We Protect You from the Sun Wind and Rain The Complete HOW TO Guide Custom Shade Sail Structures Made by A&B Canvas Australia INSIDE The 5 Steps to Creating an Amazing Shaded Area to Help you Become the Envy of your Street! Create a spectacular shade experience with an exciting shade sail or shade structure from the shade specialists
Dear Friend A&B Canvas Australia. Today, in a world where the ozone layer is depleting, global warming is increasing and litigation is out of control, we have an obligation as councils, business proprietors, schools and parents to protect our children, staff, patrons and ourself from the damaging effects of the harsh Aussie sun. At A&B Canvas Australia we have been creating quality shade solutions for our clients for over thirty years. We have learnt a lot in thirty years and feel it is our responsibility to educate the public in the best way to correctly provide a shade experience that not only looks terrific but provides practical shade. Please take your time and read our comprehensive guide to give you a better understanding of the science of shade protection so you can make an informed decision when purchasing your shade requirements. Kind regards Paul Lewis Managing Director A&B Canvas Australia There are 5 steps in creating a custom made shade sail structure: 1. Planning your structure 2. Installing your fixing points (posts/brackets etc.) 3. Selecting your required shade cloth and colour 4. Measuring your area 5. Installing your shade sail Follow these steps carefully and you will have a wonderful shade environment. Step 1 Planning Your Shade Sail Structure There are many, very important considerations when planning your structure, and in fact this is the single most important aspect of the whole process. Proper planning will ensure that your sail structure performs in the way it was intended. Before our consultant comes to visit have a clear idea of the area in mind that you wish to cover with a shade sail. It may be a paved area, a courtyard, a deck, a pool; regardless, the area is known but the how to remains in doubt. There may be opportunities for creating attachment points for your sail on areas of existing structures, or we may need to install steel posts to create a totally free standing structure. To follow are the many points that we at A&B in consultation with yourself will consider during the planning phase: 1. Movement of the Sun The sun rises daily in the east and sets to the west. As the seasons progress, it also moves from low in the sky during the cooler months to high in the sky during summer. Your structure should be planned to provide maximum shade protection during the height of summer, on or around the longest day of the year, December 21 st, or summer solstice as this is when it will be needed most. We conduct what 2
we call a shade audit where we take into account all the different variables that need to be considered when creating an effective and practical shade structure. Things like: The time of the day you will usually be using the area and need shade. The location of the site. Where is the sun coming from? The exact area where solar protection is required. The usage of the area. Are there lots of kids running around? Aesthetic considerations. You really want shade but you want it to look great as well! Wind exposure. Are we in a sheltered spot or do we need to beef up our fixing points to handle a stiff sea breeze. Are there any trees or buildings that will also cast shade onto the area. This shade audit ensures that the finished structure not only looks good but creates a practical shaded area that encourages usage when the sun is beating down at its hottest. 2. Sail Design & Architectural Twist Sails work best when they are designed to have a twist, or architectural hyperbar effect. This is where the fixing points, being steel posts or brackets, are created at different heights, such that the sail is then twisted in order to fit. A flat sail is harder to tension correctly, and in times of heavy downpour can catch and hold water for long periods of time, thus putting excess load pressure on the fixing points. Further, from an aesthetic perspective, they look boring. We recommend we install your fixing points with diagonally opposite high and low points, to avoid these problems and create a visual such as the following: To get a good proportionate difference in height, a good rule of thumb is to divide the distance between the two adjacent poles by four and that is the difference in height that you make the poles. I.e. if the poles are four metres apart then the difference in height will be one metre. Of course the more difference you make in the height of the poles the more spectacular look you will give the sail. If a twisted effect cannot be achieved or is not suitable then it is important for the sail to have a pitch, either a slanted effect or at least a low point that will prevent any pooling of water that may occur. Even though our sail is made from a porous shade cloth it will still hold water in the case of a heavy downpour. 3. Sail Size 3
