Greenhouse experiment concluded
Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2010 11:07 pm
In 2008 I bought a cheapish plastic covered greenhouse from ebay like one of these http://tinyurl.com/yyt2o33
At first I was pretty impressed - did the job, heated up well, looked reasonably sturdy etc.
By mid 2009 I was less so - the PVC plastic had started to degrade.. the nylon guy-rope cords had rotted and failed and it was leaking. By Autumn 2009 the little squares in the PVC has started to fall out letting the weather in and the heat out (i.e. pretty useless). By Winter 2009 it had blown over in a gale and mangled all the steel tubing.
Conclusion - these are good for no more than 12-18 months... a throw-away, disposable greenhouse. I doubt that I got the benefit of the purchase price back in tomatoes. (you can buy a lot of tomatoes for 50 quid)
I rescued much of the steel tubing staging stuff and now use it my "proper" greenhouse so it wasn't a complete loss.
I doubt I'll get the costs back of the proper greenhouse either but its so nice just have one.
At first I was pretty impressed - did the job, heated up well, looked reasonably sturdy etc.
By mid 2009 I was less so - the PVC plastic had started to degrade.. the nylon guy-rope cords had rotted and failed and it was leaking. By Autumn 2009 the little squares in the PVC has started to fall out letting the weather in and the heat out (i.e. pretty useless). By Winter 2009 it had blown over in a gale and mangled all the steel tubing.
Conclusion - these are good for no more than 12-18 months... a throw-away, disposable greenhouse. I doubt that I got the benefit of the purchase price back in tomatoes. (you can buy a lot of tomatoes for 50 quid)
I rescued much of the steel tubing staging stuff and now use it my "proper" greenhouse so it wasn't a complete loss.
I doubt I'll get the costs back of the proper greenhouse either but its so nice just have one.