Where can I find plans for a high greenhouse tunel that I can build for little money?

-- hector rodriguez (hector@wabcmail.com), January 11, 2002

Answers

How high do you need them? You might consider using several cattle panels bent up and over in a upside down U shape and held in place using t-post, or use cattle panels for a 4' high wall and then put U shaped cattle panel on top for the roof. You can buy large sheets of clear plastic from your local wally world for the cover.

-- r.h. in okla. (rhays@sstelco.com), January 11, 2002.

http://www.h2othouse.com/html/plans.html http://theurbanrancher.tamu.edu/cottage/greenhouse.html http://msucares.com/pubs/is941.htm

-- Laura (lauramleek@yahoo.com), January 11, 2002.

PVC pipe with the ends glued via "T" fittings to a base pipe and arched over to another base pipe with both bases imbedded into the ground works for a frame.

-- mitch hearn (moopups@citlink.net), January 12, 2002.

Hi Hector,

Invest in a conduit bender and either make single hoops out of a 10 foot section, or make larger hoops with more pieces and some couplers. You can either drive the ends into the ground, or build a wooden frame at the ground and you can attach the hoops to it with conduit hangers...I just bent 1/8 insh steel flat bar, because it wa sin my scrap pile. If you use the wood, you can attach the plastic to the wood with a batten and staples...I made a clamp for the plastic using aluminum channel and a piece of redwood ripped to fit inside it. I just wrapped the plastic around the batten and screwed it into the channel. If you want, you can even double skin ot and put a little blower on to inflate between the two layers. Inflated, and attached to pipes driven into the gorund, those structures survived a 70 mph spring gust in South Dakota.

I switched to metal conduit because my PVC hoops kind of rotted away in the sun....they got brittle and by the third winter they kind of shattered even in the wind at -20 or so. Right now galvanized conduit is not that much more expensive. Use heavy wall if you make it very high.

I can describe in better detail how we built these if you want.

Oscar

-- Oscar H. Will III (owill@mail.whittier.edu), January 12, 2002.