You may have noted in the pictures above that the sail is actually smaller than the area between the columns. In order to fully tension the shade sail, we require a space between the sail and fixing points for rigging turnbuckles, and also catenary curves in the sides of the sail. For larger sails, these tension gaps and catenary curves need to be quite large, to ensure maximum tension and thus maximum longevity of the sail. For this reason, we strongly recommend installing your fixing points reasonably further apart from each other than the actual shaded area you desire. As a general rule, your sail will begin about 300mm away from the fixing point, although this varies depending on the size of your sail. We do, however use a clever device, designed in Australia by a friend of ours, called Ezy D s and Ezy T s. These stainless steel attachments make it unnecessary to have a turnbuckle on every fixing point and that way we can anchor the sail closer to our fixing point. This is great when you want to get your sail as close as possible to something like your house or shed. Ezy T s allow sails to attach to other sails. This allows us to create interlocking sail designs which look fantastic and increase the shade area. 4. Fixing to Existing Structures Caution is imperative when considering fixing to existing structures, such as your house. In instances of poor weather and strong winds, the loads placed on fixings by the sail are enormous, and should not be underestimated. To ensure that your existing structure is adequate to handle such loads, we may need to consult a local engineer or qualified builder. For the best safety practises, you should remove your sail when high wind conditions are forecast. Of course we have the expertise and the products to correctly attach to existing structures if they are structurally strong enough and we have access to engineers and builders experienced in shade structure design and installation when the job is beyond our capabilities. 5. Steel vs. Timber We recommend steel posts and not timber posts for your sail structure. Steel is stronger, will not overly deflect (i.e. bend from the ground up), and will not rot. Rust factors can be compensated by using galvanised steel or aluminium. Note that steel is inherently stronger than aluminium, and thus is typically cheaper to obtain. We tend to steer clear of aluminium poles in most instances. That said if you are prepared to remove your sail periodically, or to have it up only temporarily on necessary occasions, then many of our customers have successfully used timber and aluminium posts. It is important that you don t use a pole with too thin a wall as this will cause deflecting when the sail is under load. Using our engineering process we can recommend the best suited pole for your structure if you want to construct and erect your own poles or we can do it all for you. 6. Post Footings Required footing sizes vary dependant on the size of the structure, the span between the fixing points and the height of the post out of the ground. For this very reason we follow strict engineering guidelines in regard to our pole sizes and our footing sizes. Correcting a post that has been leant over in high winds due to an undersized footing is a difficult, sometimes impossible, job. Even a small movement of your footing will also compromise the ability to tension the sail, thus reducing the likelihood of maximum longevity. 4
If we are digging through land fill or raised garden beds, these depths are not included in the overall depth of the footing. Engineering plays an important part in ensuring a super tight, great looking and long lasting sail. NB An ideal situation follows: We often install supporting poles near a swimming pool. It is important to note that the pole must be the same distance or more away from the edge of the pool as the depth of the pool. Remember this engineering concept when designing your shade sail with our consultant 7. Underground Services We must ensure your area is clear of underground services, such as sewage and water plumbing, or electrical cabling, prior to digging holes for your footings. Damages to services can be dangerous, and expensive to correct. We will need to see a plan of all services that may be under the ground prior to digging. Things like reticulation, telephone cables, electrical or gas lines are costly to fix and dangerous if damaged if we don t know they are there. We can help you with a services search if you do not have plans of underground services available. 8. Local Authorities At A&B we are aware of most of the local authorities guidelines as to relevant building regulations that may be a factor in your development of a sail shade structure. Different shires have different rules with relation to shade sails. We ensure that we are up to date with all local government rules and regulations. Now that together we have properly planned your shade sail structure, it is time to move on to the first of the installation phases installing your fixing points. Step 2 - Installing Your Fixing Points Once we have resolved the issues raised in step 1, it is time to install your fixing points. As previously stated, we never underestimate the importance of being fully engineered with your footing dimensions, poles and fitting to existing structures a well installed Shade Sail will last many years, and become a very cost effective means of shading any area. The more liberal we are in these earlier phases, the longer the life of the sail structure we build. 5
