I need to cut a hole in my wall

Aren't cat flaps cut into doors traditionally? Sounds a bunch easier than through a wall?

Chain drilling+bolster or an angle grinder - latter is going to be very messy.

A bricks width missing from the wall isn't going to be missing - your windows take out a lot more 😉 Try and make sure the hole has two half bricks on top so they're supported by weight on the ends still in the wall.

Also what sort of insulation is it? Might need careful cutting too to avoid too much damage. And make sure you don't breach the damp proof course.

100% your cat won't use it if you do go to all that trouble!

It'll be a cat tunnel not a flap - to your cat there will be all kinds of scary shit lurking inside! 🤣

Couldn't you put it in a window and just use a ramp?

anyway, are cat flaps the new Mercedes? will there be pictures? (please let there be pictures)

How much time do I have to get the popcorn before you start?

Aren’t cat flaps cut into doors traditionally? Sounds a bunch easier than through a wall?

Yes, but the door is a double glazed unit, and ordering another one of those is going to a) cost loads and b) take several weeks to fit and we need this so we can leave our cat at home for our holiday and we forgot to organise it in good time. Plus it means we can still keep the kitchen warm with the heavy curtain in the winter.

Couldn’t you put it in a window and just use a ramp?

Oof don't, we've been through every possible combination a thousand times!

100% your cat won’t use it if you do go to all that trouble!

And you!

@wwaswas ah yes. I was thinking of borrowing one of those hand held drill/chopper things like a mini pneumatic drill, but I do already have an angle grinder with an appropriate disc. That might save 60% of the chopping work.

A bricks width missing from the wall isn’t going to be missing – your windows take out a lot more

They have a lintel though! Fairly sure I don't have cavity wall insulation and the DPC is safe. Good tips though thanks.

21mm masonry drill applied to the cat should have the problem solved in seconds. I give you that it's going to be a bit messy but hardly worse than than all the dust drilling through the wall will create.

anyway, are cat flaps the new Mercedes? will there be pictures?

It'll either go ok or my house will collapse, so you'll see it on the news.

hardly worse than than all the dust drilling through the wall will create.

House is that dusty already you won't notice.

Fairly sure I don’t have cavity wall insulation

Only fairly sure? - some of it is made of little loose polystyrene balls you know...

Dig through the floor, under the wall, and make it a proper tunnel.

Your cat can wear baggy trousers to disguise the disposal of dirt across the lawn.

but I do already have an angle grinder with an appropriate disc. That might save 60% of the chopping work.

They create an unbelievable amount of dust that gets everywhere. Alright if you're cutting in an empty shell of a house not so much if you've got anything in the house / room. I put an angle grinder through a single skin brick conservatory many years ago for a dog flap. It was horrendous.

You'll spend longer clearing up than knocking out with a bolster.

I was thinking of borrowing one of those hand held drill/chopper things like a mini pneumatic drill

If you have the option to borrow a core drill with a clutch and a 102mm bit, defo 100% do. So much easier, hardly any mess, cut through both inner and outer brick/block work at the same time and leaves a neat finish to both brick/block faces

You could prob hire all the kit for a day for not much more than £35

molgrips

Yes, but the door is a double glazed unit, and ordering another one of those is going to a) cost loads and b) take several weeks to fit and we need this so we can leave our cat at home for our holiday and we forgot to organise it in good time.

Probably too late, but you can probably just get a new door skin, rather than a completely new door. That's assuming it's uPVC.
It's what we did when we had our windows and doors done; got the door skin replaced with a new one with a plain lower half.
It was then dead easy to cut a hole in and fit the cat flap.

Much cheaper than a while new door

Is there a shed you can put a flap in and make it comfy for the cat?

You've just as much chance of teaching it to go into the shed as teaching it to wriggle through the [b]tunnel of dooooooom![/b]

👹👹🙀🙀

Most fun way is to use a petrol driven cut off saw thingy. I cut a doorway using one.

SDS drill, big masonry bit, chain drill it. Only got one brick thickness to go through.

