hoop-house Roll Up Sides

Anyone have any expertise or advice on how to make your own roll up sides for a hoop house (a poly covered metal framed greenhouse)
The hand cranks are really expensive from what I have seen
There must be organic-permies who have/need a cheap efficient way to ventilate their greenhouse using roll up sides.
ideas?

The roller core is just chain link top rail. The handle is EMT conduit. You need to figure out how to make a U-joint or source a cheap one--it isn't hard, but I don't know your skills, tools, or materials.

I have a friend whose hoop house just has long pvc conduit (maybe 3/4") with a piece of rebar through one end that acts like a handle to turn the pvc. Then it is just a matter of securing the rebar when you have the side the height that you want. Pretty amazing how simple it is. not sure how the pvc is attached to the plastic cover. One cool thing about it is that it is pretty light and didn't seem to take much effort to roll it up. I hope this helps.

Christopher Danz wrote: not sure how the pvc is attached to the plastic cover.

Tape. And at least two wraps of cover on the core when fully down.

For 'on-the-cheap' this year I'm going to try the 'walk-in tunnel' that eliot coleman suggests in 'the new organic grower'. Lighter and less permanent than a hoop house. It will definitely be taken down at the end of the season and moved next year.

In a nutshell: arch frames, pvc, rebar, etc.. (for big ones can be anchored into ground by driving lengths of pipe into the ground to hold the ends of the arches)...if it's just six or eight feet wide you secure the plastic at each end by gathering it up and stretching it out and away along the hoop house axis and attaching it to a stake in the ground

Cords with bungy to add tension are stretched over top of the plastic to hold it down to the arches....to ventilate you just raise the bottom edge of the plastic and friction between the cord and the arch will hold it in place.

A picture would be worth a thousand words.

I haven't tried it before but I trust Coleman.

good luck.

I prefer drop down sides to roll (or push) up sides. You're trying to vent out the hot air that is trapped at the top of the hoop house. Top down ventilation is superior to bottom up. I think there's higher costs with drop down, though.

In my area there are a lot of people who have built the PVC/rebar tunnels. None are standing after the 2nd season. The PVC gets brittle and the structures fail with the wind and snow loads we experience. PVC is also not very permacultural. If you're thinking over a longer time frame, making bows out fence post top rail turns out to be less expensive than PVC due to its lifespan.

we always just used baling twine to hold the sides up. wrapped one end around the spring lock that holds the plastic down and looped the other end around the bolt connecting the uprights to the hoops. likely takes longer than roll-up rigging, but two 100-foot houses only took me five minutes or so to open up and maybe two minutes to close.

I'm with NM Grower, though. top ventilation is the way to go. the wax-filled cylinders that will open a vent automatically aren't terribly expensive, and they're very handy contraptions.

NM grower, i agree about the PVC. Not sure what 'fence post top rail' is ? Something like a 1X2 ? How small a size bow can you make before it breaks?

Sorry I haven't logged on here in a couple a months. Springtime farming took up all my time. Fence post top rail is available at any hardware store that has a construction material yard. It is used at the top of a chain link fence. It is galvanized steel, 1.375" in diameter, and comes in about 10' and 20'lengths.

Most growers will make or buy a jig and bend the pipe into a semi circle. A 20' pipe makes a hoop that is 12' wide and 7' high. You can look at a pipe bending jig here:
bender