Step 3 Selecting Your Required Shade Cloth and Colour We manufacture sails using shadecloth from several different manufacturers but we do however recommend three products, Monotec 370, Made in Australia, Supershade Plus, made in New Zealand and Rainbowshade, made in South Africa. Out of the three our preference is for the Monotec as it is the strongest shadecloth on the market today, as well as being the only shadecloth manufactured in Australia. It is also more suited to larger sails. Shade cloth typically is made two ways (i) monofilament or (ii) monofilament and tape. Now sorry to bore you with technical stuff but the different construction of the shadecloth makes a difference to the end product that is your shadesail. The monofilament fabric has a higher strength and a lighter weight, while the monofilament and tape typically has a greater UV factor but is a heavier fabric. A monofilament fabric with a high thread count per square inch, such as Monotec with a thread count of 16, has high strength as well as high shade and as such is the premium shadecloth on the market. All three fabrics that we use are designed for the purpose of tension shadesails and have good guarantee s to back them and that s why we are confident to recommend them. All fabrics have an exciting range of vibrant colours and colourful hues. Ask any of our friendly staff for a brochure or sample. A&B s manufacturing process We pride ourselves on making the best possible shadesail money can buy and that doesn t end with supplying the best shadecloth. Tenara thread, a long lasting UV treated thread is used on all our sails. Wind and weather pose a serious challenge to the seams and hems of shade sails. Within only a few years, they can rupture and tear. Tenara thread gives you the reliability you need. It is absolutely resistant to weathering and that s guaranteed. At every anchor point we heavily reinforce the sail as this is where the most pressure is applied. At these points we use an EZY-Slide D-ring or EZY-Slide T-ring (see below) held with double stitched heavy duty seat belt webbing. EZY-SLIDE D-RINGS & T-RINGS EZY-SLIDE D-Rings and EZY-SLIDE T-Rings are a patented system developed and made in Australia. EZY-SLIDES are designed to allow the free movement of perimeter cable in both shade cloth and waterproof membrane sails. All stainless steel content and fully Australian made. The system ensures identical loading on all anchor points and on all curves. The result:...no Tight sides... NO Puckers.. NO Wrinkles... Around the perimeter, A&B shade sails have a 4mm stainless steel wire rope (6mm wire is used in larger sails) in a double stitched pocket. The arcs in each side of our sails (catenary curves) are determined by the length of each side and the perimeter wire ensures that the arcs pull out tightly and remain tight for the life of the sail. 6
You won t see shade sails of this quality at your local hardware store. In fact if you look hard at the shade sails over the nursery at one of our biggest hardware stores you will notice they are made by A&B. When you want a real quality shade sail you can t buy it off a shelf. The Poles: The professional installers at A&B are used to installing poles and fixing points following strict engineering guidelines. In most instances 100 x 100 x 5mm poles are used for all shade sails up to a span of 5 meters and a height of 3.5 meters. Anything over this size needs consultation with our engineer. The strength of these poles ensures that there is no bending when under a load. Unlike many of our competitors we do not use poles of lesser strength than this in any circumstances; why? Because inferior poles will deflect (bend) and within a few months your once tight shadesail will look like a hammock. The right poles, the right sail and our expertise will ensure your shade sail will remain tight and look fantastic for years. We guarantee it. Poles can be powder coated to suit your colour scheme or left galvanized. We also have the expertise to attach to walls and roofs using quality sail specific hardware. As with the poles we can supply you with the hardware and the know how so that you can erect and fit yourself or we can simply do the whole lot for you. The Hardware: All hardware, turnbuckles and shackles, are 316 grade stainless steel. They will not rust and they finish the sail off with a really professional look, a look that you won t get using galvanized hardware. (We are happy to supply galvanized hardware if that is your desire) Other fixing hardware that we can supply include 7
The Guarantee: You have seen how we plan for our shade sails, how we take a great deal of care to engineer our shade sails, how we manufacture our shade sails using only the best quality tension shade cloth and strongest thread, I ll even show you how to install them later. We are so genuinely positive that we are supplying you with the best possible shade sail on the market today that we are prepared to back our product with a ten year guarantee. If you follow our maintenance guide and maintain maximum tension on your shade sail when it is up over the summer months we will guarantee it for ten years. We guarantee the shade cloth, its construction, the thread and the quality of all fixing points, pole and footing for a full ten years. That is way above any industry standard. How can we offer such an outrageous guarantee such as this? Simply because we use the best quality product and manufacturing concepts in the industry and I am happy to stand by my product for ten years. (In fact some of our shade sails will grow to be more than twenty years old) Step 4 Measuring Your Area Creating your shade experience is a two step process. Once all the poles and fixing points have been installed we take quite comprehensive measurements. We triangulate all of the measurements automatically taking into account the variances in fixing heights and necessary angles to best create your product. It would not be possible to properly create your shade sail without these measurements, and that is why we cannot install the fixing points and the shade cloth at the same time. Once the measurements are taken they are input into a CAD diagram where the correct allowances are made and plans for the manufacture of the sail is drawn up. It can take up to a week before the sail is ready to be put up and this gives our footing ample time to cure. Step 5 