2011 Haunted House With Help From Instructables Posters

Halloween is our favorite time of the year, we are already planning for our 2012 Haunt ! We begin the actual build of our Haunted House in September, a couple of hours each night and a lot of long weekends and fast food meals later we get the thrill of scaring hordes of people. We started over 15years ago when my kids felt they were to old to trick or treat, so we had a party for the teens and they came out to scare the trick or treaters. Each year after that we added more and more props, adding portable carports to enlarge our fun areas until this year where we have somewhere around 3000 square feet and 20+ actors.

A lot of this years Haunt was built with used privacy fence for walls and roofing (a green haunt!) and of course my piles of possibilium, the rest is built from carports and plastic like you can see in my previous haunted house posts.

 Throughout this "ible" I will refer to halls and tunnels, in this case the two words are interchangeable.

BEHOLD the Portal ! You may have seen my Wall teaser "ible" if not here's the link, https://www.instructables.com/id/halloween-wall-teaser/ , the finished piece is blacklight reactive and looks eerie when lit. The drawbridge/portal gate is a prop originally inspired by another "ible", over the years we used a battery powered winch but this year we recycled an old garage door opener and it works FANTASTIC. In front of the gates sits my "throne"  an electric chair my son and his father in law built several years ago, my book of the undead stands next to me on a podium, which does double duty through the year as an easel in my studio. The flying vampire is a life size barbie I found several years ago on the curb

Once over the drawbridge and through a short tunnel you enter an open hallway, before you is a 20x20' portable carport with recycled fencing walls and a couple of decorated hallways that end at a doorway.

Open the door and you enter the skull trophy room, you get another look at our recycled fence walls and all the shelves that are made from recycled materials, https://www.instructables.com/id/Skull-room-shelves/ , go thru the next door and your in mom and pops final resting place, the coffins are recycled boxes faux painted to resemble wood, the baby coffin is made from foam-core board.

Up to the skull room our patrons are alone, in the skull room they pick up a guide, once out of the final rest area the scares begin, 1st you see one of my storage sheds wall with a demon leering down at you and then into a skeleton and spiderweb lined hall with one or 2 actors, from there your into a dark tunnel whose walls are padded with recycled carpet padding that has been soaked with water, some baling twine hangs from the ceiling and is also wet. Beyond the dark tunnel is a small room with a toe-pincher casket my son built years ago as our entrance door, this year it pops open and an actor jumps out.

Leaving the casket scare you walk down a curtain draped hall lit with strobe and black lights, a fluorescent skull spider is painted on the end wall and another short hallway leads you to the next scare

Various types of pvc and metal pipes make up the torture chambers bars, various electronic props distract you from the actual actor in the shadows until he jumps out and slams into the bars. Another short tunnel lined with recycled manikins leads to the truck scare.

Once you enter this door it is slammed behind you, the walls are lined with bodies (more recycled manikins) and an exit door is marked on the end wall ( it doesn't work) your guide is grabbed and when she screams, you turn to see the back of my 18' cargo van that is used for storage, the door flies up and the guide is pulled towards the flashing lights and running saws, she screams "open the door, open the door", but you CAN'T, its nailed SHUT ! The guides throat is cut and you are splashed with blood (a small bulb of water is held along with the knife) a helpful spirit opens a section of the wall and you can escape !

You have escaped the trap ! A hallway stands in front of you but WAIT, half way down a panel pops open and a ghoul screams at you, we had to reinforce the wall opposite the panel because grown men where jumping into it and knocking it around ! At the end of the hall stands a "working" guillotine, the plywood "blade" is backed with heavy steel plates to give a really loud THWACK as it hits, a short open area leads you into what we call the spider tent

Before you stands a white plastic wall, giant shadows pace back and forth demanding body parts while blood and guts strike the wall, as you walk down the hall the shadow disappears and you enter a dark room filled with hanging bodies,(more recycled manikins) fog and a cold breeze provided by a recycled bounce house fan, an actor hides in a dark corner waiting for the right time to scare someone in your group, out of the meat locker and into a ghastly bathroom where another actor beseeches you for help and begs you not to go any further, a few more props hang from the ceiling of the next hall and then your into the demented dokterz play area.

Leaving the dokter you're greeted by a re-purposed Santa in a demonic mask and cape, a variety of packaged body parts lay in a bin along the wall, through the doorway lays a maze of blowing plastic with fluorescent splatters and CLOWNS, lots of clowns ! Hanging clowns, pirate skeletons re-purposed as clowns and 2 live clowns, one 4' tall and one well over 7' with his wig, from there you enter the graveyard, an ice chest fog chiller keeps the fog down near the ground.

The demon daycare may be our most discussed room, not because of its scare, its more creepy than scary but because my 7month old grandson is part of it. With both parents being actors and no babysitter we designed this room with the baby in mind and he LOVES it! Most of the furniture in here is curb rescue and then there is my casket baby swing which you can see the beginning of at, https://www.instructables.com/id/short-toepincher-casket/ , the top beam is simply carved Styrofoam, the swing is from a discarded air conditioner screen and the chain wraps around a piece of broom handle, it does swing but isn't motorized. Creep around the butler and you sigh in relief THERE'S the exit !
But wait.... Whats this? A chalkboard asking if we scared you?
You go to make your mark on the board and the girl behind it pulls a pin, the chalk board drops and she releases a blood curdling screeeech.. this "final" startle scare got every group, even those just walking past had the "chalkboard" drop because there's a hole the actor can see through.  NOW you are done right.? ..maybe not, sometimes the clown and or a zombie gets you as you step thru the door ! Or Michael Meyers may chase you down the street or that zombie hiding down between the parked cars...

Well that's it for 2011 = (
We had a great time scaring folks and even though pics can not do the Haunt justice, We hope that you enjoyed the tour of our Haunted House...Only 364 days until HALLOWEEN ! ! !