Seriously; How have I never thought of this until now.......Floating Portable Canopy

[sysinu]

I have an inflatable canopy that I bought from REI. I built a frame out of PVC that holds the bottom's shape and it floats just fine. I don't have any pictures, but it was cheap and collapses to smaller than a duffel bag.

 

[Ronnie]

This is what I put together.

Components:
29” long x 4” diameter PVC
End caps and joints
Pool noodles 3” x 2’ legs and
2” diameter plugs
Adjustable bungee cords
Closed bungee loops
PVC primer and adhesive

Total cost, approximately $55
(Excluding the pop-up)

It is installed on a small 4’x6’ pop up but the plan is to use 8’x8’ or 10’x10’ and test the same soon.

 

[Ratket]

So 4 of these....

Robot or human?

Strapped to the legs and a drift anchor and you are all set...

Hell the pool noodle idea may even work..

 

[Speedling]

I wanna see this in action and get reviews of how wellit works!

 

[Ronnie]

I finally tested this out today. I think it works well. Today it covered a super Mabel as well as a super rockstar tube today.

 

[tdonoughue]

So... I have a dumb question:

If you have a shade where the legs are aluminum, can't you just put it in the water? Also looking at some of those camping shades that use the fiberglass poles...

All that said: I readily admit I never thought of this either. Duh.

 

[2kwik4u]

So... I have a dumb question:

If you have a shade where the legs are aluminum, can't you just put it in the water? Also looking at some of those camping shades that use the fiberglass poles...

All that said: I readily admit I never thought of this either. Duh.

I mean I could, but it would sink in a hurry. I'm talking about floating mine in 50-75ft of water

 

[Ronnie]

Without some kind of protection the legs on the pop up might rust and probably quickly if the interior of the legs are not painted. Otherwise I would have tried to strap fenders on one instead.

The trial worked well enough for me to buy a larger pop up and transfer my pwc floats to it for my next and last big boating trip of the year. I will post pics of it after next weekend.

 

[tdonoughue]

I saw this being used in 1-2' of water in the pics, thus the comment. Aluminum does not rust.

But of course in 50-75' that is a different story and the rust becomes relatively insignificant as an issue...

 

[2kwik4u]

I saw this being used in 1-2' of water in the pics, thus the comment. Aluminum does not rust.

But of course in 50-75' that is a different story and the rust becomes relatively insignificant as an issue...

Kinda figured, but I couldn't help myself

 

[Ronnie]

I just got this at Walmart. I was planning on getting more coverage but with this my overall cost is about around $100. It should do a good job of shading my gang plank inflatable which measures 10’ x 10’.

If I don’t need to worry about rust the idea of lashing inexpensive fenders from wall mart is worth reconsidering for about $50 (excluding the pop up).

 

[Ronnie]

Update: I transferred everything to a bigger pop up (10’ x 10’ at the base with 8’ x 8’ off shaded area. It worked great until someone pushed one of the tubes under water. If i were to do it again I would make the floatation tubes longer, like the length of the leg at its lowest deployment height.