Remember those super awesome hoop houses that I mentioned a couple posts ago? The ones that we slaved away on from dawn til dusk for four days straight? The ones that looked so good because of my partner's great design? Those? They collapsed...
There was a slight flaw in the design because we wanted to use all pvc piping to save on money. Basically, there was a little spot where water could collect from rain and as it collected the water weighed down the pipes creating a larger spot to hold water... The one pictured here ^ was the worst. We used a different size plastic and the ends were able to lift up to create deeper pools so it was pulled all the way to the ground. Some pipes were just bent a bit, but there were eight that were snapped in two.
You can see how it made a big water bucket here ^
And so a new project began. We had to figure out a way to stop water from pooling without getting rid of the pipes that were collecting the water in the first place because of how much support they gave to the whole structure. What we really needed was a way to stop the pvc from bending so that only a small amount of water could collect before rolling off. It was a really good thing that our first idea worked so that we didn't spend any extra money on something that was useless.
What we did was buy posts for every other domed pipe so that it would be stopped from sinking any lower and making that water shelf. We also made little platforms to keep the posts from sinking into the ground. Then we got pvc connectors and cemented the broken pieces back together. Now they look better than ever and are even stronger! Now we know for next year and wont make that same mistake again.
So beautiful :)
It has rained a couple times since the fix and they have stood up great!
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