A Road To Self Sufficiency

Well it's happened..... All my skip diving has started to pay off!!

I'm on my way to getting my new " recycled" greenhouse... woo hoo...

It started a few months ago when it became evident that I needed a greenhouse to grow more crops. I managed ok this year planting seeds out when the weather determined I could. I did get many plants from my good friend and neighbour, Brian who has several greenhouses but on the whole, Like a man needs a shed it would be easier if I had a greenhouse.

Being skint and I mean destitute hence the growing of my own crops I decided that I couldn't afford a greenhouse but then with the usual thinking in a hot bath I came across the idea to see if I could get a greenhouse for nothing.

Now my greenhouse in plan form isn't your average little thing, nop, I wanted mine to be 3m x 4m or 10ft x 13ft in good old english money. so how was I going to get one this size.... build one I thought but with my knackered back it would not be possible but if I could salvage the materials from places such as skips and building plots then I might be able to pay someone to build it and although it would not be free it would be well cheaper.

So I started to look around especially when taking the dog for a walk. I'd get to know the builders and say hello to them etc and take an interest in what they were building. This is an interest of mine as I'd love to renovate an old house into an eco code 6 house but for now can't afford that. Anyway, I'd get to talking to the builders and renovaters and I began asking if I could take bits of wood, pallets etc from the skips.
This would lead to them asking what I would be doing with them and I'd mention my recycled greenhouse plan. It's amazing on a number of fronts, firstly because many of the builders were genuinely interested and secondly the amount of free materials that were skipped that had nothing wrong with them was amazing.
As time went on I spoke to one renovator and he gave me 400 facing bricks that were new. He'd bought a couple of packs of them and started to use them only to find out that they were metric size and his house was built with imperial size bricks. Those he had used could not be returned so were to be skipped. I got them. Lsater on from this renovation he took the complete roof off as some timbers were rotten... Guess who got the remaining timber which was something like 100ft of 8" x 2".... I got a couple of old 1953 pantry windows from his skip and these will probably go on ebay as they are leaded and complete, EVEN with the shoulders on the frame... He even delivered all the stuff in the back of his van just when my son was home from uni so he earned his keep that day,lol.

Total cost... 4 heads of garlic, beetroot a couple of pounds of onions and 2 heads of lettuce. His wife was shy about taking the produce but they certainly enjoyed it.

At another skip the builder was knocking down a couple of stoothing walls to build an extension. Virgin 2"x4" rough sawn timber, about 223 ft in 6 ft pieces. Even if i had to splice a couple of bits together I'd still have over 100ft of 2"x4"x12ft long.

In the allotment that I share with another neighbour the greenhouse is well knackered and really is dangerous. It hs a lot of glass still intact so I said I'd clear it out and they can put up their flimsy allu 6'x4' greenhouse that they paid £70 second hand.

I was riddling some soil and collected a lot of loose gravel type stones so these have been washed and stored for the concrete so all I need is some sharp sand, yellow sand and some cement and bobs your uncle fred. I've even got anothe neighbour and his son to do the building and the cost for their services..... 4 boxes of fresh fruit and veg NEXT YEAR.....

I reckon if I have to pay anything it will be around £50 for the sand and cement and maybe some for glass if there isn't enough around the lottie but even so it should be less than £30 I guess. Therefore a 3mx4m greenhouse for less than £80 ... that'll do me fine.

Oh, I nearly forgot, I also found an old calor gas bottle which I plan to make a greenhouse heater out of after all the safety precautions have been taken to remove gas etc.

Updated 29.04.10

The bricks have now been laid by friends while I made tea and bacon sarnies and I did have to buy the sand and cement at a cost of £39.00 Since the original post there has been more wood collected and so there should be enough now for the full frame. All I need now is a joiner, lol.