homemade green houses?

[birdbrain5]

i see pre-built green houses that are very nice and seem to be fairly reasonable on prices. but i was thinking of making my own A frame green house. just a small one. i was wondering if anyone has done this and could give me some tips on how you went about it. if i buy the regular plastic you find at lowes and cover it with that, should that be ok? i know it may not last thru winters and whatnot but with all my other projects going on i cant splurge for a nice green house. after materials im sure ill be coming close to the prices but this way i could chip away at it over a couple weeks until i got it done. any thoughts or ideas? thanks!

 

[jbowyer01]

I think you could build one pretty cheap using cattle panels. Theres a thread somewhere here on BYC using them as runs and greenhouses. I havent tried it yet but have plans to this spring. I know there is also a farming website that you can purchase the thick clear plastic pretty reasonably and it should last a while.

 

[nifftiness]

oh, good post! Im interested in peoples succsess with diy greenhouses to. I was thinking of making one out of old free shower doors or sliding glass doors of off craigslist?

 

[BlackBrookPoultry]

There is special greenhouse plastic you can buy to put over your frame. It lets the right amount of light in.

 

[Joz]

I live in New Orleans, where there is plenty of deconstruction/reconstruction of housing. We have 3 low-cost salvage resellers, and 2 or 3 upscale places that sell salvaged vintage building materials.

One of the low-cost places sells window sashes for $5 apiece. Some of the glass is broken, and some of the glazing isn't secure, but with some judicious picking over of the supply you can get some decent parts.

I've been wanting to buy a bunch of those window sashes and build a greenhouse on the side of my house with 'em.

 

[Junkmanme]

I built a hoophouse of 3/4 inch PVC. It worked fine. For a plastic covering, I just used 20' X 25' plastic from WalMart, about $12.00. (It will last about 4 months before the UV rays (Ultraviolet Light) from the Sun deteriorate it. The UV-treated stuff is much more expensive.

It was built of Scrap Wood, mostly....and 20 foot long sections of PVC.

I had 8 55-gal barrels of water inside to retain heat. It would stay 10 degrees F warmer than outside overnight.
I had to run a "Swamp-Cooler" in it during the day to keep the temperature down in the mid 80s.
(without the "Evaporative Cooler"...the temp would soar above 120 F.)

There are many different "plans" on the Internet for such "Hoophouses".

-Junkmanme-