Installing Your Shade Sail Of course the first time that the sail is installed will be by our professional team of installers, however it is important to know the process so that you can remove and refit the sail at the change of season in future years We recommend that at the end of each year, when you take down your sail that you remove all the hardware (shackles and turnbuckles) and give them a spray with a protectant lubricant and store in a dry place with your sail. However there is no harm in leaving them attached to the sail, but still give them a spray with something like CRC or lanolin. It s a good idea to mark the sail with a letter or number and mark the fixing point as well so that it is an easy task to match when reinstalling The installing process is extremely important in ensuring maximum longevity of your sail. When reinstalling the sail yourself we recommend you follow these steps: 1. Lay out and attach your components Each sail point will have a combination of shackles and turnbuckles. Unwind the turnbuckles to full extension, and use the shackles to connect the turnbuckle to the sail corner points if not already done so last season. 8
2. Attach your sail Fix your turnbuckle (which is already attached to your sail) to the relevant fixing lug on your fixing points. At this stage, leave the turnbuckles fully unwound, until all points have been attached. Move from point to point until all points of the sail are fixed as required. NOTE: In the manufacturing process, we have allowed for the fact that the fabric will stretch. This means that considerable force will be needed to wrench up the last points to get them close to the fixing points. We guarantee that this is the best way to manufacture your product, even when you think your sail may have been constructed too small. We recommend you consider creating a quasi-pulley effect to pull the last points up. This is done by tying rope onto your sail corner point, and looping it back and forth to the relevant fixing point. You may have access to purpose built pulley systems such as block and tackle, and if so we recommend you use them. Continue this process until all fixing points are in place. Your turnbuckles should still be fully unwound. 3. Tension your turnbuckles Before you tension up your sail make sure that the wire rope that travels around the perimeter of the sail is locked off. It should have been set when the sail was initially installed but if it has come undone or has loosened off follow these directions: In one corner (we try to make this the most easily accessible corner) you will notice the ends of the wire. Simply wind the wire around the Ezy D and thread it through the pocket on the other side. Now using the wire grips supplied lock both wires together at the base of the D. The wire will now form part of the tension on the centre of the sail as the turnbuckles tighten the catenary curves. (This will make sense when you see it in action!) Now simply move around from point to point, and tension each of the turnbuckles as required. As previously mentioned, the longevity of your sail product is dependant almost completely on how well you maintain tension in the sail. The sail materials, perimeter pocket, and corner fixings are designed to be placed under very heavy load, so do not be too afraid to pull the sail up extremely tight. Note that if you are using your sail for temporary purposes only, and will be installing it and removing it on regular occasions, the tension aspect for longevity is not as crucial. However, should the day be a little windy, try to maintain as much tension as possible, as the constant gusty movement of the sail creates a 9
whipping effect and will eventually damage the corners and compromise the overall product. Once again, if you wish, you can get our expert installers to install the sail for you. To remove your sail simply follow the preceding steps in reverse order. And that s it! Your custom made shade sail area is now completed, so sit back, relax, and enjoy. Now, you have taken the first step and the first step is awareness. You ve now acknowledged there is a need to come and see me. The next step is action. To take advantage of our brilliant and extensive range of shade sails and shade structures in a variety of styles and colours to suit you that s GUARANTEED to last and Look fantastic CALL A&B ON 9353 2550 TODAY! or send us an email to sales@canvasaustralia.com.au I m looking forward to meeting you as my new and valued customer. Warm Regards, Paul Lewis P.S. Remember, my comprehensive guarantee on the quality and workmanship of our shade sails and shade structures lasts for a 10 year period. You never risk a cent. That s how confident I am in delivering you the excellence you deserve. It s that simple! P.P.S. And please don t forget, you really can enjoy the advantage of alfresco outdoor living today and add incredible value to your home with a fantastic shade sail from Important. A&B. Start improving your lifestyle today CALL today 9353 2550 or email The contents sales@canvasaustralia.com.au of this guide are the copyright of NOW! A&B You ll Canvas be Australia. glad you did No part may be reproduced without permission. This edition October 2008 you re guaranteed of that! Disclaimer This guide is written to provide technical information to potential customers of A&B Canvas Australia and purchasers of shade sails. The information provided is based on our research and general knowledge as well as information provided to us from consultants and engineers. It is provided in a general nature only and as such no warranty is given until an actual purchase is made from A&B Canvas Australia. 10