Greenhouse repairs - replacing glass panes with acrylic panes

The terrible weather here in the UK in December, January and February didn't hit us anywhere near as hard as it did some parts of the country, fortunately being inland and on a hill (50m above sea level and no rivers nearby) the flooding and damage was minimal.

That said, there was some damage to fencing, the rose arch and more urgently the greenhouse - three panels of glass needed replacing.

Broken greenhouse glass panes

The problems with the greenhouse were partly my fault, I made a fatal error when erecting it. The error was in securing the corners with post-crete before placing the glass in the roof. This meant that the structure was cemented in as a slight parallelogram rathan than a rectangle, meaning that even though the aluminium frame in the walls of the greenhouse remained square (so the glass fitted perfectly) the roof frame formed parallelograms where the square glass was to be fitted. The glass just about went in on the roof but it was a tight squeeze. Any movement in the frame would have put pressure on the sides of those panes, causing them to shatter if the force was too extreme.

(Maths) lesson learned the hard way!

I opted to replace the glass with 3mm acrylic panes from Greenhouse Warehouse. 3mm is the minimum thickness you should use for roof panes to avoid bowing. The reasons for choosing acrylic were:

• Easier to handle than glass (which actually gives me palpatations!)
• Can be ordered and delivered easily online
• Seven times stronger than glass
• More likely to withstand the strain of being fitted into a poorly erected frame.

This is now fitted and the panes are almost indistinguishable from the glass panes.

Greenhouse with replacement acrylic pane (top right)

Greenhouse with replacement acrylic pane (top centre)

The acrylic panes are slightly more opaque  than the glass ones and hold on to water droplets/condensation whereas water runs off the glass panes keeping them clear and transparent.

The last of the winter firewood will stay dry now. Job well done!