Can't say enough about this product.

I went with the extreme as I didn't think about the door and how many pulleys I was going to need to use. And it has the usb power function.

If you have neighbors (as I do) you can set the door opening to whatever time you want. (after the rooster would start crowing) and then using the light setting for the door is awesome, with the safeguard that it will shut by a specific time.

The only thing I would like to see changed on this is the ability to mount it upside down and the display be able to be rotated (electronically).

I may end up having to mount it upside down at some point, but would have been nice if that was an option on the display.

But you will not be disappointed, as this is a must have.

Very nice and strong door opener. Had a couple issues with the string breaking but found out it was rodents chewing it. Very reliable and if you remember that a flashing light means the batteries are dying you shouldn't have any issues. I go to bed knowing our chickens are safe behind a closed door. Also, in the morning the birds are let out in their run automatically. I love this thing!

UPDATE: Died at 7 months. Seems like the motor froze. String will not move at all. When I attempt to re-calibrate the door the screen just blanks out and does nothing. I will try to contact the company to ascertain warranty service and will update afterwards.

UPDATE 2: Contacted the company, a few emails later it was decided I needed to return the opener for repair/replacement. Well, the company is in the UK and mailing to the UK is not cheap, nor fast. Mailed 14 days ago and have not heard anything yet. Requested status update or information on the package arrival, but nothing heard back yet. Will update again later.

Was relatively easy to install other than the mounting phillip head screws were of soft metal and stripped easily (took me awhile to remove them - I knocked off one star for all that agravation). I replaced them with decent quality small decking screws I had around. Other than that things went well and the instructions were easy to follow. I set the unit up to use its built in light sensor to open at dawn and close at dusk. Was initially worried that the door may close before all the chickens had retired for the night but it closed well after they were all in and it has worked brilliantly for the 2 months we have had it running. My next worry is that we are now in the dead of winter with lots of snow and temps going down to 0 degrees F and that the chemistry in the 9v battery will fail, but so far no problems. It sure is nice not have to get up early on these cold winter morning to let the chickens out, and also not to worry if we aren't home at sunset to close the coop door. Before the ChickenGuard we lost a chicken to a predator that got into the coop at night before we had gotten home to close it..

Like many others, we have been opening and closing the chicken coop door manually at dawn and dusk. After reading a few reviews, we decided to give the ChickenGuard Premium Automatic door opener a try. Installation and setup of the door opener is easy. The bulk of time was spent on building the slider door - it took about an hour after getting the materials together. I used aluminum "U" channel from a local big box lumber store to make a rectangular "frame" for the door to slide up and down inside. The door panel is a simple plastic/poly cutting board. The finished door and frame were screwed onto the wall, outside the door. The opener is underneath a significant overhang at the top about 4 inches above the door frame, so the timer is the way to go for us (instead of light sensor). We don't have much of a predator problem. However, I will still be adding a larger "lip" to cover the bottom and keep prying paws out where the door closes. After a couple of days, it seems to work great; can't beat it.

Update 3/28/2018: The automatic door closer/opener is still working like a charm. The batteries last quite a long time. No problems or concerns a year after installing the unit.

First, I like this controller. Once I figured out the programming logic I found it worked well, seems well built, and should last a while. It's not perfect, however.

While I have had the controller for only a few days, it seems quite well made. While relatively expensive, it stands head and shoulders above other units. A few Summers of our brutal heat should tell the final story. I do have a few suggestions, however.

At this price, the instruction manual could be a bit more well written. Some steps and explanations are a bit murky (and I'm a computer type guy), and not all steps are illustrated. For example, it's not quite explicit that the Manual modes and Auto modes are mutually exclusive. The statement is a bit gray.
Also, for this price, I would expect the Manual buttons to override the Auto mode. If I'm working in the chicken pen it would be nice to have a Close or Open button without needing to reprogram the unit. Also, the AA batteries are kind of hokey. How about a 6V power jack in the unit so one could use a small 6v battery and solar charger, as an option? This would be inexpensive and there is plenty of room. Finally, I'm not a fan of string-like gaskets. A quality unit like this should have a pre-molded O-Ring to seal the box.