Sherry and fellow company are awesome people... I could care less if they think this is a HFGH thread. If it wasnt for people like all of you. Us newbies would be in a compost pile along with our greenhouses. Keep the information coming...... My door was wrong also and by the way the door parts were sitting on my porch when I got home from work today. What a joke only took a year from china..... What happened to US jobs It would have not taken a year....... Quality Control Machining inspector for the U S with shipping requirements 6 weeks..... Barb

I can give you some idea of costs of the HFGH. Can't tell you how much time to put it together -- we're retired and work at a slower pace. Reading posts here on how others put their together will definitely be helpful. I didn't document the details of building because it had already been done so well. We did put the roof on piece by piece rather than as the instructions directed. Can you imagine two old people on ladders struggling with an unwieldy aluminum structure eight feet in the air? Additional purchases for HFGH reinforcement: Spring Clips -- $10.95 Bolts -- 15.96 Bolts -- 24.27 Aluminum tape 19.94 Aluminum piece 10.98 Straps 9.44 Wafer Screws 7.97 Clamps 4.67 -- a cost of about $105.00 US. The following would be necessary for any greenhouse set up that we might have used, not just the HFGH: Treated lumber for base and hardware for assembly Ground Fault outlets Water pump Drum fittings and hoses Hoses Elec. Box and Breakers Wire -- we already had wire -- that's another hundred. Outlet boxes Duplex boxes, recept. covers Conduit Water Valve Pipe and fittings Temperature Gauge Water Drums Adding this doubled the cost of the HFGH. I have not included the cost of buying or building benches, patio pavers for the paths and barrel support, nor the cost of a heater (we already have heaters), nor the cost of shading. Everybody's mileage will vary because of regional differences, personal needs and individual ideas on how this should be done. I hope this gives you a general idea of what to expect. Nell Here is a link that might be useful: Greenhouse

I thoroughly enjoyed seeing your HFGH go from pieces to completion... well done! Thank you for sharing your experience! I wish you and the LL many happy days of greenhouse growing! We just purchased the 10' x 12' model, and will be constructing it this coming spring... I'm really glad to know that it was money well spent... we have the boxes sitting in the garage, awaiting warmer days and a leveled place to begin the building process! I, too, have bookmarked your site, and am looking forward to future photos and comments!

svalli and kicksnj, I apologize to both of you for missing your posts. I haven't been able to check here for a while. My husband and I made our living by forging iron and fabricating items out of mild steel, so I'm pretty familiar with my old friend rust (we have a saying, rust never sleeps.) Steel is always trying to return to its natural oxidized state, but with modern finishes and a little maintenance, we can usually keep the enemy at bay (in most climates, anyway!) Sorry to hear that rust is trying to interrupt your greenhouse projects. Without seeing photos of the rusted bases, I'd tend to imagine the blistered paint and underlying rust are more of an annoying (and admittedly worrisome-looking) cosmetic issue than a true structural risk. My approach would be what kicksnj suggested; remove any loose or blistering paint with a steel bristle brush, rough sand paper, or rough abrasive pad. Then prime any roughed-up areas with a good metal spray primer (Rustoleum is good) and follow with another coat or two of a good spray paint made for exterior use (again, Rustoleum is a decent brand.) I'd sure rather pursue this approach than to abandon using the base, since as svalli mentioned, the clips that hold the vertical aluminum beams in place are anchored by the formed lip on the steel base, and then you have another set of challenges. I wonder if Harbor Freight has modified the finish on these steel bases, as our 4-year old base still doesn't show any signs of rust (but, we do live in a dry climate.) Svalli, since you've already constructed the two-by-four replacement base, I'm trying to visualize your challenge. I'm sure you've found that the hold-down connectors (part 47) do two things at the same time; they not only secure the aluminum floor plates (parts 1 - 6) to the steel base; they also attach the vertical aluminum wall studs, at the same time. So, even after you screw the aluminum floor plates to the top of your two-by-fours, you'll have to figure out how to attach the vertical wall studs to the aluminum floor plates, with no hold-down connectors to help. You may already have a solution for that, but I'm just making sure. The polycarbonate panels do touch the vertical lip of the aluminum floor plate; the panel clips (part 53) press the panels tightly against the aluminum frame, from the outside of the greenhouse, for air-tightness. It would probably be best if the screw heads did not fall in the area closest to the vertical lip, since it might affect the panel fit. The actual measurement from the outside of the poly panel to the outside of the aluminum floor plate can vary, depending on whether or not you use weather stripping between the polycarbonate panel and the aluminum frame. (I did.) What matters most is that you realize the poly panel needs to be able to fit tightly to the frame (or to the weatherstripping smooshed against the frame) if you want to avoid air leaks. If I'm misunderstanding, please feel free to post back! Again, apologies for my slow reply. I hope some of this helps. Hang in there, the challenge has been well worth the end results for me.