Fencing and Posts

   / Fencing and Posts #11  
I'm building a fence around my place to keep cattle, horses and goats in, but also to keep wild hogs out. For my fence, I'm putting 6 inch round posts in at my corners, and every 100 feet. I'm putting 6 foot T posts in every ten feet. My fence is four feet tall, 2x4 horse fence. It's super expensive, but because of my goats and horses, I don't want to use anything with a smaller spacing. I also use the same 2x4 fencing on my dog yard.

From what I'm seeing, your costs are about as good as I've seen. I just paid $5.09 for 6 foot T posts.

If you are going to add wood rails to the posts, then the 8 foot spacing makes sense, but then you really don't want to try to attach wood rails to T posts. I would reconsider that idea and then spread you T posts out farther. For high tensile field fence, you can easily go 15 feet apart for your T posts. Especially if all you are doing is marking your property line and keeping your dogs in. I've read that some high tensile fence manufactures say that you can go 25 feet in spacing your T posts. Where I have my cows, I've been paying attention to what everyone else is doing, and it's all over the place. I've seen T posts spread out 15 feet apart, and running for thousands of feet with just T posts. I've also seen fence lines with all wood posts without any T posts used to hold in cattle. I'm not sure if there is an actual wrong or right way to do this since nobody really seems to know, or care. My goal is to build it as good as I can, and not have to do it again.

How are you stretching your wire? I bought one of these 4 foot stretcher bars from Kencove that I highly recommend. I put a come along on the top and another on the bottom, and I can really pull the fence tight quickly and easily on my own. I use my backhoe with some chains to anchor the come along's.

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   / Fencing and Posts
  • Thread Starter
#13  
The front fence I stretched with 2-2"×6"×4' with bolts comnecting; and pulled with a SxS. Worked OK, but not attached to the method.

My goal is to build a good fence, that looks decent, without over spending; but at the same time; if the extra $100 now means it lasts; I'd rather do that.
 
   / Fencing and Posts #14  
I think T-posts are the way to go. You live in a very challenging environment for wood posts. If you have access to marine pressure treated wood, UC4A/U4B/UC4C, you could use those and expect some longevity, but around here, they are neither easy to find, nor inexpensive.

Don't use round posts; those are almost always peeler cores from plywood manufacturing. They are a very soft, low strength wood, and while treated, aren't treated to a standard, and will decompose rather quickly.

Here, pressure treated posts are gone in 5-7 years due to insects and fungus. I'm having to self treat all my pressure treated wood with copper naphthenate to try and get some longevity from it. However, the treatment is only 1/4" deep, so if the wood cracks in the future, the post is toast. Don't forget to treat and cap the top of the post to keep rainwater out.

All the best,

Peter
 
   / Fencing and Posts #15  
My wood posts are about 26 years old and are rotting off. The fence was to mark lot lines and keep dogs in. The old saying "fences make good neighbors" sorta applies. I have found out that bad neighbors will always be bad, even with a fence. I'm debating on taking down some fences and shoring up the bad neighbor fence with t-posts.
 
   / Fencing and Posts
  • Thread Starter
#17  
The comment about cost was; I always treated Tee posts as the inferior product, that was 1/2 or 1/3rd the price; when I saw them basically with 25% of each other, that's what got me wondering; was there a cheap source of Tee posts. I swear I thought they where around $2.99/each; but I guess everything has doubled over last 4 or 5 years.
 
   / Fencing and Posts #18  
Having bought lots of T-posts, they do come in various qualities. The cheap ones will bend the moment the weather changes. (Kidding) Seriously, keep an eye on the weight/ft, and buy the heavier ones. I think that pulling bent T-posts and replacing them is no fun.

I don't know when I last saw even cheap T-posts for $2.99, but whenever it was, it was a long, long time ago.

All the best,

Peter
 
   / Fencing and Posts #19  
This fence stapler was mentioned in another thread. Since I have fence to continually repair and rebuild I’m interested in one of these. I’ve looked at several air powered fencing nailers in the past but the cost and having to contend with the air hose didn’t appeal to me.

I already have some Milwaukee battery tools so this may be an option and I thought others in this thread may be interested also.


Tool only is $599 at Home Depot. Com
 
Last edited:
   / Fencing and Posts #20  
This fence stapler was mentioned in another thread. Since I have fence to continually repair and rebuild I’m interested in one of these. I’ve looked at several air powered fencing nailers in the past but the cost and having to contend with the air hose didn’t appeal to me.

I already have some Milwaukee battery tools so this may be an option and I thought others in this thread may be interested also.


Tool only is $599 at Home Depot. Com

It’s a great stapler. Fast.
 

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