Project description
My collection has outgrown the windowsill. Around seventy pots of cacti and caudex succulents, the largest a ferocactus in a twenty-two centimetre pot, and every winter I lose two or three of them to damp stagnant air and weak light. I want a proper display case built for them, standing on the floor in the corner of a north-facing room, so the plants stop depending on what the weather does outside.
The footprint I can give it is eighty centimetres wide and forty-five deep, and it may go up to a hundred and eighty tall including the base. Three growing shelves plus the floor of the case, and the clearances matter more to me than the shelf count: thirty-five centimetres of free height above the bottom shelf for the tall columnar plants, then twenty-eight and twenty-two for the smaller pots higher up. Shelves need to be removable, because the plants change size and I will want to rearrange them. Front access is through doors, and I need to reach a pot standing at the back of the bottom shelf without unloading everything in front of it, so tell me honestly whether sliding doors, a hinged pair or a lift-out panel works best at this depth.
On the technical side. Frame in aluminium profile or welded painted steel, your call, but it must carry roughly sixty kilos of pots and wet substrate without the shelves bowing. Glazing: I would prefer real glass for clarity, four millimetres, though I will listen to an argument for twin-wall polycarbonate on the back and sides if it buys me useful insulation. Lighting is full-spectrum, something in the region of forty to sixty watts per shelf with a decent red and blue balance, mounted so it can be raised as plants grow, driver outside the case, wiring sealed against splashes. Everything on a timer running twelve to fourteen hours in summer and cut back to a cold dry dormancy in winter, with a separate switched socket so I can kill the light without touching the fans. Two small quiet fans, one drawing in low and one exhausting high, to keep air moving and stop rot at the base of the stems. Each shelf gets a drip tray with a lip and a drain to a small collection bottle, because I water from above and I am tired of wiping the floor.
Send me a sketch or a simple model with dimensions, a materials list with what it will cost, and how many days from order to a finished case standing in my room. I would like it within two weeks. Assembly can happen here, but the parts must fit through a standard doorway.
The footprint I can give it is eighty centimetres wide and forty-five deep, and it may go up to a hundred and eighty tall including the base. Three growing shelves plus the floor of the case, and the clearances matter more to me than the shelf count: thirty-five centimetres of free height above the bottom shelf for the tall columnar plants, then twenty-eight and twenty-two for the smaller pots higher up. Shelves need to be removable, because the plants change size and I will want to rearrange them. Front access is through doors, and I need to reach a pot standing at the back of the bottom shelf without unloading everything in front of it, so tell me honestly whether sliding doors, a hinged pair or a lift-out panel works best at this depth.
On the technical side. Frame in aluminium profile or welded painted steel, your call, but it must carry roughly sixty kilos of pots and wet substrate without the shelves bowing. Glazing: I would prefer real glass for clarity, four millimetres, though I will listen to an argument for twin-wall polycarbonate on the back and sides if it buys me useful insulation. Lighting is full-spectrum, something in the region of forty to sixty watts per shelf with a decent red and blue balance, mounted so it can be raised as plants grow, driver outside the case, wiring sealed against splashes. Everything on a timer running twelve to fourteen hours in summer and cut back to a cold dry dormancy in winter, with a separate switched socket so I can kill the light without touching the fans. Two small quiet fans, one drawing in low and one exhausting high, to keep air moving and stop rot at the base of the stems. Each shelf gets a drip tray with a lip and a drain to a small collection bottle, because I water from above and I am tired of wiping the floor.
Send me a sketch or a simple model with dimensions, a materials list with what it will cost, and how many days from order to a finished case standing in my room. I would like it within two weeks. Assembly can happen here, but the parts must fit through a standard doorway.
Other / Miscellaneous Cash, Bank transfer
