Wall Section Experiment

Anyone who designs IDPA Stages knows that walls are a hassle.  Typically, they weigh way too much and are cumbersome to move and store.  So, here's our latest "wall experiment."

It requires two ten foot lengths of plastic 3/4 inch pipe, two elbows and two tees.  Then it requires a section of very lightweight garden netting and a minimum of eight small zip ties, plus two pieces of rebar.  That's it.

The finished product weighs practically nothing and the thin netting offers virtually no wind resistance.  The 4 foot wide by 6 foot tall sections could easily be zip tied together to create hallways, room sections and even more architectural features.  One section by itself makes a nice cover structure.

One of the nice things about this design is that there are no braces or "feet" that could cause a tripping hazard.  There are no rough edges, no splintered wood and no sharp corners.

We put this one together by friction fitting the elbows and tees.  Technically, the wall sections could easily be taken apart at the end of the season to facilitate easy storage in our tiny shooting stage storage shed. The only recurrent annual cost would be the zip ties.

Now we need to test the wall section in action, as well as in high wind to see how it behaves.  So far, so good.  We got this idea back in September but haven't had the time to get it together until today.

(Added later) We think it would be a good idea to glue the inside joints of the tees and elbows.  Otherwise, the other parts can be friction fit, making seasonal storage a piece of cake.

The pipe and fittings for one section cost $6.75, including sales tax.  We bought 100 feet of the netting for $15, so there's about 75 cents worth of netting in this section.  We buy our zip ties at Harbor Freight when they are sale so 8 zip ties would cost about 16 cents total.  The grand total cost comes in under $8 per section or basically $2 per lineal foot of wall section.  We're thinking it would take a minimum of six sections (24 lineal feet) to build some decent stages. Cost would be about $50 for that much wall.  Ideally, we'd like to have 48 lineal feet which would be about $100.

As far as stage design materials go, that $100 is a genuine bargain for what it buys.