High Tunnel Greenhouses Made with PVC Hoops and Homemade Sawmill Lumber #CaptainWingnut

Hi, I'm Brad. Sorry about the wind. It's really windy here all the time. Today is the start of building high tunnels or greenhouses for our planter beds. We have planter beds here for 10 years and we can't plant until June 1st and we're done by September and it's just too cold otherwise. So we're going to put greenhouses over our planters and you can see the planter behind me and above is a little mock-up of a PVC and how it's going to be. I had to do that to make sure that it missed the roof of the gazebo there. But we're going to put these tunnels, these high tunnels in over our planter beds so that we can extend our growing season. And I'm going to use PVC and I'm going to show you how it all works. So let's get started. Before I forget, don't forget to subscribe and click the notify button so that you know when I release new videos. So here's the mock-up, that big ring right there is the mock-up of where the regular ribs will go. That's 8 feet tall, 4 to 12 feet wide and we're going to now cut some pieces to go in there. They've got to be 23 feet long to fit it. So I have an inch and a half, it has the highest tensile strength of inch and a quarter, inch and a half, two inch. Inch and a half is the toughest one and so I'm going to make these 20 footers three feet longer and to do that I have to reinforce the joints and that is done with an inch and a quarter piece inserted in the middle of them. So right now we're going to cut three feet two and a quarter inches pieces and then we're going to reinforce that joint. So while I'm lengthening these inch and a half PVC pipes and putting inch and a quarter pieces in the joint, you probably can't see that it's moving so fast, we're going to drill holes in the ground and put T-posts in the ground because there's serious rock below us and then these will go over the T-posts and we'll bolt them down and they can't blow away and come loose. Okay so I've got some marks made ready to put in the posts, there's a mark and you can see that we're all going to put in posts, hold the PVC posts. So let's start drilling. We live on a mountain of rock, it's really deep and thick shell rock and it's right below my feet so I'm using an SDX max hammer drill using an inch and a half bit to get down through the rock so I can put the T-posts in to hold the PVC posts. So I'm about to cut my USA T-posts six footers into three footers. I can put them in the holes. Now I'm marking off two feet of the T-posts and that's how much is going to stick out of the ground. This two feet will make the outside edges of the PVC pipes stand up straighter than just curving. Okay so now we're going to put the T-posts in the ground and the green part goes in the ground the red part stays out of the ground and it's two feet out of the ground one foot into that down into the rock and this will make the PVC posts stand up real straight give it real straight edges at the first as it comes out so these babies are pounded down into rock you got to use hydraulic power to get them back out and so this is a really good thing. We'll drill through the PVC through the T-posts and bolt them and they will not come out of the ground. Okay so now we're going to attempt to put these 23 foot PVC poles up on top of and slide them down on these T-posts and these T-posts are exactly the size of the inside diameter of these PVC poles so it's quite a challenge plus the PVC poles are used to being straight and even though we're in the heat of the summer you have to be really careful because they might want to break so you make some extras just in case. I also had let the glue set on these for about two weeks before I did this I wanted them to be really solid and firm and so we finally got the first one on now we're going to set these other six posts on up and get ready to go and there's always something that happens these T-posts create a little burr on the PVC and you got a grinder and sharpen them down and get the new post on and then you've got these 23 feet foot poles sticking up and you got to figure out how to put them bend them over and of course there's always one that doesn't want to bend and it breaks and so we just cross our fingers that it's going to work and the heat of the summer is going to help them get their new shape but it was quite an effort. Now it's time to cut some poly pipe we got this pipe out of the oil field that they were throwing away so I'm going to cut some six inch pieces of this poly pipe and then split it and that will be a cap that can go over each of the PVC poles as a reinforcement where we put bolts through so that the bolts don't crack or bite too hard on the PVC itself so this poly is very very durable it works really good and I have to make four of these per pole there's gonna be one on the top and one on the bottom of each PVC post so you can see how they're going to work here we're going to put them over it we're going to glue them in place and then we can drill through them and bolt through them and we should not have an issue with the PVC pipe at that point. So now we're going to install these poly braces and the purpose of these is that PVC does not like to be drilled through does not like to be compressed it'll crack and split and break so these poly sleeves just happen to be perfect size so