Switch to the SDS chisel bit to knock out the bits between the chain drilling.

Make sure you protect yourself from silica dust!

Do a diamond pattern with a vent pipe drill bit? Think Hatton Garden robbery...

https://www.screwfix.com/p/erbauer-diamond-core-drill-bit-127mm/1313v

They create an unbelievable amount of dust that gets everywhere. Alright if you’re cutting in an empty shell of a house not so much if you’ve got anything in the house / room. I put an angle grinder through a single skin brick conservatory many years ago for a dog flap. It was horrendous.

Hmm yes.. but, I can do the exterior bricks before I do the inside, and the interior can be done with a hand saw.

Hire a 9in grinder
Buy a 9in diamond blade
Soak bricks 3 or 4 times around area.
Sharpie marker square on wall.
Have at it with grinder
Amaze youself at your grinding prowess and the blades ability to slice through bricks like lurpack from the fridge.
Drill through each coner of the thermal blocks then either sds stitch or bolster the square out.
Fit catflap and render 5.1 mix 3parts soft, 2 parts sharp, 1 part cement around hole.

Probably too late, but you can probably just get a new door skin, rather than a completely new door. That’s assuming it’s uPVC.
It’s what we did when we had our windows and doors done; got the door skin replaced with a new one with a plain lower half.
It was then dead easy to cut a hole in and fit the cat flap.

Much cheaper than a while new door

Even better, can you not just replace the lower glazed panel with a UPVC filler panel?

Again, that would be my solution and would mean you wouldn't need a heavy curtain top cover a cold door 😉

Failing that just forget about it and hide the cat in TJ's trailer when he visits.

(but yes, start from the outside and work in, if you have a sabre saw you can cut the block with that and an appropriate blade)

Its double french doors, both sides are all glass, one piece.

Is it one off the pet porte micro chip ones?

I think ours was just done with a drill and bolster but we had no kitchen in at the time so it wasn't really a job that needed to be neat.

I chain drilled a cat flap hole in a cavity wall. I was able to position the hole under a full brick which was supported either side by other bricks. Not the cleanest of holes be once the plastic external frame of the cat flap was installed it looks ok.
Cat likes it.

If it is needs to be in quickly, and only temporality, open a window fully (or even remove the glazed bit), cut a piece of ply to fit, then put the cat flap in that. Secure the ply in to the opening using whatever modesty blocks/screws work.

We have done this on a semi-permanent basis with a sash window. The wood is painted to match the window frames, and we have fixed the sash closed around the ply.

Is it one off the pet porte micro chip ones?

Cat Mate but chipped yes.

Just open the door when moggy want's in or out?

Just open the door when moggy want’s in or out?

Hmm I never thought of that!

Have you done it yet? It's a two hour job, tops.

You already got the kit to chain drill and chisel, and a hand saw, so I understand.

Weekend. Someone's offered to lend me an SDS drill and chisel bits, which is what the chap on the YouTube vid I watched was using.

I'm going to have to move this outside plug as well.

Google self corbelling brickwork. Chop a whole brick out as the Cat Mate box illustration shows. Hammer and bolster chisel will do and then complete the shape in the course(s) below
Cat Mate make an extension tunnel, but I made something similar in wood (£13 for a bit of plastic was a bit rich). The wooden tunnel has the advantage that you can fill any gap between a whole brick width and the cat flap width. It also gives you something to screw into easily
Two things to watch:
polystyrene insulation (drill a 13mm hole in the mortar first to check)
cable chase for the socket on the inside wall

Well, yeah, I need 5 of those plastic extension sections, that's fifty quid. So yeah it probably is worth making my own. Just need something that'll be unaffected by water; since the door goes on the inside the tunnel is exposed.

Across the road are renovating a shell of a 50's house and expanding it x2. They've basically rebuilt a bigger house retaining two walls. they cut the holes for new windows in the front wall with the only tool (apart from a pneumatic hammer) they seem to own, a disc cutter. My god the mess, it rained dust everywhere. Without water to damp down the mess.

