Polytunnel Part 7 - Battens

In the next stint on the tunnel build, I started fitting the rebate battens which are used to trap the polythene cover in place around the timber base rails and around the door frames.  It's one of the last things to do before the cover goes on.  As usual, I seemed to spend a silly amount of time watching the instructional video on YouTube, but I wanted to get it right first time.  When it comes to starting to play with the polythene covers itself, that's when it's possible to make expensive mistakes so best make sure everything is right first time.

Starting with the door frames, the battens are nailed into place around the outer edge, using a spare piece of batten to make sure there is enough of a gap to add the main battens later.

Once the door frames were done, the base rails also had rebate battens fitted followed finally by the door frame rails.

After the rebate battens were all in place, the instruction video gives you a brilliant tip which helps tightening the polythene in place later on.  I marked on the soil anchor tubes, the location where the tube fixing was placed back when the timber base rails were being installed.  All these marks should be approximately level with each other.  Then, I marked a point on the hoop, 6cm further up before loosening off all of the bolts that were holding the base rail in place.  It actually took quite a bit of effort to get everything raised correctly without pulling the whole hoop up and off the ground anchor tube.  Most tricky were the corner fixings.  In the instructions, it states that there should be enough play in the base rails attached to the door frames to allow you to move the corners 6cm up.  But in truth, I think because the tunnel is only 6 foot wide, this is a struggle.  Nevertheless, I pulled up the corners as far as I could.  I think on the 8 or 10 foot wide tunnels, this would have been a much easier job to do.

I didn't have the time to carry on with the final push of getting the cover put into place, but I did still have a bit more time available.  I used this time to pre-nail all the battens that would be needed in the next stage of fitting the cover.

So that's it for this stint.  I'm a firm believer in getting preparations right, and that if they are done right, the whole job becomes easier.  Since we're now coming to the crux of the build, everything needs to be in good order before we make the final push.

For now, thanks for reading, and we now wait for a window of opportunity of both weather and time to carry out the next critical stage.