Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Chatting => Design and Construction => Topic started by: NettleBed on January 08, 2015, 13:10
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I need to move my green house. Obviously I will need to construct a new base.
What are your preferences?
It's an aluminium gh about 10' x 6' maybe a little larger. I don't intend to grow anything directly in the ground so I'm thinking concrete base or concrete foundations and a gravel infill.
Are there any major advantages or disadvantages to either plan?
E.g. drainage, weeds, temperature stability, anything?
Thanks
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I'm in the league of less is more.
So less work means more gardening - yay!
The only thing I would be interested in my greenhouse doing at the base level is keeping rodents out. So I'd be tempted to have a perimeter of bricks and/or treated wood and sit and secure the g/house on top of that.
So for the years I don't want to grow in the ground of the g/house I'd put some membrane down so that if/when I change my mind it's super easy.
Think of the money you'll save. :)
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Have to admit I'm veering to a gravel/scalpings interior.
Less concrete mixing and less chance of the gh flooding and if I change my mind as you say.
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Much prefer my greenhouse borders to when I used to grow Toms / Cues in pots. I now water every other day, much easier to control than days-of-old and watering multiple times each day.
Mine have a 2-course brick base. Bricks are a bit soft and some have got frost damage, if doing it again I would use engineering bricks.
Only advice is to make sure the diagonals are exactly equal before re-erecting, to be sure it is square, otherwise you won't be able to fit the glass!
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Whatever you decide (and I am in the "make it taller" camp with a step into the greenhouse) do make sure the base is completely level on absolutely solid ground, or you may find the frame of your greenhouse twists, with disastrous results
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Whatever you decide (and I am in the "make it taller" camp with a step into the greenhouse) do make sure the base is completely level on absolutely solid ground, or you may find the frame of your greenhouse twists, with disastrous results
2nd that, a 10x6 or bigger will have a fair amount of weight and is likely to sink at some unless footings were solid.
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do make sure the base is completely level
What you said, but I would favour a small fall towards whichever end the gutters will drain into a waterbutt (or just disgorge - which might be better at the back than the front :) )
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Whatever you decide (and I am in the "make it taller" camp with a step into the greenhouse) do make sure the base is completely level on absolutely solid ground, or you may find the frame of your greenhouse twists, with disastrous results
2nd that, a 10x6 or bigger will have a fair amount of weight and is likely to sink at some unless footings were solid.
Hmm that's what happened to mine & was to be resited last year but didn't get done, but now we are moving will have a new garden to be put in & hopefully hubby will take the weight of a 10 x8 with toughened glass in to consideration next time, also it was supposed to have no step as I can fall over nothing. Height doesn't come in to it as I'm a short @ rse anyway. But it's a rhino greenhouse & was one of the tallest ones I looked at
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You should be OK laying the base - which I assume is an aluminium channel base if it's a Hall's model - on 4" concrete blocks, placed flat at intervals of a couple or three feet and levelled. We have used this method twice, and the second time, we used 18" x 18" paving slabs laid on sharp sand all over the inside. It's worked well, and is free draining if any watering goes awry!
All the toms, cuces and peppers are planted in long planters or big high round pots, and stood in deep trays, so watering is dead easy!
If you are using glass then the whole structure will that much heavier, but also sturdier as well, and will be less likely to blow away!
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Hello,
I'm about to get a greenhouse in May. An Alton 8 x 12 so it should be fairly heavy. I am about to start clearing and levelling the space for it which will be approximately 10 x 14ft.
What would you recommend for the base? I am tending towards using slabs with some hardcore then builders sand under the slabs as it would allow for border beds but I am a newbie to this...
All advice welcomed!
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I would put a concrete footing in. Its a fair seized greenhouse and maybe? slabs might move independently of each other?
I found these on the Alton site:
http://www.altongreenhouses.co.uk/why-alton/installing-your-greenhouse
http://www.altongreenhouses.co.uk/pdfs/greenhouse_base.pdf
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Personally I much prefer borders in the greenhouse to a hard base and containers. I've had both, over the years, and watering the borders is much easier - but the soil does need replacing periodically.
In my "cropping" greenhouse I lowered my borders (I have concrete footings and a couple of courses of bricks as the base to mine) in order to have more cropping-height to the roof).
I also have a staging-only greenhouse and that has a hard floor.