Fit it in a door or don't bother.

You need a hilti DD350 and a 250mm diameter core bit.

That'll sort ya out.

I've drilled 12m deep 76mm diameter holes through bridges with them. Can't go wrong. Go big or go home.

I didn't bother with the tunnel extensions. I tidied up the brick with some mortar and sealed off the cavity.

I replaced the bottom panel (unglazed unlike the top half of the door, but the principle still holds) in the back door with a flat insulated door panel of the correct thickness. I think I had to cut it to size to fit my door, which was a task of similar difficulty to cutting the hole in it for the cat flap. It was probably a 20 minute job after sourcing the panel. I'd have put a glazed panel in the attic just as easily as I put the original door panel, ready to refit post-cat.

I see this wouldn't work for you though. Have you considered having an indoor cat?

I just installed a cat flap on Tuesday…but it was in a UPVC door, which my jigsaw went through like a knife through butter!
(Makes me realise, forget thieves trying to break a lock… an 8mm drill and a sharp jigsaw, and just cut out a HUMAN flap!!

Anyway… good luck with the brickwork…. COre drill and SDS Chisel attachment w=should square out that circle!

DrP

Shed is the answer. Or in our case, summerhouse. Catflap in door. Cat sleeps there every night all year. Only allowed in the gouse when we are in.

He has an electric blanket in his bed for the colder months.

I can't believe you're thinking of cutting a hole in the wall just for a cat.
Madness 🤷🏻‍♂️

We had one put in a double glazed door really quickly and cheaply. We had two glazed panels in the door, and the local DG company replaced the lower panel with a uPVC panel and fitted the catflap in that. Cost about £50 about 10 years ago.

Have World class accident and molgrips ever met? This is something we all want to see ( from a distance). Imagine the jolly japes

When I was a kid the house had a round tunnel through the utility room wall for our dryer vent pipe to be shoved through. When we got a cat it found it and used it fine. It had to sort of dive through but did it happily and with no problems. The tube emerged in a glass lean to greenhouse thing and dad decided to fit a flap to the door of that rather than leave the door open.... Cat didn't agree.... Door with flap got left open.

I had this problem but couldn't bring myself to permanent ruin the brickwork outside the house. In the end I stick drilled into the attached garage and then put a second flap on the garage door. Really glad I did that as one cat subsequently went blind so he can access his litter trays in the garage but not go outside unsupervised.

i put a hole into garage and built a timber 'bedroom' for cats worked well restricting access into garage , they only used it a bit... for removing bricks i can recommend a screwfix mortar rake bit to fit to angle grinder, works better if you can reduce/control speed on angle grinder virtually no airborne dust and quite controllable.

I can’t believe you’re thinking of cutting a hole in the wall just for a cat.

TBF he's cutting a hole in the wall for a holiday.

Is this going to end up like the car thread? A quick job before your holiday and you had to panic-buy a new car, this time you return to find the house has collapsed and are panic-buying a new house?

It would surely be easier to dump the cat and get a new one after the holiday.

Are all the cat kennels in S. Wales booked up? Might be easier than a hole in the wall.

Other than that chain drilling I found easier and less messy than large diameter core drill unless you have v. fancy professional quality gear. Don't need a 20 mm bit though 10 or 12 mm bit takes less than half the time per hole and is easier to control in my DIY experience. Probably worth buying a new, sharp, 12 mm bit of decent quality for the job as it will spall less.

Good luck and remember this one doesn't even have a warranty 😉

Flippin eck.

- There's no shed

- The garage is no place for a cat, and it's at the front of the house where she's scared to go.

- She wants to come and go all the time, I'm not getting up every 20 minutes all night to open the door.

- They are French doors, you know, big windows that open like doors. There's no PVC panel, they are all glass and there aren't two sections. Two sections would look really weird. As windows they have full length curtains which would have to be left open for a cat flap to work.

