Is your beach umbrella broken? You can try to repair it
How many times do we throw away an umbrella just because it has a hole in the fabric or some part is broken? It is a shame to do this when you could simply and quickly repair it, doing both the environment and your wallet some good. There are some useful tips around that make a repair easy and fast and that can be used to save umbrellas.
The circumstances in which we usually find ourselves having to repair an umbrella are: the tearing of the fabric; the bending of one or more frame's arms; and the breaking of one or more if its support slats. A bit of patience and dexterity will suffice, and your umbrella could be as good as new in no time, ready for its next use.
Holes or tears in the fabric
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- Unhook the fabric from the frame and find the points to be repaired which can be holes or vertical gashes.
- In case of gashes it will be sufficient, to arm yourself with a needle and thread and sew the cut closed.
- In case of holes, however, you will have to put a patch on them. Recycling a piece of canvas from other umbrellas or old throwaway bags, cut out the piece of fabric you need, (obviously larger than the hole to be covered). If you want to do a more exact job and take the opportunity to revolutionize the style of your umbrella, you can think of adding multiple patches here and there in a decorative way. They will appear to have been put there on purpose to decorate and not to repair.
Bent arms
- It is very easy for the arms to bend with the wind, deforming the umbrella. In this case, the first thing to do is to remove the fabric, separating it from the frame.
- When you have the bare frame of the umbrella open in front of you, begin to straighten the slats, one by one, where needed. You can do this by hand, or by using pliers.
- Close the the umbrella and make sure that it is now fully straightened.
- Put the fabric back on. Your umbrella should now be fixed.
Broken shaft (stand)
The shafts of an umbrella, in addition to bending, can break. Even in this circumstance, the first thing to do is to remove the sheet from the slats and identify those that need to be adjusted. The possible ways to do this are many but not all of them guarantee full stability after repair. The idea that seems most reliable to us is to use pieces of metal tube, easily available in hobby shops.
- Therefore, get a metal tube with a diameter slightly greater than that of the cue and cut a piece that is not too long.
- Put some glue on the broken ends of the stick and, by slipping one into each end of the tube, make sure that they touch each other and stick together. They will remain fixed by the glue and held in place by the piece of pipe.
- If you want greater safety and stability you can add, with a drill, one or more screws to fix the tube to the slats.
What do you think? Could you consider repairing a broken umbrella by following these tips or would you throw it away?
