Definitely would not take long with plastic.... or wood.
For the suet holders...A design based around it isn't a bad idea. But in my experience, the holders they sell they tend to be kinda cheap and never quite close right. But it could just be the brands I'm familiar with? Also you need to be careful about how wide the bars are. Some of them aren't very close and I've seen a young guinea pig get stuck in one once when we tried using it to keep the hay a bit neater at a pet store I worked. Nothing serious though, we just had to help him squeeze his head back out after he calmed down