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Found some photos:
(https://kgarden.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/img_3810-13_greenhouse.jpg)
Staging greenhouse - I have mist propagation under the staging
(https://kgarden.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/img_4592_greenhousecrops.jpg)
Cropping greenhouse - lowered borders
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How long is it going to be there?
http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=111679.0 (http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=111679.0) Here's what I did for my 8x10'. Strip footings, 4 course of engineering blocks. All built level(ish) then 2x1" wooden strips bolted to that with a slight fall for the gutting and the greenhouse then screwed to the wood. The floor is weedproof membrane covered in chippings and I grow in pots.
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Lardman, I am hoping it will be there at least as long as I am! My greenhouse comes with a concrete "kerb/base" to keep the wood away from damp ground so I shouldn't need a course of bricks. What I will try to do however is put in a slight gradient to the rear so I can allow rainwater flow. I'm not sure how to secure it to the concrete yet so I will need to check up on it.
I've just been reading your thread on building your concrete base. It has supplied me with lots of lovely ideas which I shall adapt (i.e. shamelessly nick!) for my project.
Kristen, those links to the Alton site are pretty useful so thank you for posting them.
I think what I will do is a mixture of the photos posted.
Obviously I will make sure the site is reasonably level (it isn't too bad just now but needs a general tidy up).
I'll then put in a concrete footing around the planned border ( like Lardman's wall foundation) and with sufficient external overlap to help keep weeds off. I've a lot of engineering bricks left over from a driveway at my old house so I could use them internally for a central path like you have Kristen. Even if I have to buy some more to, it'd be cheaper than installing concrete and it'll allow me to have internal borders for planting out tomatoes etc. I could even raise the internal bed slightly with one level of bricks.
More importantly, it'll save me from the ordeal of digging out the entire greenhouse footprint only to then fill the hole in with ballast and builder's sand.
Thank you both for the advice, suddenly it doesn't seem quite so daunting...
I will get photos sorted once I am back home.
I'm also about to move my 6' x 4' greenhouse from my old house and hopefully I can reclaim the slabs it currently sits on. 2 greenhouses, woohoo!!
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More importantly, it'll save me from the ordeal of digging out the entire greenhouse footprint only to then fill the hole in with ballast and builder's sand.
That reminds me, in case relevant to you ...
I erected my greenhouse a bit later in the year, and it was already quite dry. June perhaps? We trampled all over the site erecting it of course ... and THEN I set about digging the borders!!! They were set like concrete, compressed like concrete :( and it was hot in there to work of course ...
With benefit of hindsight I would have dug the plot first (after putting in the footings but before erecting the structure). Even if walked on during construction it would still have been easier to till once fully built.
Make sure a measurement of each diagonal matches, exactly, the other - then your structure will be "square" - otherwise the first you'll know that it is out of true is when the last sheets of glass won't go in :(
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Thanks again Kristen for passing on your exeprience- I guess hindsight is always 20/20 vision. Given my soil is an interesting and highly variable mix of clay and silt/sand, I'd planned to dig borders before erecting the greenhouse: mostly because it will otherwise be a big muddy mess.
I had read about ensuring the diagonals are precisely equal but getting a reminder before starting is also helpful. I will update on progress once I make some progress!
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We're not allowed any concrete on site, so I am hoping that this will be ok. I got some free sleepers and have put them on the soil on my plot with help from OH. They are 12cm wide so I am hoping that gives me a tiny bit of leeway to move the frame around before bolting it down. The diagonals are currently about 5mm out from each other and we couldn't get it any closer. The greenhouse going on top has palram panels because I figured the wood will move so glass would crack.
Have taken Kristen's advice and created a (very) slight fall to the back, and MoS's advice and raised it with the sleepers. I will be planting into the borders - and digging them before I mess about with the frame.
Any other tips to bear in mind?
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Looks fine to me surbie ;) 5mm isn't going to matter
There's no point in mucking about with footing and dwarf walls on a plot. The sleepers will last, the old bloke next to me still has some forming a shed base from the 70s :ohmy: and even my cheap 6x1" modern boards have done 5 years.
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That's great, thanks Lardman. :)
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I am on a budget, what would you recommend for a stable but cheap base? I thought sleepers but not sure where to get those without paying a premium :/
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Find and reclaimed timber yard near you and see what they have in stock, I did this and got 6" x 8" timbers for a fraction of the cost of sleepers!