Hanging whole cow Elk

[tlgeorge19]

So I'll be hanging a whole cow elk in my garage to age a little bit. Is 1 eye bolt and a pully going to be enough to support it? I always quarter my elk so curious about hanging 1 whole one would be safe for my garage or not. Thanks!

 

[Wrench]

1 eye bolt isn't enough information. Are we talking a legit shouldered eye bolt, lag eye bolt? Grade, size and what is it supported by?

 

[Maverick1]

1 eye bolt isn't enough information. Are we talking a legit shouldered eye bolt, lag eye bolt? Grade, size and what is it supported by?

One eye bolt directly into the drywall should work fine!

 

[tlgeorge19]

1 eye bolt into the joist/truss. If not 1 then 2 into separate joists. Don't know much about eye bolts but it is going to have to be screw in.

 

[Geewhiz]

I know from experience that 2 eye bolts with wood threads (no nuts) screwed into the bottom of different trusses will support a whole mature cow elk. At least it did for me.

 

[Wrench]

You're looking at 300ish pounds static weight for a skinned and gutted cow. Pulling and such will add dynamic load.

My advice is to put a 2x4/6 across a couple trusses and use a machine threaded eye bolt at 3/8" minimum.

A bolt directly in the bottom chord of the truss sounds like a good way to make a mess. You could sister a piece beside it to drill through....but spanning joists will be better and easier in every way.

 

[Wrench]

A shared load like geewhiz posted would make me feel much better.

Eye bolts don't side load well and a single one is going to get worked in every direction.

 

[Geewhiz]

You're looking at 300ish pounds static weight for a skinned and gutted cow. Pulling and such will add dynamic load.

My advice is to put a 2x4/6 across a couple trusses and use a machine threaded eye bolt at 3/8" minimum.

A bolt directly in the bottom chord of the truss sounds like a good way to make a mess. You could sister a piece beside it to drill through....but spanning joists will be better and easier in every way.

I concur.

 

[Dirtscoots]

If your trusses are exposed maybe choke or basket two slings with two different pulleys? Splits the load and you aren’t drilling. I have extensive rigging at my disposal though I guess could be a complicated or expensive solution if that isn’t the case.

 

[def90]

Exposed joists/trusses? If so run a board across two joists and mount the eye bolt to that.

 

[tlgeorge19]

Nothing is exposed there's sheetrock there. Couple things to try! Thank you

 

[swMontanaHunter]

A field dressed cow elk could range anywhere from 275 to 375 lbs. I wouldn't trust just one lag-type eye bolt.

 

[TuckTruck]

This was a young bull I got last year. I have a long 2x6 spanning 6 trusses that ive installed 5 3/8” machine threaded eye bolts in with large washers. I wouldn’t hang a whole elk on one bolt. But as you can see, each bolt will hold half of an elk. This year I got a larger mature cow and did the same thing and it held up fine again.