Ok ... So I guess it was a bit windy at the Quad this year. It literally crushed one of my tents. I had set up the one I got at Dick's Sporting goods. It's a 10 x 10 pop-up type with legs that are at an angle ... not the straight up and down ones like the Firstup ones you get at walmart. I thought the angled legs might give me a better base to work with in these windy conditions. I anchored that thing down with nice spikes but it was stlil no match for the wind and I had to hold it from time to time as the gusts got REALLY bad. Finally I noticed some others had lowered just the back legs and kept the front legs in there top position creating an angled effect and effectively blocking the majority of the wind. I didn't have to hold it anymore as the wind was coming from the back and pushing the roof down .... so hard I noticed the bottom brace looked as if it could buckle and as I went to go get a bungee to tie it back for support I saw it give way. In haste I pulled bandit's crate right under the buckled area and it held the tent up for the remainder of the day. The Cross Brace bar had bent but not broken but the whole back wall was really flimsy now so I thought I'd have to toss it .... that was till I was walking around Home Depot and thought of a way to fix it.

At first I bought a 3 foot piece of Steele and a couple of metal screw clamps thinking I could cut the metal into two pieces and create a splint, clamp it on either end see if it would hold. The Parts were like $5 and I thought it would be better than asking the budget committee for a new tent. Anyway, I get this stuff home and it takes me a couple of weeks to actually pull it all out and play around with it and I realized I could make the repair and you really wouldn't notice it at all. We're already like the hillbilly Disc Doggers in the group and I figured it would be better if I didn't show up with a tent held together by beer cans and duct tape right ?

Here is the bend. I know it doesn't look like much but it really made that wall flimsy and I was afraid it was going snap with the next light breeze.

em all up while I had it out. Not too tight, as you don't want to make it so you cant close this thing up

and put it back in the bag.

Once it's off remove the caps and make sure you keep all the hardware so you can put it back together.

It's like $3.50 at Home depot for this little piece of steel, It was the smallest piece theyhad. I guess you could use aluminum but itlooked too light for me.

It was just a bit longer than the cross section itself.

Next I took my stake Mallet and lightly flattened that cross beam back to straight being careful not to breat it or flatten it. You might want to use a rag or something underneath so you don't scratch it but I was careful and it didn't really look too bad. Plus I used smooth concrete in the garage and not the rough concrete in the driveway. Why I didn't use my nice workbench which was made for this I'll never friggin know.

 It didn't look too bad ... just a little crease at this point

Next slide the steel up through the cross beam and take a black marker and mark the holes. I had my wife mark as I held the bar in one place but you can use duct tape to hold it. I also marked the ends so I could cut the excess off and if your smart(not like me) you'll push the rod slightly into one end so you only have one end to mark and consequently cut but I hadn't used my dremel in a long time and wanted to get my moneys worth.

Remember, measure twice and cut once so double check everything just to make sure you marked it right

 Now drill out where you made your marks. Use a drill bit that with go through metal. My first one didn't but I switched bits and it was like butter.

Next cut the excess off the end(s)

Shove the bar back in the cross beam and make sure your holes line up. If they don't now would be the time to know before you go and try and put things back together.

Mine lined up pretty good . Theres a little play as the steel bar isn't quite as large as the interirior of the support beam so you have a little room.

Put the center screw back in first so it'll hold everything while you work with the ends.

Put the ends on and then replace the end caps. I tried to put the crease to the side where the tent cover would be and you won't see it when you are in the tent.

The whole thing took about an hour but I was playing frisbee with the dog too.

I put the top on and set up the tent ... seemed fine.

Folded up just fine too.

Theres a before and after ... you can see more bow on the one in the daylight so it even appears to have straightened things back up a bit and it no longer felt flimsy.

Thanks for reading !!!!

FIRST person to stop by my tent and ask to see the repair cause they saw it on the website gets a free Frisbee :)

--Chris