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Where can I get fence posts?

Started by Piston, March 26, 2010, 11:59:19 PM

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Piston

Hi Guys,
I posted a while back about a neighbor of mine giving me trouble for not having my dogs fenced in (even though they never go in her yard) and it seems i've lost the battle, i am building a fence next week for the dogs.  I am gonna mill all 1x6 boards for a horizontal rail fence out of white pine.  I need about 4,000 board feet as the fence will be about 1000 feet long total, and 4' high with 6" between boards.  I think this should be good as the dogs wont' be able to sneak through it but you will still be able to see through it, i don't want a privacy fence. 

I know I shouldn't use white pine for fence posts so I am looking around.  I was going to use 4x4x8 pressure treated but I just priced them at 11 dollars a post, i need about 125 of them!  I am looking for some better ideas for fence posts, probably cedar would be my best bet right?  I plan on putting them in the ground the way JimRogers recommended in another thread.  Do any of you guys have access to cedar posts?? Also I prefer 4x4 rather than circular posts, but I can't be too picky. 

Otherwise I plan on just getting a few quotes from lumberyards but I would much rather give one of you guys some business.  Any good recommendations? 

Actually, now that I just reread the post, jim used EWP for posts too and has had good luck, maybe I should just go that route????
I will be milling freshly felled trees though, so they are very green, would this be okay even if I used the paint jim mentioned?  I don't know if they need to be fairly dry before painting??/
Arrrrgghhhhhh....I hate my neighbor! 


Oh ya, I'll be sure to post pics after a couple weeks and show my progress.


Quote from: Jim_Rogers on February 16, 2010, 02:04:40 PM
Piston,
As you said the pieces that go between the posts are called rails, and the pieces that go up and down on the rails are called pickets, even if it isn't a traditional picket fence, they can even be regular boards.

When I made my fence here a the sawmill yard, I used regular EWP for the posts. However, I went to the store and got some "fence post paint" made for coating wood that is in direct contact with the soil. Home Cheapo has some by the Behr brand, but you may have to special order it and it may come in only 5 gallon pails.

We painted only the section of the post that went into the ground.

And we used my little 1' wide bucket on my backhoe to dig the post holes. This made a long but narrow hole. After we set the post, we checked it's location with a tape, and made sure it was plumb on two sides and in line with the string, and then back filled around the post with some crushed stone.

By back filling with crushed stone just around the post, the surface rain water runs through the stone and doesn't sit in the dirt and rot the post.

To make sure we had enough stone to do all the holes we used a slip form of 12" wide boards. We'd place the boards in the hole and then fill the side next to the post with stone, and the other side with the dirt from the hole. As the hole filled up we'd pull the boards up and do it again. Tamping down the dirt and stone as we did it. This worked great for us, and we've had these posts standing here for many years.

We did paint the above ground sections of the posts and rails with regular house paint, nothing special, and it has made many of the rails last many years.

You can see the fence in this photo behind the frame and deer.....



Jim Rogers

-Matt
"What the Lion is to the Cat the Mastiff is to the Dog, the noblest of the family; he stands alone, and all others sink before him. His courage does not exceed his temper and generosity, and in attachment he equals the kindest of his race."

bandmiller2

Piston,I'd use oak before ewp preferably white oak.Good advice about the crushed stone,what I do is just fill and tamp putting the stone the last foot to ground level thats where they rot.Frank C.
A man armed with common sense is packing a big piece

trapper

wont do you much good there but our local bulding supply has treated 3X4 landscape timbers for $1.88 each.  but normally the landscape timbers which are only flat on 2 sides are about the  cheapest posts you can get
stihl ms241cm ms261cm  echo 310 400 suzuki  log arch made by stepson several logrite tools woodmizer LT30

bill m

Kencove farm fence supply ( www.kencove.com) has posts at a better price including shipping.
NH tc55da Metavic 4x4 trailer Stihl and Husky saws

Dana

I sure wouldn't waste all my time and effort and money to build a fence and then use pine (white or otherwise) for fence post. It would be different if they were commercially treated. I just don't think they will last.
Grass-fed beef farmer, part time sawyer

stonebroke

landscape timbers are normally treated for groung contact and not in ground use. Better than no treatment though. If you can find some locust trees they would be the best. Terrible to saw and you have to drill and screw( no nails) but they will last a few years longer then granite.

Stonebroke

P.A. RESHARP

Stone broke is right about the landscapeing posts, they are only treated on the outside as a norm, I just priced 4x4x8 treated posts at lowes for $6 and change, of course that is in p.a. Might have been a sale price also

DanG

I know that the idea of milling old power poles is unpalatable to most folks, but it would be your cheapest option if you can get some. ;)
"I don't feel like an old man.  I feel like a young man who has something wrong with him."  Dick Cavett
"Beat not thy sword into a plowshare, rather beat the sword of thine enemy into a plowshare."

Toolman

Locust or cedar is the way to go. White oak would be my second choice. I soak the ground contact part of the post in a 5 gal bucket of used motor oil. I have a grape arbor with cedar posts that I built 15 yrs ago. Those posts are just as solid as the day I put them in the ground. I know many of you may frown at this, but, I occasionally pour my used motor oil on the base of the many posts I have on my property. I pour it directly on the post at the ground. It makes the best wood preservative.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have" (Thomas Jefferson)

sigidi

Down here for rural fencing fella's use split posts - a day on a chainsaw would get ya all the posts you need. We pick species which have high natural durability and then slice out 7'6" long 'slices of pie' so the fence posts end up having a cross section looking like a 'slice of pie' down here each one goes for around $10-$15 and a good splitter should make 100 a day a great splitter should do 200 a day - not bad coin if you are a great splitter and only have to pay for C/S running costs, need a 70cc or bigger saw to do it well.

Having said all this I just use 4x3's which I happily slice off with my Lucas ;)

Mind you we also have a different method of putting them in... two ways ya dig a hole with iron bar and what we call scissor shovels or clam shell shovel. Iron bar breaks up the soil/rock, scissor shovel pulls it out the hole, drop the post in then use the head on the iron bar to compact the soil back around the post - that's the manual way. Mechanical way is fella comes with tractor mounted post driver, for split posts it has a 3' auger, this drills a pilot hole, flips out the way sideways, split post is pointed and placed upright over hole, then 250kg hammer is dropped on posts head until "she's in" each post takes about as long as it took me to type it out, normally around 10 hits and it's over...
Always willing to help - Allan

bandmiller2

Have any of you guys ever tried that antifouling copper paint for boat bottoms on posts its quite toxic to what eats wood.Frank C.
A man armed with common sense is packing a big piece

sgschwend

I just removed some rough sawn raised beds (the inside is 100% ground contact, the bottom and about 20% of the outside is too).  They were made from green DF.  There was one other that was made from store bought wood.

The results were the rough sawn DF were in perfect condition, the store bought lumber was 75% gone.

I am guessing that the green lumber makes a difference.

Steve Gschwend

sjgschwend@gmail.com

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