To do the sun/shade studies I propose here two things need to happen. The site plan needs to be rotated to true north and a set of shade templates must be constructed. The site plan rotation makes it possible to use the same templates for all projects in the same general area. The templates work well over about a 30 mile radius, which can probablly cover the work area of most designers. To do sun calcs one needs the Lat/Long location of the area. This can be found at ... www.topozone.com Below is a screenshot of me looking for Shawn's project at Campbell, CA. Note on the left I have set the "Corrdinate Format" to "D/M/S". Then at the top of the map the Lat/Long will be shown as degrees, minutes, seconds. At the lower right True north is shown with the difference for magnetic north and grid north. A lot of mapping will use a grid north and I suspect Google maps may well be shown to the UTM grid which is a 0.636 error from true north at Canpbell, not something to worry about for sun studies. We don't have the sun observation described above to pin down the rotation needed, but looking at Google Maps of his house I was able to determine that the roof edge is near azmuth 215 degrees. Azmuth is direction of a line in degrees or rotation from North. Think of it as the hand on a clock where 0 is at the 12 position of the clock and as the hand swings clockwise, 360 degrees is the full circle. 90 degrees is East, 180 is South, 270 is West. Sun calcs are easily done at the following web site ... http://www.srrb.noaa.gov/highlights/sunrise/azel.html Below is a screen shot of a sun calc for Shawn's project. Above I have set the "City" box to "Enter Lat Long", and the values I got from topozone are entered. The time offset box is set to 8 (7 for Mountain, 6 for Central, 5 for Eastern time) and set Daylight Savings Time to "yes". A date and time was entered, and then the calc button is clicked to get the results. By changing the time by trial and error I look for an azmuth of 215 degrees, the roof edge direction I got from google maps. The time comes out to be 1.49PM. Though Shawn missed the sun observation last Saturday, he guessed it was near 2PM. It looks like rotating his plan so that the roof is at az 215 is what we need. Next I need to complete the templates for this area.

Dan - I assume you painted the EMT red? I just bought some 10ft lengths of UV-resistant EMT to use as fence posts to hold up 7ft bird netting as a deer fence. The stuff also works great for caterpillar tunnels. But what is the lattice material you have in those pix (not remesh?) and how is it attached? Will it support heirloom tomatoes? I was going to have DH cut some cedar trees and sink 4 of them into the ground 25ft apart, then top each pair with 2x10s and run wire across like an old-fashioned clothesline, use baling twine to train the vines (tomatoes and cukes) but the EMT/mesh looks easier. I appreciate the help - we've got about 60-70 tomato plants (that includes Speckled Roman pastes and Gardeners' Delight cherries, not all the big slicers, maybe only 20 Brandywines, 6 German Johnson, 4 Cherokee Purples) ready to be transplanted in the next 2-3 weeks (not to mention the peppers, and have to plant the cucurbits and herbs too!).

I've been ordering from Northstar Wrought Iron for a long time - great obelisks and pillars, and great quality for the money. All of their products are powder-coated, retaining their new appearance. This year, I ordered some of their pot rings and love them! Great for hanging on fences - adds height interest. Check 'em out www.northstarwroughtiron.com

missingtheobvious - no reason you couldn't glue the horizontal parts together. Whatever floats your boat! My storage situation is in a very low crawl space under the house. Only about 4 ft tall and access is through a small window which is about 1 foot by 3 feet. It's easier for me to break them down and store the uprights horizontally. I've put them back together so often that it only takes me about 30 seconds to assemble each horizontal bit. I pound the uprights into the ground 12 inches deep. Never had one blow down yet. Of course, no hurricanes here in SoCal either. But I did have an email from one guy who did have a tropical storm (a real one downgraded from a hurricane) come through. He had 3 different cages and my design fared the best. The cages are actually quite flexible, but sturdy. I'm not sure what you're asking about the UV-resistance of the pipe. Most of my pipes are over 20 years old and they're holding up well. A few of them don't fit quite as tight as most though. Could that be due to UV damage? I just slap some tape on them to thicken them just a tad.