My £50 polytunnel from eBay

I think the only seams in the covering are at the ridge and around the perimeter of the end panels, and did wonder how covers would stand up to winter gales, even thinking about removing the cover over winter.

This could be a combination of degradation caused by lack of hot spot tape plus friction from wind - I've sea fished enough to see what wind does to well constructed flags - but as both the vertical and horizontal poles touch the cover applying hot spot tape is an expensive option.

Perhaps some anti-hot spot tape (or even thin slitted pipe insulation) applied retrospectively to the poles in the most vulnerable locations would extend the life of the cover. Where do the worst areas of wear occur?

 

I bought my hotspot tape from here,quick degrease of metal work and away i went 4 rolls to cover a 4.5x2 later version
1 x 25mm x 9mt Anti hotspot-Polytunnel/Greenhouse Tape on eBay (end time 10-Aug-11 18:55:18 BST)

 

That's a good price, and I'll definately use that on my 6 x 3m tunnel (where only the hoops are in contact with the cover), before eventually repacing with 'proper' polytunnel plastc sheeting, but for the smaller tunnels with so much more metalwork to cover, it may not be cost effective as a replacement polytunnel cover is about twice the cost of that tape.

 

ahh but it might make the covers last longer?

 

Suppliers only claim an extra year out of it, but I've found a 4 pack of tape from that seller for £12.74 incl P&P which makes it seem worthwhile. 4 x 25mm x 9mt Anti hotspot-Polytunnel/Greenhouse Tape | eBay

Thanks for your link, I can remember looking through some of their stuff some time ago, but I think it was for seaweed fertilizer but 10l of Maxi-crop was cheaper from elsewhere for £38, but their 1m wide woven polypropylene weed control barrier is a great price and I'll be using quite a bit of it (50m roll) to cover the ground around the external perimeter of my 3 tunnels when they're all up.

As it's only £17 more for an extra 50m of that barrier, it makes me wonder about using on top of beds in the tunnel to cut down evaporation and watering where growing plants like tomatoes that could be grown through holes as I do with my outdoor toms. As it's situated away from home where I have no water other than what I take with me (collected rainwater is never enough) anything to cut down watering will be a great help.

 

An update from the 28th June.......

Then:



Today:

 

Superb effort, hope you get excellent yields

 

See this on another thread reminded me that I'd never posted how I both increased the headroom in my polytunnel and used raised beds without losing any growing height:

I probably should have responded to Steve's comment back on the first page of this thread:

Basically what I did was raise the whole thing up by 100mm and also raised the ground around the outside by 100 mm:

 

Wouldn't you get the same effect by just digging the path out?

Steve...

 

Not quite, as surface water moves horizontally through the topsoil above the heavy clay subsoil after heavy/prolonged rain, filling any hole/low area full of water and this would flood any sunken path. It would also mean the plytunnel beds would no longer be raised, so they would be waterlogged over winter and very often into very late spring just like all the surrounding land.. This is something i'm familiar with in an 'inherited' shed with a mud floor at ground level that gets sodden over winter/spring.

After adding topsoil/compost/manure/etc. to growing areas, increasing the depth, I've also had to increase the height of the paths between them to stop them becoming flooded, impassable sumps after heavy rain, not just by the depth of rain that's fallen but much, much more that's run out of the adjoining topsoil. Wells I've dug have filled with water immediately after heavy rain the same way.

So putting it on stilts 'lake dweller' style seemed the best (only?) option.

 

As my last pic was Aug 17th last year, I thought I'd add a few more to show a full year.

6th October 2011 - Tomato plants up to the ridge:



1st Nov 2011 - Time for some occasional paraffin heating



29th Nov 2011 - Frost finally killed the toms, but luckily I'd picked the lot the afternoon before (lasted until Christmas) so I didn't bother trying to heat the night of that frost:



And yesterday, every available bit of space stuffed with plants:

 

Hehe, I dont see a plank hanging from the ridge with plants lined up along it.. ;-) There's some more space to fill for you.

Well done Scrungee, I've been trying to get hold of some of those blue or black mushroom trays...they are like hens teeth around here.

Steve...

 

I've got 2 planks notched at the ends which fit across the path and are supported at the ends by the raking vertical timbers. They're intended as seats but have been used for auxillary space. I've also got a board that goes across the top of the water barrel. I would put staging across the end but I grow cucumbers up there.

I get mine from a local hotel/restuarant but there doesn't seem to be many left out for me these days. The deeper tomato boxes (not the big veg crates) as on RH side of 29 Nov pic have all but dissapeared. I think it's due to lots of imported stuff now comes in cardboard boxes. And they don't last forever as I've chucked a few brittle ones away this week.

 

Added some more removable staging across the end - I can now get approx. 100 seed trays in there (and that's excluding what can be temporarily laid on the borders):

 

You've missed some space Scrungee!



Suspend a plank from the roof, good place to get peas going...out of the reach of Mice.

Steve...