Electric roof opener

[George]

This has the juices flowing http://tinyurl.com/39gjj7

Now I'm thinking a car wiper motor and 10 foot of chain (which I'm sure I will find in the skip @ work ) My wife's uncle rigged up something similar to open his garage door after his back started playing up and it works a treat.

Anyone tried this or have any ideas on this?, now my roof is pretty free moving but it does take 2 hands stretching above my head to get the job done, after the initial inertia to get it going its quite easy with no effort.

[barkis]

My obs. is almost finished. I have today adjusted the wheels on the tracks to ensure the roof slides back on a straight path, and it does.

It requires no effort to move, but unless I fit a pulley and fit some yacht cord, it is a stretch to reach up.

I was in my local Netto store yesterday, and they are selling a garage door infra red operated electric door opener, and I toying with the I dea of utilising it for the roof opening and closing. It's probably a bit overkill, but what the heck, it is only £40 which is cheap. My birthday in November. I may coax the wife to by it for me. Since it is usually shower gel, and after shave, I my have a job on my hands [ersuading her.

Ron.

[Helen]

Got the local shed man coming this afternoon to discuss options (he assures me he can build a proper shed to my design for the same sort of price as a B&Q one). I'm only little, so some help with moving the roof would be a great help - so thanks guys!

Helen

[barkis]

Helen, I bought four solid tyred fixed wheels on Ebay. They were 75 mm diameter. Don't get castors, as they would try to rotate as you roof position changes. Fixed wheel are better as long as the are aligned properly. I was thinking about electric opening and closing, but really it would not be necessary as it is so easy to move the roof back and forth, I can do it with on finger. There is one spar that runs across my roof internally near the front when closed. I can easily reach it to open and lose it. So Easy Peasy. If you are unable to do anything like that, you could have a pulley installed front and rear with a cord or rope to pull on making life easy for you.

Believe me, it is so easy to open and close, and so quiet, no one is going to hear me when I close up at some ungodly hour, so no worries on that score. My biggest worry, is the infernal noise the LX90 makes slewing.

My ob. is very similar to Dave's (Centroid) and I am sure he will confirm how easy it is to operate he roof. He won't have the noisy slewing either I would guess.

I will put more pics up when I get near to the completion day.

Ron.

[Helen]

Thanks Ron. That's really helpful! (Pictures would be great too!) Our shed man said he can build whatever we want - so have to really decide what I want/need now It sounds like if we get the rolling mechanism right then I won't need electric assistance (will keep the complexity and cost down ).

Helen

[Stardust]

I use rope to pull the roof, it does take a bit of effort to get it moving but that's because it fairly heavy, once moving it's ok. Going off is easier than brining back. At least I don't have to worry about the wind moving it. Fixed castors work a treat I think mine are 100mm solid nylon.

DAve