Is this Hop Trellis design ok?

[BlackFox]

Hi, this is my first HBT post. I'm about to build a hop trellis in the next few days and I was hoping you all could give me a second opinion on my hop trellis design. I mostly want to make sure this design would be structurally sounds and safe, because it will be placed in a shared community garden.

I've only been allotted a 3ft x 3ft area to grow my hops, so I have to make this amount of space work.

The design includes a 4x4 pressure treated post, sunk 3ft into the ground and filled in with dirt. The post will rise 5 ft out of the ground, then a 13ft PT 2x4 will be secured to the side of the post with 2 large lag screws, and a 5ft 2x4 will be attached to the top with 4 hop lines attached, each hop line will be spaced 1.25ft apart.

I plan to grow 2 Zeus plants in the 3 foot raised bed, spaced 1ft apart, then I will train 2 vines from each plant up the trellis.

At harvest time I should be able to unscrew 1 lag screw and pivot the top half of the trellis downward. Since this is a community garden I don't have access to a ladder.

Ideally I would like to space the hop plants further apart and space the lines further apart, but I only have a 3ftx3ft space to work with. All the hop vines will be the same variety so it should not be a big deal if they vines intermingle.

Please let me know your opinions.

http://imgur.com/25tnxHh

 

[billl]

I'd be afraid to put that up in a public space. A typical ratio for large poles is 1/3 below ground.

 

[BlackFox]

I plan to adjust the total height to be 15ft. 1/3 of 15ft would be 5ft underground, which I think is really overkill.

I have looked at a lot of trellis forum post and people typically bury their post 3-4 ft deep. Also I just found some info regarding commercial hop growers, they use 20ft posts and bury them 4ft deep (not 6.6ft). I also read on these fourms about a telephone pole installer who said they bury 15ft poles 3ft deep, and for every additional 5ft in height, they bury the post 1ft deeper.

It seems to me that 3-4ft should be fine.

 

[kryptonite1055]

Instead of having to pull that lag screw at the end of each season, why not have the twine go down the back side of the pole and tie them off there. At the end of the season all you would need to do is tie a new line to the old one and lower your hops down. If for some reason the hops have over grown the top of the trellis, you can still pivot it over as you described.

 

[BlackFox]

Instead of having to pull that lag screw at the end of each season, why not have the twine go down the back side of the pole and tie them off there. At the end of the season all you would need to do is tie a new line to the old one and lower your hops down. If for some reason the hops have over grown the top of the trellis, you can still pivot it over as you described.

Good idea, I suspect the hops will eventually grow over the top of the trellis, and pivoting the trellis down might be fun, but I think I will try to tie the lines to the back as suggested to see if that works as well.

 

[Stealthcruiser]

The commenter mentioned "public space" for your benefit, in this liability, blame placing society we live in today.

As "kryptonite1055" mentioned, that's a good idea, and you could incorporate cheap hardware store pulley's to lace your trellis' through, and if they start to grow over the upper arm, lower your trellis' and let them "sag" a little, to bring your crop closer to your reach, and not drag your crop over the arm to retrieve it.

 

[MeMyself&I]

Any updates on how this project turned out? I've bee daydreaming a similar system. The problem I'm envisioning is the lowering of the arm. Seems you need to have some sort of winch system or that thing is just going to mousetrap you IF you could even get enough tension off that bolt to take it out.