Shade Sail - need a good one that won't break the bank
 

I actually want a few of them. Coolaroo seems to be a popular brand...anyone use them?

http://71.41.112.226/Images/Shade_Sa...and_TRIAV7.jpg

Coolaroo Sails

Shadesails.com has some more expenzive ones, but I wonder if it worth 2x the price..,

Shade Sail - #1 TopQuality Tensioned Shade Structures and Tensioned Fabric Structures from Shadesails.com! The Official Site

They also have a cheaper Eclipse line.

Anyone have experience with theses? I just want the sails. The hardware I'll get at the local HW stare.

My friend makes and distributes the sails and my company installs them, occasionally.

I will get you in contact with him.

PM me.

Sent you an e-mail Randy. PM is a little bothersome on my iphone.

We have a coolaroo 16' 5'' triangular sail on our roof deck, works great! Cost was $97 and included the hardware and two turnbuckles.

Where did you get 1 for that price, these are cool need 1

I have two Coolaroos, and am looking to add a third. They work well.

I got mine from AceHardwareOutlet.com, they have them listed under coolaroo's parent company name, Gale Pacific.

Here is a pic of ours from when I was setting it up, we're very satisfied with it.
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1273063082.jpg

Yeah - we want to go this route too - Souk post what you find out..

We got ours from a local patio funiture place a few yrs ago. It's a 16 footer. Not sure of the brand , I thnk it was about $145? Love it. Although its time for a replacement, its pretty beat up.

Will do.

This is what I'm wondering....longevity. I intend to leave them up throughout the summer months. The Koolaroos are about $100, and the Skyclipse are twice that, but promises better quality. I want to get 3-4 of them to cover a 30X15 patio...the Koolaroos may have to do since I'm not willing to pay $1000+.

Grant - that's a great looking patio/balcony.

Mines probably about 8 yrs old. Its usually up from may to october. Never taken down. Between the sun beating on it, suffering through a few severe storms, it held up pretty good. I cant complain.

Thanks! The Coolaroo makes it MUCH more livable since there is no natural shade to be found on our roof. I wish I had bought one years ago.

I can't really comment as to longevity since I've only had mine for a couple of months, but the fabric itself seems fairly bulletproof... reminiscent of the stuff they use to make winter pool covers, or the stuff they use for the bouncing surface of an outdoor trampoline.

Vin - that's the feedback I was hoping to hear.

It gets pretty windy where we are some days, so the roughed material as Grant described it is a plus.

Quick question...do they offfer any protection from light rain? Do they hold water and sag?

Something I'm interested in as well. So what do you do to attach that 3rd point. I don't have the brick pillar like in Tishabet's photo. Sink A post in concrete? Looks like that in the photo in the orginal post, my patio layout is similar to this.

(edit, ok so I'm reading the Coolaroo installation instructions now...... :))

Jay

Jim - I understand that they are not meant to provide rain protection, although my internet search did turn up some waterproof ones. I suppose a light rain may run off a sloping sail even if it isn't meant to be impermeable. The weave on the regular sail appears to be tight enough to allow this if it's just a light drizzle and the sail is angled.


Jay - My patio is between two structures, but if I didn't have this configuration, I would probably do something like this (with the pipe or conduit allowed to pivot at the wall). This would only work if you had height...or you use a right angle triangle sail and place the pipe under one of the non-hypotenous side of the sail.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1273073164.jpg

The Coolaroo is somewhat stretchy, so the cantilevered design posted above may not work if you have any significant wind. To stabilize the pole you'd need a lot of tension on the rope/cable that is the lower stay and the Coolaroo which is effectively the upper stay, but the Coolaroo isn't really made for that. Mismatch between the properties of a rope/cable and a Coolaroo. I'd simply have another rope/cable acting as the upper stay.

The Coolaroo is not water-resistant in anything more than a very light sprinkle. But, it is easy enough to cut a tarp to the same shape as the Coolaroo, attach it to two of the Coolaroo mount points, roll it up neatly, when it rains, simply unroll the tarp and connect it to the third Coolaroo mount point.

