there was power to them and their depth was just right for these boxes, after insulation and sheeting. The interior sheeting covering the insulation is .040 aluminum. It won't be incredibly dent resistant, but will do the job, is significantly cheaper than the .063, and doesn't add near as much weight (at some point the guys I use to help me load and unload it are going to say no).
