What kind of carport or pergola is best for you?
You have decided a carport or pergola is a great idea to protect your valuables but what kind of carport or pergola is best for you?
There are many styles and prices to choose from but there is only one place in Australia where you can buy any style available. Car Covers and Shelter is more than excellent quality and prices, but they have the largest selection of carports available. All styles of carport or pergola can be purchased through them from the two-leg cantilever carports to a full solar carport installation.
Carport Designs available in Australia – What kind of carport or pergola is best for you?
Before you get started with planning your new pergola or carport, you need to view the range of what carports are available in Australia. Here is a list of the types of carports or pergola you might consider: –
- Skillion (flat roof)
- Gable (can have the gable left open or can be in-filled)
- Dutch Gable
- Hip Roof
- Cantilever
- Solar
What is included in a Carport Kit?
Once you choose your style and have it designed exactly to your dimensions your DIY carport will come complete with everything. Every post, beam, facia, sheet, flashing, bolt, screw and silicone sealant required will be supplied.
Concrete footings or a concrete base will be your responsibility but other than that, all you need to supply are some basic tools and labour. If you don’t have the handyman skills, try a local handyman in your area. In most cases, the additional cost will be no more than a day’s labour.
Carport Kits Done for You & Delivered to Your Door!
A Quality Carport Kits Will Save You Time and Money:
- You pay for the materials you need and nothing else –All kits are ready-to-build; pre-punched and pre-cut to the right size and length.
- Everything you need supplied –Everything you need to install your carport is supplied and delivered to your door.
- Quicker Installation –Installation is made easy as the carport kits are cut and punched to size. Everything is made to fit, and your kit is delivered with a full list of material (parts list) as well as plans and drawings to assist you.
- Engineering is included with all Car Covers and Shelter Carport Kits saving you time and money. In most instances you will require the supplied engineering drawings to get council approval. Carport kits can be designed to suit all wind regions and are designed specifically for you.
- Price includes delivery to your home for most of Australia – All major cities in Australia are covered. The national supply network can deliver to most areas of Australia all included in your price.
Carport Kit Designs – What kind of carport or pergola is best for you?
The least expensive carport or the least expensive pergola is the Skillion or flat roof carport. The Skillion carport is also the most popular type of carport and the easiest to install.
Skillion kits can start at around $1300.00 for an ‘off the shelf’ Budget Carport. The ‘off the shelf’ range of carports are the least expensive to buy. While they are known as ‘off the shelf’, they are always made to order but the engineering and design is standard on these and can not be altered in any way. With these, what you see is what you get. The best quality off-the shelf” is the BlueScope Lysaght Lite Skillion range in either single carport, ( 3x 6 carport kit) or double carport kit, (6 x 6 carport kit).
Any size Skillion of any height will be custom made for you through the Professional Choice Range. For little to no extra cost, these can be designed to be strong enough to support the weight of solar panels on the roof. Just ask for a Solar Ready skillion.
Skillion Carport
Skillion Roof Carports or Flat Roof carports are not “Flat Roof” but generally have 2-5 degrees of roof fall on them, allowing rainwater run-off. The Skillion design is common in Carports, Pergolas and Patios and anywhere cover is required.
Gable Carport (Sometimes called the Pitch Roof)
A Gable roof carport has a roof with two sloping sides that meet together at the top or ridge. The roof looks like a triangle if viewed from the front. There are some variations that can be made on a Gable roof. A standard gable roof can be left ‘open’ on the Triangle front and/or back to give an ‘in-fill gable’. The standard gable roof is a plain design, where the two sides meet in the middle.
There is also a Dutch Gable Carport described below.
The Dutch Gable Carport
A Dutch gable roof adds an extra element of design to a gable roof because it has an almost pop-up like roof that increase the height in the middle.
This extra in design makes, a Dutch gable roof more expensive than a standard gable. The Dutch Roof is common in all our cities as the intricacy of the design is popular in more expensive city homes. The Dutch Gable Carport is an excellent solution for protecting your cars, SUV’s and caravans. Again, they can be designed for you in any heights, depth or length and the Choice of colours in your Colorbond roof for your Dutch Gable Carport allows for a very stylish finish. The Dutch Gable Carport roof pitch tends to make an excellent match to most existing house roof pitches.
Hip Roof Carport
The Hip Roof carport is the writer’s personal favourite! A hip roof carport is self-bracing so requires less diagonal bracing than a gable roof carport. Again, they can be made in any dimensions in either a square profile (giving 4 triangular roof fronts), or they can be rectangular.
Hip roof carports are therefore better suited for high wind or cyclonic regions than gable roofs so keep this in mind if you live in a cyclonic area. They have no large, flat, or slab-sided ends to catch wind and are therefore more stable than gable roofs.
Cantilever Carport
A Cantilever Carport kit means fewer posts and more open space by using a combination of aluminium and incredibly special polycarbonate materials. A cantilever Cantaport can provide excellent protection anywhere and they make fantastic, light and cool garden patios. Cantaport makes great carports, sports ground, garden patios or swimming pool shade where free space is critical, and an unobstructed view will add to a very functional design.
Solar Carport
What makes a solar carport unique is that they do not require a roof or surface that the solar panels must attach to. This is because the roof is the solar panels.
This is different (and a lot more expensive) from installing solar panels on an existing solar-ready carport roof that already has a built-in roof.
Solar carports, complete with solar panel roof, only come in two sizes (single or double). They cannot be customized in any way so ‘what you see is what you get’. The panels themselves serve as a dual-purpose solution for both covering the owner’s vehicle and for producing clean energy.
Solar carports are tall ground-mounted solar panels lifted high enough so that a vehicle can fit below.
Solar Ready Carports
All other carport types on this page, with the exception of the Cantilever carport, can be made solar ready. This way, you choose the size and shape of your carport. Any solar installer can then retrofit solar panels to the roof. Please note, this can only be done with Professional Choice carports. Others are just not strong enough to take the additional weight. The result would be a solar carport at less than half the cost of a true solar roof carport.
What kind of carport or pergola is best for you? – Further Reading