that when they're compressed they are the ones taking the pressure and then I use a special glue it's called Lex-L they're not sponsoring this it's just what I use and it never dries it never goes hard but it secures the poly to the PVC and then the PVC is not going to crack or split or break when I put bolts through it and I swear this stuff will stick to water it makes a permanent bond between the PVC and the poly. So I'm going to put two of these per pole and I'm going to put them four feet up and then down at the ground and they're going to hold those side rails that brace and hold the curtains and the top. So now it's time to build the side rails that go on those poly brackets now this is rough cut wood it's exactly two inches wide by six inches high and I have to build eight of them four for the tops and four for the bottoms and my sawmill can only cut 20 foot length and so these have to be 23 feet and of course I make them another foot so that I can have some extra to cut off once I get them up there and make them fit perfectly but I use multi-nail strips to put them all together and then when it gets to the bottom one you'll see here in just a moment that I put poly I affix poly with that high-powered glue and with extremely long screws to the bottom ones so that none of the wood sets on the ground to rot so the the bottom rails will fit on the sit on the poly and there you go you can see I'm putting the poly on now and it'll sit on the poly and then the poly sits on the ground and so there's no not going to be any wood rot on these rails that are on the ground so this is quite a job I've compressed a whole day's work into about a minute and 30 so here's two of the completed four two bottoms that'll go up and then I'll create two more and take them up now since this is just bare wood right off the sawmill and it's rough cut it needs to be preserved so I have another video I'll put the link up on the top there where I use used motor oil but since I didn't want this wood to be black I used clear brand new motor oil with some diesel thinner in it and we're just putting that on and let it soak in overnight and these babies will be treated to be water tight when we get them put onto the greenhouses and then all of the rest of the wood that goes into these greenhouses has to be sealed and we use the same motor oil and and diesel fuel concoction and it does a wonderful job in fact it really makes the wood look beautiful and so I got my my princess Chrissy here helping me get all of this wood and there was there's quite a stack this is just a little tiny portion of it but we're getting it all sealed and ready to put together so once the sealer is dry and the glue is dry and everything is ready then it's time to haul them up to the high tunnels up on the mountain where the high tunnels are and these were not so big that I couldn't just carry them so I didn't need the tractor but there are some beams coming up that I have to use the tractor to get up there I just haul them right up to the high tunnels and then put them in their place this is one of four bringing it up and then what we're going to do is we're going to drill them drill through them through the through the poly brackets and through the t-posts and through everything and then we're going to bolt put these big long bolts through the rails and the t-posts and the PVC and the poly and snug them down tight so that these babies can't come apart now I can't drill through I have nothing that can drill through these t-posts so actually what I did was I raised them up and put a notch in them that I could drill through and put the bolts in so there it is bolting them down I'm going to get all four of them bolted down and then we'll move to the top rails so now it's time to put the top rails on and I was too lazy to walk all the way down to the shop and get my chain grips and so I just grabbed some rope and dyed it up and then had Princess Chrissy Miss Chrissy come and help me set these up and drill through them and then put the bolts in now these weren't hard to drill because they're outside of the they're up above the t-posts so these drill pretty easily through and you can crank them down pretty tight nothing breaks nothing was having any issues that poly pipe was really protecting so I've now got all four bottom rails built and in place I've got three of the top rails in place and this is the last top rail to go so I'm just lining it up leveling it up and getting it ready you can see the splice in there because it's so long and I'll get the bolts in get it all locked down tight and be ready to build the end caps okay so this next step is to protect the PVC pipes I'm using white UV paint to paint the outside of the pipes because when the curtains are down they're exposed directly to the sun and I don't want any issues as time goes on with the sun shining through the plastic even though the plastic is UV protected I don't want any issues with these pipes being degraded by the sun so I'm painting the outside of all of the UV pipes wow was that a challenge now the next operation is to build the end caps and I opted to build this one outside on the ground and didn't realize that it was really going to be heavy and it's quite an ordeal to carry it in and put it in place so I built the rest of them in place I put the piece of poly down and then I put the end cap on