My Shop is Officially Cooler than Before

[CalgaryPT]

My shop faces south-southwest. From June to October it can get unbearably hot in there—so much so that I sometimes give up. I like having the door open for the breeze but the sun just blasts in there and makes it tough to wear leathers, gloves and especially a helmet or even clear face shield for grinding. I have two fans but they can't keep up.

This was my cheap solution: shade screen material (6'x15') from Home Depot for $30 (online store only). For now it is just held in place with welding magnets, but I will be adding attached tarp clips to the door this week for a more permanent solution.

So far so good...you can see the light difference in the shop from an earlier pic. It is SO much cooler now. Wish I had thought of this earlier.

I like the fact that it doesn't touch the ground; there's nothing to trip on, and the neighbourhood dogs can still come in for a treat.

 

[Tom O]

How about stringing a wire or curtain rods across so it can be pushed off to the side?

 

[Tom O]

I was thinking about something like this using a tarp welding or regular type to stop the undesirables from looking in when they come to play or watch baseball!
Buddy down the alley uses a sheet.

 

[CalgaryPT]

How about stringing a wire or curtain rods across so it can be pushed off to the side?

Thought about this, or a rod along the bottom edge so I can roll it up. But there is literally an inch of clearance between my closed door and the stuff around it, so something will get caught. I don't mind the hassle of tarp clips...I'm just so happy I can use my shop this time of day in August. Huge improvement for me.

I also discovered, depending on how you orient the cloth, I can see out but others can't see in. Bonus points.

 

[Tom O]

Well it looks like I’ll have to give it a go if they can’t see in! I wonder how those pull down blinds work...

 

[CalgaryPT]

I looked at those Tom. They might be fine, but I didn't have the clearance at the base of my garage door to accommodate one, nor could I find the right size. They were also more expensive. Also, you might have to adjust your garage door's settings as it would add maybe 20 lbs. of weight. The fabric is negligible.

Attached is my permanent solution. The tarp clips stay permanently attached and I just hook the cloth up on the door when needed. Because of the movement/vibration of the door I didn't trust metal screws at those points in the hollow door, so I used 1/4" rivets. Works great.

If you do something similar don't bring the material all the way to the ground...it's a tripping hazard.

Here's the material on Home Depot's site: note it comes in different colours: https://www.homedepot.ca/en/home/search.html?q=shade cloth#!q=shade cloth

 

[CalgaryPT]

Just thought of another issue with the pull down ones: it would probably trigger your photocell safety feature near the bottom when you shut your door, if mounted too close to bottom.

 

[Dabbler]

very nice! I like the improvement in privacy!