Bought a roll of Coolaroo fabric (100' ft or so) at Lowes 5-6 years ago. Used it to cover a pergola in the Chicago suburbs from June-Sept. Today? Minor fading, no significant stretching, only thinking now of replacing it. Actually doubled it up to get a little more sun protection over the patio. Attached with screws and hasn't ripped, torn, etc. around those areas. Great stuff.....

Thanks Enzo. The blue 16'5" ones I want are out of stock. They appear to have the best prices. I sent then an e-mail about back ordering it.

Home Depot has a very good selection. Lowes not so good. Then Google brought up a lot of hits.

Might have to get some of this, looks like a nice option.

You'd think a guy with money burning a hole in his pocket could get a hold of these pretty easily, but nooooO!

The AceHardware website was a dead end. Even when their website indicated the item I wanted as "in stock" a call to India (yes, I called their number...but spoke to someone in India) to confirm status resulted in , "sorry sir, but we do not have any in stock and the website is off by 24-48 hrs on the status." Sure, 'cept I called 3 or 4 times throughout last week. India doesn't have it instock...


So I kept looking and waiting and waiting for someone to have some blue 16'-5" sails in stock. Finally called Cymax, an online retailer that had free shipping, and they were able to promise a drop shipment from Coolaroo (in stock there!), but they couldn't offer expedited shipping. Coolaroo couldn't help unless I was willing to pay $50 more each to buy from them directly, then pay the expedite fee. EEEEK!

Cymax was nice to work with though. The girl who I made contact with followed up on her end and called me back when she promised and didn't make any false claims or promises they couldn't keep. So I rolled the dice and hope to get them before Memorial Day.

Here's a link to Cymax's Coolaroo sail. They also sell the sand color ones in this size for $95 each. It seems blue is a high demand color.

Coolaroo 16 ft 5" Triangle Shade Sail - Ocean Blue - 433505

BTW - just about every online retailer drop ships from Coolaroo in California. So it seems. So when Coolaroo is out of stock, they all show out of stock, or some expected ship date....based on Coolaroo production.

Cool, I decided we need a couple more of these, thanks for doing the research.

John, if you call Cymax, hit extension 550. The girl's name is "Coral" (yes, like sea coral), and very pleasant to work with. The smaller sizes are much cheaper than the 16'-5" ones I bought, and if I had a smaller patio, I would buy the small ones and get creative with how they overlap each other.

W/R Coolaroo. They were nice too, but they couldn't help me. I offered to pay them the UPS fee directly to expedite the shipment, but they weren't set up to do it, and they couldn't undersell their retailers.

Man I hope noone ordered from Cymax on my recommendation. Over 2 weeks and I still haven't heard from them. So I called and was told the item is out of stock and it isn't expected to be instock until after the 4th of July!

What a scam. My payment was essentially a short term loan to Cymax. When I told them to cancel the order I was told it will take 1-4 days and someone will call me to confirm. WTF! Issue a refund to my CC immediately.

I confirmed with Coolaroo the items were instock before I ordered through Cymax. Minutes between calls. I'll give them a day, then I call my CC company and get the charges reversed. Never order from Cymax.

No worries. It has been raining constantly here, all thoughts of needing another shade sail evaporated. Maybe if the rain stops this week . . .

good timing, i just got one off of EBAY for @ $65.00 bucks. Came to the house in three days from AZ. not looking foward to the install though.

I found an e-bay store which had the 16.5 foor shade for $29 each, but you had to buy the turn buckle kits separate. With shipping & tax, three shades are $175. They are in Texas, so hopefully the delivery will be quick.

What about a want ad for used sails at local sailing clubs?
May require a little stitching in the center to tighten it up, but it would be big and cheap.

I actually gave up on this idea. I wanted them for the graduation party we were having for one of the kids. It's been so windy and stormy here this year that I'm probably better off having never put them up. I've already loss 1/4 of a tree in the back yard, and I'm chopping one down over the weekend as it's leaning beyond salvation.

True I would have taken down the sails, but then it'd be up and down and up and down. Too much for for now. I'll probably just build something permanent one of these years.