“Very pleased with the product. It is sturdy and well manufactured. It is not rainproof and is not claimed to be. Lyndan at ClearSpell was at pains to volunteer this, but it did not concern me as it was wanted primarily as a controllable sun shade, which it does exceedingly well. Following its assembly and siting it was tested on both counts by a heatwave at 29deg and a subsequent severe thunderstorm on the night of Friday 13th! It passed all events as expected.
It is suggested that assembly is a 2-person job. The frame is best assembled upside down and this way it is straight forward and easily accomplished by one person. It will however need at least 2 persons to turn it right way up and carry it to its final position. Four persons, one for each leg, would be even easier! Installation of the roof vanes definitely requires a minimum of 2 people, and three is better - one to support the vane and one on each end to fix the holding screws. All in all the total assembly time was about 5 hours. I used a power driver with a hex Allen key bit, which saved huge amounts of time compared to using the supplied Allen key wrench! Also to note is that the supplied ground fixings are only tent-hooks to fix direct to the ground. We used 50mm M8 coach screws (4 to each leg) to secure to the wooden decking. Again this is speeded up by having an M8 socket for your power drill. Very happy with the product, the ClearSpell customer service, and the assembly.”