- We don't want to keep her indoors all the time. Being a very very timid rescue cat she took ages to feel comfortable outside and now she does she gets proper stimulus and freedom and isn't bored shitless all the time begging to be played with. So being outside is good for her. And no, she's not killing wildlife, she's far too timid for that, and doesn't go outside the bounds of our tiny garden except to hide under next door's van.

- Further to that, if we bundle her into a cat box and leave her with strangers in a cattery that's going to really set her back so we need to avoid that if possible. But we cannot put 2 weeks' worth of litter trays out so catflap it is. She's just learning to do her business outside now.

- I've cut bricks, tarmac and concrete already during the course of the garden renovation, dust is under control I know how to do that part.

Anything else?

Pics of the cat?

The only place I could fit a catflap was in a bifold door. Ended up replacing a whole large glass pane for one made with a hole in it for the catflap. Cost £300 and took a week to manufacture and fit but works really well.

Final option, if it's just time that is stopping you getting the glazed panel ordered and cut for the flap, temporarily fit a solid panel into one door or a sheet of OSB.

Anything else?

If that's the state of the cat, then honestly, you all going away and leaving to fend for itself it is going to have the same effect as bundling it off to a cattery, if it's that nervous. Have you thought of a stay-cation this year? you could do day trips and you can maybe just not have to build the cat-tunnel in such a rush?

Have World class accident and molgrips ever met?

This is the STW equivalent of "Never cross the streams" in Ghostbusters and must never happen

edit: this is why I don't have pets, I love the idea of a dog or cat, but the reality of them is catteries and kennels or persuading a neighbour to come around and feed and water it, or having to deal with another thing's shit...

Anything else?

Holds breath for an "I need to buy an automatic refrigerated cat feeder" thread 😉

I bought an automated, wi-fi connected cat feeder and it is pretty good. Uses the tuya smart home app. Only dry food. So water needs to be topped up inside the house, otherwise the cat can exit via the cat flap to drink rain water out of a trough.

Pics of the cat?

https://glamorganstar.co.uk/fifi-has-her-eye-on-a-new-home/

this is why I don’t have pets, I love the idea of a dog or cat, but the reality of them is catteries and kennels or persuading a neighbour to come around and feed and water it, or having to deal with another thing’s shit

Same reasons I didn't want one either.

If that’s the state of the cat, then honestly, you all going away and leaving to fend for itself it is going to have the same effect as bundling it off to a cattery, if it’s that nervous. Have you thought of a stay-cation this year? you could do day trips and you can maybe just not have to build the cat-tunnel in such a rush?

It's a fair comment. She's been on her own several times for a few days at a time and was ok. The only concern I have is if she will get used to the cat flap in good time to use it. We're going to have to get a neighbour involved at some level I think.

Yup definitely, if only to check on food/water.

To those wondering if the cat will use the tunnel, a liberal application of sudocrem should help

In all seriousness, we have a Sureflap cat flap for our two cats and we put it in, it took them some time to get used to coming through it.

Because of the shroud that houses the microchip detector, it is quite a 'deep' tunnel & they were quite nervous about coming through at first.

It also makes a 'clack' when the solenoid releases which startled them. We ended up taking the batteries out & taping it open for a day or so, to get them used to going through it. Once they were used to that, we then stuck batteries in & dropped the flap down. They got the idea pretty quickly.

Regarding feeding while away - we have some rotating feeders which are good for 3 days if set to open twice a day (they have 6 food bays).
We could have it only rotate once a day & it would probably still be OK, so could get away with a week away.

These are the ones we got:

rotating cat feeder

The set-up is a bit fiddly with the small LCD, but it's OK. Just keep the instructions safe.

I am a bit concerned about her getting used to going through the tunnel. We already have the feeder - it's got a big hopper and stores tons of food.

Make sure the lid of the hopper absolutely, 100% guaranteed, cannot be levered, hooked, clawed or bitten open.

Once went to a neighbours house to check on their darling furball to find it had managed to get into the hopper and eaten rather a lot more of the food than planned.

The hopper is now filled and then taped shut.

