Gym

 This is my approach to a shade structure for my outdoor gym. We don't get a ton of rain, maybe 8 inches a year, but the sun will destroy anything other than steel in about 1 season so I needed shade and maybe some protection from mosquitoes...and a little privacy. The answer was a shed kit with these plastic connectors for 2"x2" lumber. I'm not in love with the small dimensions of the lumber and the connectors were mostly OK but the bottom of the truss doesn't do much. It's just a tiny bit of stability.

I hunted hard for a cheap approach but $1000 in materials is about the minimum this project can be done. That includes the 120 pavers, the pressure treated bottom frame...all the lumber...the metal roof and the shade cloth.

Pavers...$120

Metal roof ...$200

plastic connector kit...$200

Lumber....$300

Shade Cloth...$100

There is an argument that spending $1000 to protect $600 in gym equipment makes no sense but I must stress how hard it is to find this equipment as far out in the desert as I am. It'll cost another $100 to get electricity to it so I can ditch the extension cord.

totally inadequate open air gym that gets too much sun

I was determined to use as much scrap lumber as possible for the purlins.

This roof was not terrible to put on except one end is blocked by a fruit tree that sucked to work around.

These pieces are the bottom of the truss but I doubt they do anything to stabilize the truss. The connectors are not even the right angle. I'd probably be better off just cutting the right angle and nailing it with finishing nails.

There are two grades of shade cloth. 70% and 90%. This is 70%.