New greenhouse, pics!

[ninnymary]

Everything looks so nice and clean! I love how beautiful it looks. What did you plant in those beds? I'm assuming nothing tall like pole beans since they would be too hard to harvest. Where are you located?

Mary

 

[Smart Red]

Jellybean, you might find those 8 x 5 beds are a tad too deep to reach the middles once things get growing well. DH made several 10 ft raised beds for me that are 5 ft wide, I am pretty tall and have a long reach, but it is hard to tend the center 1 x 8 sections. I usually plant them with something that needs a long growing season and doesn't need a lot of attention.

You have a great looking greenhouse there. What did you decide on for ventilation?

 

[digitS']

Nice! You are really fitting these in well with your natural landscaping .

Ventilation. Yes, I have wondered what size hoop house could just make use of passive ventilation in the end walls. Of course, it would depend on outdoor temperatures and air movement but reasonable temperature and zero wind - how large could it be and keep things down to 5 or 10 degrees above the outdoors on a sunny afternoon?

The greenhouse has an exhaust fan but both my temporary hoop houses have only a door and about a 2' square window at the other end. One structure is 9' x 20'. The other is 8' x 12', with a 4' x 8' shed attached.

Air volume makes a difference. I think I'm really pushing it with the 9' x 20', even though it is only 5' high. The center path is excavated down a foot.

Orientation also makes a difference - north/south, east/west.

Steve

 

[bills]

Wow! That is a super looking home-made greenhouse.

My old one is on it's last legs. I had been seriously planning on a getting a new pre-fab one, but after seeing yours, I'm thinking maybe I should built one myself.

Could you please elaborate a little more on it's construction?
Like, how did you attach the cross pipes to one another, zip ties, wire? Do you need to protect the plastic from rubbing on these spots at all?
What diameter pipe was used, and why the two different types? I see you have some grey and some white.
How did you anchor the pipe to the base on either side, drill holes for it to slip into, or?
Can it handle a decent wind? Living close to the ocean we get some pretty strong winds from time to time, and I worry I might see it flying off over the horizon..

Mu current greenhouse has a lower vent window on one end, and a high vent window on the other. It creates a nice gentle flow of air via convection. My lower vent has vanes on it, so I can regulate the flow on cooler days. The entrance door is a dutch door, so on the really hot days I can open the top half of it, to vent it even faster. No shade covers are used. It may depend on what your growing, as to if they are needed or not.

 

[thistlebloom]

Your beds are very appealing Jellybean.
It seems a very pleasant atmosphere to work in. I like your whole setup.

 

[jellybean]

I just put a white shade cloth over the house as it was just getting too hot. Right now I'm just opening both doors in the daytime as I don't have vents on yet. The shade cloth is really helping with the heat. I have bush beans, tomatoes, onions, kale, carrots, eggplant and will add peppers. Some of those may not do well I know with more heat but since we get such late frost I planted some inside and some outside of some plants. If it doesn't excel it's not the end of the world. Outside I have planted peas, kale, spinach, broccoli, squash, turnips, radish, beets and a couple extra eggplant. I can reach the center of beds pretty easily, but I still put longer growing things inside like turnips that I will just harvest once. Also have blueberry bushes in pots. I started with a frame of 6"x6" lumber that my husband milled as I was going to drill holes and put the pipe into. Decided to just attach them to the inside instead. The ends I built a frame from 2x4s and put plywood over it, using home made metal pieces that screw into the frame so there were no rough spots the plastic would touch. I used wire to tie all the hoops together and covered those with poly tape to reduce rubbing.

I didn't want to buy much, the materials were in a junk pile someone left here. That's why there are two pvc pipes, I didn't have enough metal ones. It is 11mil plastic, and yes we get a lot of strong wind. So far it's stretched tight enough it doesn't flap around or anything and is very sturdy. One issue is the pipes are inside the frame, which leaves 6" of space between the pipe and plastic on the bottom of the sides. I will need to figure out some way to support the plastic when we get snow. I used polyfastener to attach the plastic. It's nice to keep from damaging the plastic and be able to reuse if taken off, but it is difficult and took two people to put up. Not as easy as I thought it would be. The shade cloth I just stretched out and stapled to the ends and the bottom frame.

 

[jellybean]

 

[thistlebloom]

I think your growing system shows a lot of ingenuity jellybean.

 

[Carol Dee]

Impressive!

 

[bills]

Thanks for the explanation of your construction methods. Nice that you had the materials on hand you could use. Wish I had a junk pile like that..lol

I have never heard of this "poly-fastener before, so I googled it. What a great system for attaching plastic to a framework!
I found this you-tube video if anyone is interested in how it works.
Still not clear though, what the seal is being pressed into. I gather it must be plastic with a groove already cut into it?

Quote-"One issue is the pipes are inside the frame, which leaves 6" of space between the pipe and plastic on the bottom of the sides. I will need to figure out some way to support the plastic when we get snow."

I see what you mean..What if you anchored the plastic on top of the 6x6 side base's, instead of off ot the outside, so it won't have that space you mention?
If you wrapped some of the excess plastic around say a 2x4, and in turn screwed them down all along the the top of the base beams. Doing this, you would get a good strong system for attaching the plastic, and fill in that space.
Snow then wouldn't be an issue, unless of course it gets really deep. If that is a possibility, you either have to regularly shovel aside what slides off, or support the plastic somehow. Maybe some thin plywood. or paneling, slipped between the plastic and the poles?