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How to improve facade of Bunnings Mimosa pergola?

I have a mimosa pergola three by four meters that I purchased from Bunnings. I am doing a bit of landscaping and adding a pool and I wanted to thicken up the facade across the top. I wondered how I would go about doing this. I could attach a beam across the front but that would be quite heavy and expensive. Is there any other way I can put a 400 millimeter facade at the top to chunk it up a bit more architecturally, like in the second photo

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Comments

EricL

Hello @Sixtysub

Welcome to the Bunnings Workshop community. It's sensational to have you join us, and thanks for sharing your questions about improving the facade of your pergola.

The largest light weight timber I could find was the 140 x 11mm 5.4m H3 Treated Pine FJ DAR Clear LOSP. You could put one on top of the other to create the illusion of thickness. However, I don't recommend drilling into the steel body of the pergola. The pergola has been painted and sealed to withstand harsh weather, drilling into its body will break that seal and allow moisture to enter which will lead to rust. There is also the possibility that while drilling into the body you might accidentally hit the closing mechanism of the shutters.

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric

MitchellMc

Hi @Sixtysub,

Eric makes a god point about the closing mechnism, which is positioned at the front of your image. That might make it difficult to add anything over that area.

I just also wanted to point out that the pergola has not been designed with the intention of adding additional weight to the top of it. So, if you were to add something to increase the thickness, it would need to be quite lightweight. There's also the issue with wind ratings and the pergolas testing. In your inspiration image you are adding a large flat surface area. This increases the stresses on the pergola from wind buffeting and is not something the manufacturer intended.

If you are to make any significant alterations I would encourage you to run them by an engineer to ensure you will not comprimise the structure.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Mitchell

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