In need of some serious shade here in July, I purchased a “car canopy” from Abba Patio on Amazon for right about $370 to cover one of our “project” trucks. It came quickly per the 2-day Prime shipping setup, which was cool. It took me a bit to finally get a friend of mine to come over and help me get the thing all together. I had to bribe him with beer. Not too bad of a deal if you ask me.

We got all the pieces out of the box and started to sort everything out and try to make a plan, even using the instructions that came with it. As we are laying out the labeled pieces, I am quite pleased with the frame tubing and fabric pieces. Everything seems quite heavy duty, just as they had advertised. The joints for all the frame pieces are just meant to be press fit, one tube slips into the joint piece. After fumbling with a few sloppy joints, we opted to tape the joints together as we worked our way through with good ole blue painter’s tape and that worked quite well to hold everything together.

The frame went together quite easily, and the fabric did as well. The ball-end elastic cords that held all of the walls and end panels were a bit tough to get in as the fabric fit very tight around the frame. I wasn’t complaining too much about the tight fit. I figure that will keep everything in place better anyways. The 2 side walls and each end secure to the upright poles with Velcro straps, which work well even to hold the panels up and out of the way. The fabric is a beige color that looks a whole lot nicer than just plain white and the frame is a sort of bronze powder coat.

I bought the set of 4 weight bags to help hold everything down and filled each one with gravel rock. Even the black canvas weight bags are built quite hefty. I am thoroughly impressed so far.. Unfortunately, after only 2 weeks the canopy met its demise at the hand of an unexpected gust of wind during one of our famous wind storms here in Phoenix. Pouring rain and violent wind flung the whole thing, weight bags and all, into my side yard and up onto the neighbor’s roof. I managed to take it apart and get it all cleaned up. After the storm ended, I cleaned all the mud off and surveyed the damage. It survived! A couple small tears in the fabric and a pair of bent corners were the only things I could see.

I contacted Abba Patio and was back and forth with them a bit trying to just get a couple replacement parts and they ended up warrantying the canopy and sending me a complete replacement one for free.

Not too long after, another good friend of mine comes and we get the new one up and rocking. This time I anchored each of the legs to 2” x 4” boards and strapped the boards to cinder blocks. Now, the legs are fixed much better and the whole thing is grounded much nicer.

I kept all of the old parts with the intention to find the replacement framework pieces somewhere and get that old one up, as well. So far, it has been a bit of a challenge to find someone carrying the right pieces and the only difficulty I have with Abba Patio is that they won’t sell just individual replacement parts and the other companies making similar canopies don’t use the same size frame tubing. I just might have to make my own parts. Awe darn, another excuse to break out the welder..

Overall, I am very pleased with the canopy and the customer service at Abba Patio. The new canopy works great, provides great shade while I am working, and even though we are out of the stormy season, I am sure it will hold up in another storm.

For more information check out www.AbbaPatio.com.