Wind trashing my greenhouse

emmilou

My new pride and joy has taken a battering from the wind and panels keep getting blown out.
Last night me and hubby were out at 1.45 in the morning rescuing seedlings and panels (it must've been a right sight, us in our PJ's and with torches in the dead of the night creeping around the garden!:eek: )

Has anyone any answers as to how I can keep my greenhouse intact in high winds, can you get stronger clips to what the manufacturers supply?

The greenhouse is a Gardman twinwall poly carb, in hindsight maybe I should've saved for a more expensive model

Teacher2301

I brought a small 4 sheff greenhouse - guess what!!! Blew over - compost everywhere. It's not been my week (car failed MOT, screwed on a repayment and now the wind)...can't wait til the end.

susieb

i have one of the small 4 shelf ones, it survived but only because its tied to the fence!

Lotus-eater

Thats horrible, sorry to hear of your problems. I've bought a quite nice glass one that I'm very glad I haven't put up yet. I did think about the gardman one, but as I'm in a bit of a windy spot for this very reason didn't.
I know that doesn't help you, but what I did do was look into the problems of panels in polycarbonate greenhouses blowing out.
What I found is that some people have used silicon sealant to put the windows in and then screwed them in as well, I suspect a thin piece of wood down two sides would help. It depends on your frame of course, if you think its strong enough to take the extra holes, it will weaken it slightly.
What I had planned, if I got the gardman was to strengthen it with pieces of wood, I wasn't sure how to do it before I got it and saw the design, but in the end, even then I wasn't sure it would be strong enough.
Hope you get it sorted.

ukmike

Same thing happened to my new poly carb greenhouse.Put it all back together & used clear sticky plastic tape aroung all edges & onto frame.Seems solid now.

[Deleted User]

Join the club Mine is only a cheap one, I had even put a brick in it but the wind was so strong, it blew it over. Luckily I only had potatoes in it, but still...

alanobrien

For the wind to blow out panels its either in an exposed area or the polycarb may not have been fitted on its seals well enough. The seal is the rubber strip that goes under the polycarb panel. What happens if they are not seated properly is that the wind gets under the seal and lifts the panel up - you know the rest. You may want to add more clips to lock the panels down tighter, these can be bought cheaply off ebay.

twink

i have a 10 by eight foot greenhouse which is quite sturdy but at the end of the growing season i buy waterproof tape and go round a lot of the panes with it, its important too in the wind to keep the door shut and i usually put a few bits of tape on the door too if its going to be really windy to make sure it stays closed

emmilou

thank you for all your replies, think we will try the tape route, we only have seals down the sides and the clips are next to useless and just keep pinging out :mad:

alanobrien

emmilou wrote: »

thank you for all your replies, think we will try the tape route, we only have seals down the sides and the clips are next to useless and just keep pinging out :mad:

????? Mine is a Gardman 6 x 8. The panels have edge grips but the seal is a rubber strip that goes under the polycarb. Without this strip the clips will be very loose and will ping out. If you haven't got the rubber strip that is probably the problem !

point3

The manufacturer's advice was to keep the window and door open during high winds to let the wind blow through, but I've found that keeping the window shut actually works better . I have the window facing into the wind direction, so that if I open it it creates a funnel effect with all the force causing the panel in the door on the opposite wall to blow out. That said, it's easy enough to just fit the panel in again once the gales are over. Thankfully they don't occur often.