top of that and screw it down into it with glue so here I come I'm going to carry that monster in and man once you get this stuff is is a full size two by fours two inches by four inches rough cut lumber and that wall was heavy for me and I didn't have a helper that day so I was just doing it totally by myself bring this thing in and you know once all the braces are in place there's a lot of wood there a lot of weight as you can see I've notched every one of the uprights so that they cradle into the pvc and hold the pvc in its form where it's at and then it goes on to the poly pipe below so that it's not resting on the ground not on the dirt and so I won't have any issues with wood rot even though I've treated them with oil and they're beautifully treated really nice but I didn't want any problems so I put it on the poly and yeah I really had a challenge here but I don't give up and when you don't give up you eventually win the things around you have to give in so I didn't give up and there it is there's one wall just about in place it'll have to have some side braces put in so as you can see here I created side brace stabilization rods out of one inch emt connected them to the side rail and to the end cap and then if you see right there in the center I've got my electrical already run and I've got the brace on this other side over here and then I have to brace and and sure up the door getting ready to put the door in so this is all shored up and ready to go there's that power line again and they are getting there got two end caps done and two to go now it's time to create the beams two big long beams these babies are full two by eight and they will go across the top of each greenhouse and each bowed pole will rest on them and they will hold any weight of any snow that may come you can see that my multi-nail is not really very big for it but I'm going to put them in anyway and build two of these things I have to build them again about 22-23 feet long and they're absolutely tough now these babies are too big and heavy for me to carry up by myself I can barely list these things so I'll have to use the tractor to get them up to the greenhouses so I've loaded the beams on the tractor and taken them up and now I've got to use a ladder because these babies are so heavy and get them in place get them up on the top so that when I flip them over they support all of those pvc hoops and I don't have any problem with anything in the winter now the snow usually just wipes right off as soon as the sun comes up and a little heat gets in it just sloughs right off but I just don't want to have any to deal with in the winter time because it is really cold right here and so this is putting them up getting them in place and it's just unbelievable how nice it's turned out so you can see all four beams are up and ready to go to the next operation so the next thing I did was I built brackets to hold on to the beam and brace the beam up in the center probably didn't need to but I just did it anyway I put in two t-posts in each greenhouse and then I welded the brackets to that that go up and give me an adjustment to push on the top beam so the next operation is to make the doors for the greenhouses and to make the doors we're going to plane the lumber down from rough cut 2x4s to commercial cut 2x4s because rough cuts are pretty slivery and we don't want to be slivery for the plastic that's going to ride on these and for the humans that's going to rub against them and hands so we're planing these down making them really smooth then we'll oil them up and water preserve them and then right here I'm cutting them up and making doors out of them and here we have one door done three to go this one's built and mounted braced it's pretty tough pretty solid so the next process is to bend the wiggle wire track to fit the pvc hoops and gladly I only have to do four just the outside ones the inside ones will have the plastic resting straight on them so bending four and then installing them then of course it's time to get out the lexell again this sticky sticky sticky stuff and I didn't have gloves on at this point and you get it on you and it is really I mean it's like tar it's it's amazing so I'm going to put the lexell on and then I'm going to put the wiggle wire down on at lexell so it's glued in and I'm going to put screws down through the wiggle wire track into the pvc then I'm going to let it set for two days before I do anything with it to let the lexell harden up the next process is to install curtain cable guides these are your small eyelets that the stainless steel cable will ride in just to keep it so it doesn't droop or sag or fall down and keeps all of the pulling strings in their place the next process is to thread the one-eighth inch stainless steel deck cable and put it across the back pulley there that back pulley is going to hold a weight I'll show you in a moment and then I'm putting terminal clamps on as I put it through the guide and through another pulley now the terminal clamps work in conjunction with these stainless steel pulleys and they work to pull the curtain up and to let the curtain down and the weight across the back is what helps pull against the cable to help pull the curtain down then the cable goes through the rail and over onto a winch and that winch is what will crank the curtains up and down and I'll give you