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OT-Need Fence building advice

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Buckeye

02-03-2008 19:40:23




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I've been building some new fence using 4-6 inch treated pine round fence posts. I put the posts in last Summer and stretched the wire late last Fall. Some of the posts in the dips rose up out of the ground. Any advice on how to make them stay down? Weights(cement blocks)will not work. I have more fence to build in the same area, so is there anything I can do before I stretch the wire? I thought about digging the hole wider at the bottom and using concrete, but that is about the only solution I have come up with.

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Pitalplace

02-05-2008 08:05:07




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to El Toro, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
I grew up on a ranch and had to build miles of fence. I hate building or fixing fence. A dead man in all low spots and heavy post on the top of hills. A dead man is made of a brick, piece of iron, or post cut off approx. a foot and a half long. You bury the object approx three to four feet deep and use a piece of galvanized wire (we used number nine) tied in the center of the object and long enough to reach all the wires. You then pull the bottom fence wire down and make a rap with the dead man wire at the right height. Then the next wire with the proper spacing. They will never pull up and usually are there long after you have replaced the posts around them.

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Tradititonal Farmer

02-04-2008 15:41:20




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Won't help now but a piece of rebar thru the post near the bottom will help hold it down



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Nebraska Cowman

02-04-2008 12:28:31




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Cement blocks will work if you burry them. But your anchors don't need to be that big. Bricks, animal bones, short chunks of post burried sideways, odd shapes of old iron, most anything, I've even dug up glass bottles. Then use #9 wire and tie each fence wire down starting at the bottom and wrapping up. The wire will eventually rust off at soil level but it lasts quite a while.



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Walt Davies

02-04-2008 11:27:21




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Wood post need to be at least 4 ft. down to make them stay good and tight. I use Railroad ties for the corners and in Gullys where extra strength is needed a small cost for a good solid fence. and about every 330 ft. I put int two 4 ft. apart and use a cross pole and X wires for strength. A good fence cost more in the short run but will out last any thing else. I use Steel post with a wood post about every 10th one and set them deep as you can.

Walt

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sheeptick

02-04-2008 08:55:29




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
like allan says, plant a deadman and anchor to it.



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Allan In NE

02-04-2008 07:04:09




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Build a dead man or buy the store bought anchors.

Allan



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Janicholson

02-04-2008 06:40:11




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
The posts are likely to have been pulled by well stretched fence wire. The winter temps shrink steel. the factor is only .000012 inches per inch of run, per degree C, but with a fifty degree difference, it amounts to about a half thousandths per inch. If posts are spaced @ 20' or 240". this equals about .15 inches per post span. from both sides, and possibly farther down the fence than one would expect. There might be as much as a half inch pulling on the angle of the wires. Coupled with the tensile strength of the wires at probably 1500 pounds each, this would certainly pull the posts.

I would put galvanized trampoline springs in the wires where they go up the sides of the dip. The springs are powerful and cheap. JimN

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rrlund

02-04-2008 06:37:27




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
I fenced two 40s a few years ago and had the same problem until everything settled good. I drove some broken steel posts in on an angle close to them and wrapped a wire around them to hold them down.



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Buckeye

02-04-2008 10:36:02




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to rrlund, 02-04-2008 06:37:27  
I was thinking about driving a 5' T-post in to almost ground level and pushing the wood post down and fastening to it. I didn't use T-posts in the fence because I want to be able to mow the weeds out of the fence row with a cutter-bar mower.



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rrlund

02-04-2008 12:13:37




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-04-2008 10:36:02  
That would work,but if you have any broken pieces,drive them in on an angle for a year or two,then pull them back out. If you drive a 5 foot that deep,you'll probably have to just drive it on down and loose it for ever.



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Dave from MN

02-04-2008 05:09:24




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
My father in law advised me to always make sure I had a long point on the bottom of the post and to put them in the ground 3.5-4 feet. I didnt do that with my railroad ties, I sure hope they dont come up out of the ground this spring! How deep did you sink them? If you dug a hole, and by chance you did have points on the post, did you also pound the post into the undisturbed soil also.