I've had a hole cut in my wall to fit a cat flap. Even worse, we sacrificed half a kitchen base unit to allow for the cat flap access. It's worked really well and avoids having an ugly cat flap in a glass door.

Not sure what happens when the cat pegs it though.

We did just this as part of Kitchen reconfiguration.

We moved his existing SureFlap from the side door of the house, we moved the location to another side of the house (so he's not existing straight into an open area so still feels safe), but still accessed from the kitchen and used extenders through a block and brick wall.

We designed this im, with a cupboard above the new cat flap site, so it's neatly integrated into the new kitchen design and he has an area under the cupboard for bed and food, so it's his new 'place' so to speak.

The cats 4 years old and took to it straight away, even through he has to crawl to get to and fro as it’s a mini tunnel.

Otherwise our only option would have been to include it in the glass bi fold door which is ugly and costly.

What spooky said above - for the holiday get a plywood panel in one of the doors (very easy - just pop the window beading out) and put the catflap in that (very easy - especially if you do it with the panel flat before you fit it). Also gets the cat used to a catflap without trashing your house.

And if you do end up going the brickwork route, go easy with the SDS hammer action. What feels like knife through butter from one side probably just means you've blown half the brick out the back face rather than drilling a clean hole......

Thought this might help…..Coredrill

Put a flap in the side door to the garage for ours back in march, a week before we were away. She's a confident outdoorsy cat but always comes home to sleep and eat. Could not get her to use the cat flap on the way in. Absolutely no way. Left her inside a few times and she will always just go out through it but refuses to go back in.

She has a wee outdoor shed box she prefers.

Stupid clever animals.

Cutting a hole in the house - that cat is never gonna use it

Job done. I wish I had not lost my brick chisels as cutting a fine edge with the SDS drill was impossible. Lines all over the place as a consequence, the outside hole is very ragged. Lots of adjustments to it which took ages. Also the exterior cover is only very slightly larger than the hole you need and the drill holes are right next to the line. It's impossible to cut bricks accurately enough and even if you did there's only going to be mmms of material left to drill into. Anyway, sealant has filled that gap in and stuck the cover to the wall. Expanding foam to help seat it.

Not one hour after finishing, the cat has used it. She wanted to go out, my daughter blocked the door and held the flap open and she went straight out. I hadn't even made a ramp to access the outside bit.

My attempt (into garage). If outside I would have used an angle grinder to do the initial neat cuts but I didn't want to cover everything in the garage with brick dust. Standard flap fitted into a housing that contains an intumescent curtain to maintain fire/smoke protection between garage and house. Expensive but not that bad when you cost up several tunnel sections.

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Nice outside cover there.  I've got the same through brickwork but the outside looks a mess as I never got round to sourcing a nice outside cover

I'm not sure it's suitable for outside, I think their main market is flats where people want to put a flap through a front firedoor into a communal hallway.

It's from Envirograf.com (custom cut to required size) but it's not perfect, the screw holes are extremely close to the aperture you need (one fixing is epoxied in) and they cut the aperture for the flap I chose too high so I had to trim the top of the cat flap fascia.

I wonder what Colin Fur(ze) would have come up with to suit the brief 🤔😂 I

Job done.

Cool, although, no pictures? Is disappoint.

I could have taken pics of the messy exit hole, I suppose. My first time cutting walls and using an SDS drill. I think the angle grinder to start with for the neat cuts would have been a much better idea as per Spooky.

I went to a great deal of trouble building an outdoor cat shed. All properly constructed the way you'd do large shed construction,60mm thick stud partition walls, internal insulation, damp proofing membrane, 3 proper windows of varying heights, a slight slope to the roof to allow cat to laze on top and clad the entire thing in shed felt. Basic cat flap at the front. Floor laid in 10mm thick foam matting

Roof hinged at one end in case of emergencies.

Installed it in the bushes in an area cat likes to hang about.

.

NOT USED IT ONCE

It probably cost 3 or 4 times buying an outdoor cat shed would cost due to construction methods, insulation etc