DIY Conservatory

[AndrewSchofield]

Hi all.

We're thinking of installing a conservatory on the rear of our property and, being currently nearing the end of a 70% DIY loft conversion, I'm half wondering about getting a 'falt-packed' conservatory and putting it up myself? Can anyone advise if this is a good idea or not, or is it best let to the proffesionals? We have had 'a guy' around to price us for him installing one and we are now awaiting his quote - but in the meantime i want to look into doing it myself. I would imagine the most important thing is making sure its watertight, but we're thinking of a fairly simply lean-to design so this shouldn't be too tricky?

Can anyone suggest the best place to go to buy a DIY conservatory?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!

 

[noseall]

I personally would save up and have a company install one for me.

Granted, the base i would construct myself, but the plastic bits i would leave for the pro's. They have limitless bits and bobs in their tall vans and seem to fit a connie with ease, well a decent company anyhow.

I have seen a few budget diy connies and they look tat.

 

[garyo]

I put a 7.5M x 4.5m P shaped one up myself, on 600mm dwarf cavity walls.

Most of the work - probably 60% - was in digging the footings and preparing the over site, since we had 12 inches of concrete in places, and the soil was full of rubble due to an outhouse that'd been demolished there 40 years ago.

building the dwarf walls was the next 20%, and once they were done the actual conservatory went together in a matter of a couple of days - it was like mechano. On that basis, if you got a fitter to do everything from sill height onwards, I don't think it'd cost that much.

The remaining 20% was standard stuff like plastering, skirting, painting, flooring, electrics and sockets etc.

A year later we had it looked over by a couple of double glazing companies who were quoting to replace the house windows, and they said it was a 20k conservatory at their prices. I think it cost us £7k (28mm non k-glass all round, including the roof)

Edited to add - it wouldn't have been possible without the folks at diynot.com!

Gary

 

[AndrewSchofield]

Thanks guys.

noseall - i know what you mean about some looking rubbish - i think its a case of you get what you pay for with uPVC products? That's why i'm looking for guidance on where to buy if i do go down that route - put 'DIY conservatory' into google and there are hundreds of sites selling them online at fantastic prices but what the quality is like is anyone's guess. I'm sure wickes used to sell them but they don't seem to any more?

Probably will have to await the quote from the cons company and see if they've broken it down in which case, it might be worth looking at just DIYing the base and then let them put up the frame on top?

 

[rogerwright]

Hi

I haven't posted before, but we successfully installed a DIY conservatory, they can be just as good as one supplied by a conservatory company at a fraction of the cost.

You should get some quotes, that's what we did, we ended up using http://www.dreamconservatoriesonline.co.uk/ - they were the only suppliers that were part of the trading standards buy with confidence scheme, which gave us peace of mind.

We got a local builder to help us, we did it together, a great compromise solution, we now have a fantastic looking conservatory for thousands less than we were quoted by companies in the local paper.

Cheers[/url]