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Buckeye

02-04-2008 10:40:39




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Dave from MN, 02-04-2008 05:09:24  
I dug the holes with a 6" auger about 3' deep. No points on the posts. I have used locust posts in the past and never had much of a problem with them, but they are not as round, heavier, and a little less smooth than the treated pine posts.



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38f14

02-04-2008 02:22:16




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Built a lot of fence in my younger years on the farm. Locust posts and four strands of wire. We would spud a hole in the ground and drive the post in with a 25 lb. post maul. Those posts were in the ground a minimum of 3 ft. Never had a problem with the frost forcing them out of the ground. I remember Pap standing on the rear tire of our Ferguson 20, driving fence posts. He was 1 tough hombre. We built most of that fence in the early 60s. Some of those posts are still standing.

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dave2

02-04-2008 01:23:23




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Not trying to be funny, but when I was a kid I built a stretch of fence to divide a creek bottom. I cut a couple of trees that were in the way and used them as posts. They were water maple, and a couple of weeks later, started sprouting new branches. By the next year, they were well on thier way to being trees again. I didn't know what I was doing at the time, but it turned out to be a good idea.

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thurlow

02-03-2008 21:14:56




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
"Brace" 'em just like you do at your corners; 2 posts 5 or 6 feet apart with a horizontal post between 'em, making an "H". Run brace wire in a "x"; top of one post to bottom of other and vice-versa, making at least 2 complete circuits. Then twist the wires together ....in 4 places..... using a stick of whatever 'tough' wood grows where you are. The brace wires should be TIGHT. If done right, they ABSOLUTELY will not come out of the ground.

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MN Scott

02-03-2008 21:05:27




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
On my corner posts and wood posts thru dips I spike a 12 inch piece of treated 2X6 crossways on the bottom. Dad taught me that, he never had a wood post pushed out of the ground by frost or pulled out by wire tension. Only thing is you have to set posts with an auger and if you want to remove them you have to dig them out. No farm tractor loader will pull them out in my experance.



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Buckeye

02-04-2008 10:42:34




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to MN Scott, 02-03-2008 21:05:27  
That sounds like a good idea for the ones I have not put in yet. Thanks!



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1936

02-03-2008 20:28:11




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
Reminds me of cutting pigs during the right sign of the moon. Dad would say he cuts them in the a$$.

Must have been a real dip or the wire was a might to taunt. Next time use three steel and a wood post.



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Vally Farm

02-03-2008 20:26:40




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
You can use some screw downs like for the dog run, or holding those tent buildings down, bu those will only slow down the heave. Have yow big of a dip are you trying to fence through? Some bigger dips may need to put another wire down real low on the higher posts to cover the lowest posts at regular height. Mike



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Rusty Wheel

02-03-2008 20:19:26




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Buckeye, 02-03-2008 19:40:23  
I grew up on a farm in the 40s and 50s. Helped my dad and grandpa build fence. I remember hearing them both say you have to set wood posts in the dark of the moon, otherwise they will come up. Don't know whether there's anything to that or not. Something to do with the gravational pull of the moon. We had a fence that came up and they said it was built in the light of the moon. Sounds farfetched to me but who knows..... ....RW

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SteveKy

02-04-2008 12:45:02




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Rusty Wheel, 02-03-2008 20:19:26  
Rusty, you are dead on right.Moon phases effect's everything,planting ,ploughing and much more. Steve



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Ken Macfarlane

02-04-2008 08:28:30




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 Re: OT-Need Fence building advice in reply to Rusty Wheel, 02-03-2008 20:19:26  
If the moon is pulling up your posts, they sure aren't gonna hold an animal in. Its probably just a way they used to explain away things they didn't understand.

When wire crosses a dip and is tensioned, it wants to take the straightest line, straight across. To solve it you need to break it into 2 runs and anchor the fence near the bottom as Alan was saying. Or you can try to fight it by trying to anchor posts into the ground.

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