My Chicago Garden

I probably could have built the cold frame in one weekend but I wasn’t dedicated to doing it. I came very close though.  The materials were obtained from Menards (have I mentioned Menards completely out classes Home Depot and Lowes by orders of magnitude?)

First I had to reduce the size of the 4×8 raised beds down to 3×8 so the windows would fit.  Not a big deal since when I made the original raised beds back in spring I used cheap pine boards and they were already rotting out so they wouldn’t have lasted anyway.  They are now made of cedar.

The major support pieces, the window units and anything that touches water or ground is built from cedar.  The wall material is 1 x 8 carsiding and will be painted with a 25 year exterior grade flat white paint.  Total material cost, minus the window glass, was about $150.  That’s pretty darn cheap if you ask me.  Especially for a 3 by 8 foot raised bed and cold frame that you can build yourself!

I’m thinking of insulating the walls with 1 1/2 inch foam.  Which should give an R7 or better insulation value.  If I can find Polyurethane or foil faced Polyisocyanurate the R value would be closer to R11. The single glass is going to be the biggest heat loss area.  With only an R value of about 1.  So I’m not sure if it’s worth the extra effort of foam. I may just wait until after this first winter so I’ll have some actual temperature measurements within the cold frame.

I still need to finish off the side panels and figure out a method of securing the windows to the frame in a way that secures them in the snow and wind, but I can take them off in the spring and summer.