a demonstration of that in just a moment these are some weights I made I poured concrete into some heavy two inch pipe cut in four inch pieces and put some hooks on the top and they hang off the back of the greenhouse and keep the tension on the curtain cable so now it's time to start cutting the plastic sheeting all in all I'm going to cut 10 big pieces of sheeting and it is six mil wv coated farm plastic really good stuff will last quite a while and so I've got to cut all of the pieces now and get ready to start putting them up okay so now I'm going to put some felt tape across every little metal piece every little sharp piece of wood everything so that it doesn't have an option to poke through the plastic this is ripstop plastic so it won't make a bigger hole anyway but I don't want to have any holes and then I'm going to adjust the piece of plastic that I cut before I nail it on when I get it all in its right place so now it's time to put the plastic down and hold it in place this is called batten tape and I'm using a roof nailer and this batten tape is three quarter inch wide and it's a vinyl tape that is really really strong and it keeps the nails from penetrating the plastic and just holds on to everything so that's how we put the plastic on and keep it in place and as you put it on the plastic becomes drum tight you can just tighten a little with your hand as you're nailing it on and it just becomes perfectly drum tight now we put it on the entire piece first and after all the batten tape and all the nails are done then we cut the door cut around the door three sides of the door so the door will work and here's the finished product doors all cut out latches even on in place and we're just about ready to put the roof on you put the end pieces on first end caps on first and then you put so now it's time to put the roof on and I had a camera malfunction and lost the video portion but I have some slides from my phone so the roof is two ply there's two layers on the roof and it's just pulled tight into the wiggle wire both at the same time and we're going to pump air between the two layers to keep the top layer from being whipped by the wind so now it's time to put the curtains on the curtain rod and the curtain rod is just a piece of chain link fence top rail and I took some I took the plastic and just folded it over made a channel in the plastic and glued it of course with Lexel and it after a couple of days of sitting it was ready to go it it's so it's so perfect it's like it's hot melted on there and so we're putting the plastic on the curtain rod and then we're going to attach the curtain rod to the pulling wires and pull them up tight so now we're going to tie the curtain rods up to the stainless steel cable and to do that I'm going to poke a hole through the plastic and it's ripstop so it's only the hole that it is it won't go any further I'm going to put this eighth inch white polyester rope that is uv and abrasion resistant and I'm going to tie it off and then I'm going to put it up through the pulley and then back to the electrical terminal eyelet and tie it on with it all up tight I taped the overhanging roof plastic up now it's time to let it down and let it all get covered up and be protected from the weather and ready to roll now we're going to use the batten tape and the roof nailer and we're going to nail the side curtains down pretty tight because the top rail is up tight where it's going to be so we're going to nail them down pretty tight so that it's virtually windproof here's how the side curtains work engage the winch and crank notice how improved the garden is too it's taken me all summer to do this and since this wasn't a kid I had to contrive and build everything so I needed vents to air put the air from the blowers in between the two sections of roofing so this was me building the blower attachments so this is what the blower vents look like and when they're finished and installed that's just uh uv protection paint on them and I made them out of the inch and a half pvc and they are just to keep the plastic from touching each other and getting stuck so the last thing left to do is to hook up the blowers to blow air between the two roof pieces to keep the top part from being wind whipped this is just three inch dryer vent and these blowers are made for greenhouses they're very durable little things and they've got a lot of power I have to choke this one down about 25 of what it can put out so this is what the roof looks like with the blower going all puffed up like a giant marshmallow it's really stable in heavy wind really nice it doesn't move at all and the temperature differential is amazing it's 67 outside but it's 103 inside and this is an overcast day the sun's not shining directly on it and the plants are just loving it and the dogs are just loving it and the builder sitting in his chair it's just loving it it's cold outside by now and it's just absolutely warm inside so there it is a summer of planning and preparation a summer of building all boiled down to 28 minutes for your pleasure I appreciate you watching subscribe if you like my videos click the bell icon to be notified when I release a new video and I hope to see you on the runway one of these days sending happy thoughts your way and sending positive vibes in your direction captain wingnut cougar ridge ranch signing off