Carports, Awnings and Screen Rooms: Mostly Scrap

Drive through Pinellas Park, Largo, New Port Richey or Holiday and you will pass hundreds of aluminum carports, window awnings and screen rooms — some fine, many bent by a decade of storms. Taking one down is one of the more satisfying weekend jobs, because it looks like a lot and turns out to be a modest, light, and largely recyclable load.

What it's made of

Aluminum. Roof pans, W-pans, posts, beams, gutters and the frame of a screen room are all aluminum extrusion or sheet. Fasteners are steel or stainless. Screen is fiberglass or aluminum mesh. Aluminum is one of the most valuable common scrap metals, and every pound of it you separate is weight that doesn't count toward your included ton and material that gets recycled instead of buried.

Taking a carport down

1. 1Check what it's attached to. Most carports are screwed to the house fascia on one side and set on posts on the other. Some posts are set in concrete.
2. 2Start at the roof. Remove the fasteners along the fascia and along each beam, and lift the pans off one at a time. They're light but long and catch the wind — pick a calm morning.
3. 3Drop the beams, then the posts. Cut posts flush with a reciprocating saw if they're in concrete footings you don't want to dig out.
4. 4Stack pans flat and nest them. A stack of pans is a neat, compact bundle.
5. 5Cap or patch the fascia where the carport was screwed on, and check the roof edge for damage the carport was hiding.

Screen rooms and lanai enclosures

A screen room is a carport with walls. Screen comes off first — cut it out of the spline channels in big sheets and roll it. Then the door, then the wall panels, then the roof, in that order. Screen mesh is general debris and takes almost no room rolled. The frame is all aluminum.

Window awnings

A few screws each. Ten minutes per window and a small pile of scrap. The stucco or siding underneath usually needs touching up where the brackets were.

How much fits

A full carport, broken down, is a small fraction of the trailer by volume and almost nothing by weight. It typically loads alongside a garage cleanout or a yard cleanup with room to spare. A large screen room is more, but still a single-load job even with the concrete kneewall if there is one — that kneewall, if you're demolishing it, is the only heavy part.

After it's down

Three things are usually waiting once the aluminum is stacked. The fascia board where the carport was screwed to the house has a line of holes and often some rot behind it, so plan to seal or replace it. The post footings, if you cut them flush, need a cap or a grind so nobody trips on them. And the roof edge that the carport was covering may show damage that has been hidden for years — worth a look before the next storm season.

At the scrap yard, clean aluminum is worth more than aluminum with steel fasteners still in it. Ten minutes with a drill backing screws out of the pans is time well spent. If you would rather not make the trip, stack it beside the trailer and tell us when you book so the driver keeps it separate.

Aluminum carports in Pinellas Park, Largo, Holiday and New Port Richey are usually on older homes and mobile homes where the association or park office has rules about replacing them. Check before you take one down whether a replacement needs approval or a permit, so the gap in the driveway doesn't become a letter.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a permit to remove a carport?

It depends on the municipality and whether it was permitted in the first place. Check with your city or county building department before you start, especially if it's attached to the house.

Can I leave the aluminum next to the trailer for you?

Yes. Tell us when you book so the driver knows to keep it separate from the general load.

Will you take a carport down for me?

Our crew can dismantle and load at $48 per man-hour with a 4-hour minimum. Send photos for an estimate.