Clothesline Plans

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I hope this doesn't a real "no brainer" but I need plans for an old fashioned 4x4 style clothesline that can be relocated. My family and I are transitional homesteaders, in other words we have to relocate frequently because of my husband's employment so we go from rental farm to rental farm. I am tired of losing assets with each move. My idea was to stabilize the poles in wine barrels in which I would plant herbs to scent the laundry as the wind blows. It may be necessary to further stabilize the barrels but I want to be able to move the whole project to our next farm (whenever that might be). My husband is of no assistance with farm projects, two thumbs and a bad work schedule, so the plans have to be simple enough for a competent mom and two kids. Any ideas?

-- Teddi Lane Turner (TLTurnerJD92@msn.com), April 17, 2002

Answers

This is just a thought...how about a "clothers tree". Can purchase them at your local Wal-Mart type store. You can take it with you. Just have to put the pole part into the ground each time. Nothing like a real clothes line. I wonder if the barrel idea would be stable enough to hold the weight of the laundry. Digging a couple of holes with pouring cement and placing a couple of poles into them for a clothes line isn't hard to do and probably would be your best idea. OR....do you have large enough trees to just tie the ropes around the limbs for the line ?? Do you have a place to put a pulley for a line and then attach to a tree or out building?? Hope this gives you some ideas to work on. Good Luck !!

-- Helena (windyacs@npacc.net), April 17, 2002.

Might get some ideas from these: Three Clothesline Designs, http://www.greenhouse.gov.au/renewable/reis/home/clothes_drying.html

Collapsible Clothes Dryer, http://www.coops4u.com/other_products.html

-- BC (desertdweller44@yahoo.com), April 17, 2002.


To save yourself putting it in concrete, buy a cast iron umbrella stand and put it in that--also, if you're talking about an umbrella clothesline, they only cost about $40 and last quite a while.

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), April 17, 2002.

i've used trees before with success. used them for 2 years here until dh came across poles free. i just strung the line from tree to tree, wrapping it around each one and hanging straight down the line. my mom has been doing this since she moved here, too and it works great. very easy to put up and down, too.

-- laura (okgoatgal@hotmail.com), April 17, 2002.

There is an "umbrella" style clothesline which is made to be removable and to fold up as well. Don't know whether you have them there or not, but you just need a length of larger-diameter (guessing - 2½") pipe sunk in the ground to put the pole in. Should do it in concrete, but may not even need to - just tamped earth may be OK for a few months, then move it a foot.

-- Don Armstrong (from Australia) (darmst@yahoo.com.au), April 17, 2002.


If you want a 4x4 post clothesline, first make your posts. Then find 2 empty 5gal. plastic buckets. Sink the buckets in the ground and stand your posts in them and fill them with sand and gravel. Make guy wires from the top of the T to the ground with cable and a dog chain holder that screws in the ground. When it's time to move just yank it all up. Easier way would be a line from the house to a tree. Just loop some clothesline rope around a high enough branch and tie a clothesline pulley to it. Then attach a pulley to a hook screwed into the house. String the line and you're ready to go. The loop of line in the tree is so you don't do damage to the tree and you can easily remove it.

-- Emil in TN (eprisco@usit.net), April 17, 2002.

I've got an umbrella style that's fastened to a long t-post, while I'm trying to figure out where I want it permanently. I drove the post, then threaded scraps of pvc pipe over it, all the way up the the base of the umbrella. Drop the center post into the pipes, and you're set. To move it, you just have to pull up the post.

-- Connie (Connie@lunehaven.com), April 17, 2002.

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