CountyLine 3pt Fence Stretcher

[Kapnfriday]

Greetings to all,

I'm wondering if anyone has any experience using Tractor Supply's 3pt fence stretcher/unroller or something similar. I've got a fairly extensive (for me anyway) fencing re-do and am not looking forward to wrestling with the rolls of field fencing. This attachment seems like it might be a good solution, but I have a couple of concerns:

1 - a lot of our fence runs through wooded land and I'm not sure I'll be able to get my tractor (Kubota B7610) into all the areas I would need to. I can remove the FEL to give me more maneuverability, and I can do some brush clearing along the fence line if needed. 2 - is my tractor heavy/powerful enough to give me a good, tight stretch on the fence? The tractor has 24hp and weighs in the neighborhood of 1500lbs plus loaded R4 rears. My longest run of fence is probably 200 feet long. I could probably break that into a couple of smaller runs.

Any thoughts/recommendations/alternate approaches are much appreciated.

Brian

 

[boggen]

when you unroll the fence in a straight up fashion. it will twist and bend and flop in each direction. and can be down right pain in rear. to try and get fence flipped in correct direction.

if fence is laying down on its side as it gets un rolled. you might have a better chance to flip fence up just once as it gets tighten. and just do the mini lifting up of fence to get it aligned up on the posts.

trying to get fence roll up near fence as you tighten it, can be a chore in it self. and you might consider a fence tightener that sandwiches the fence. (think 2x8's with bolts and washers) and some chains. and connect to FEL. so you can position the fence a tad easier as you tighten the fence. having on FEL also allows you to lift the fence up some as you tighten it. granted you need to be careful not harm fence as you try and tighten it.

though you may opt just to get a sandwich fence tightener and just use some straps (like you might use to tighten loads down on a trailer or in back of a pickup truck). and just loop the straps around fence posts as you go down the line. so you can get a tighter fence.

i keep saying a sandwich fence tightener vs a tightener that just has some hooks on it. hooks will more likely bend the living day lights out the fence were you are trying to tighten from. and/or break welds or weave in the fence. if you are able to get a sandwich fence tightener, that goes over a couple of the vertical pieces in the fence. you will more likely keep a nice fence, that is not all warped and torn out of shape after tightening.

 

[crowbar032]

The three point stretchers work well in flat clear ground. If you have anything to go around or over dips and valleys they can be a pain and I'm too cheap to buy one. I will try to describe how I did most of my fencing. I nailed the end of the fence roll to the first post and made sure the post was braced well (bracing is very important or you'll pull the post over if you aren't careful). I took a spud bar and ran it through the center of the roll of fence then looped a chain around each end of the bar and attached to the front end loader and drove backwards as close to the posts as I could get. The fence unrolls itself pretty easily that way. To stretch the fence, I took an 8 ft 2x4 and cut it in half then drilled three 1/2" holes in it so that 4" carriage head bolts will go through both boards. Put one board underneath the fence and one on the top and bolt it together. Attach a chain around the middle of the board and pull as tight as you want, just don't pull the fence apart or pull over the first post you nailed to. I pulled backwards with the front end loader so I could adjust height as needed like boggen said. As you nail to the posts, the fence will get tighter the closer you get to the tractor and stretch board so you might have to release a little pressure. The most I ever tried to stretch at one time was half a roll (about 150 ft). I think you have plenty of tractor to stretch the fence tight. For the places I couldn't get the tractor, well just do the best you can. I have an antique fence stretcher. It's basically a rope pulley with a catch on it to keep it from releasing like a pulley. I used that with the board and manually pulled as tight as I could. You can only do about 20 ft at a time with it though. I suppose a come-a-long would work too.

I hope you will have at least one person helping you. Dad always told me one man fencing isn't worth a crap. After trying it, I understand why. To get the fence good and tight and at the proper height, you'll need help holding it at the right spot on the posts. And definately clear as much brush as you can around the fenceline. I'm still missing a wrecking bar that was eaten by some brush. Good luck.

 

[bcp]

I'm still missing a wrecking bar that was eaten by some brush.

I just finished painting my bars bright orange. They were all dirt and brush colored before.

Another useful fencing tool for tight locations is a fence unroller. Do a Google image search for lots of ideas.

Bruce

 

[Kapnfriday]

Thanks for the feedback guys. Don't know why I didn't think to do the Google image search. Found a lot of useful info - much of it from older TBN posts. I will have my wife helping me with this project. We did this once before and now have to redo it as we had a tornado in April of 2011 that took out a lot of trees and a lot of fence. Thanks again. :thumbsup:

 

[gumshu]

I was putting up a 300 foot section of horse fencing and used my Kubota BX, a come-along and a fence puller. My BX weighs about the same as yours. The tractor wasn't heavy enough while pulling and had to resort to using my pick up truck to get the proper stretch. My larger tractor wasn't available at the time.
On the other hand, it worked just fine hanging smaller sections.

 

[bigdad]

I always painted my Lineman's pliers bright red so I could find them under the poles.

I just finished painting my bars bright orange. They were all dirt and brush colored before.

Another useful fencing tool for tight locations is a fence unroller. Do a Google image search for lots of ideas.

Bruce

 

[quicksandfarmer]

I have the model you're looking at and I've put up some fence with it. It's a good unroller, not so good stretcher. If you can drive the fence line it will lay out the fence as fast as you drive. It's incredibly easy -- attach one end to the post and drive. Even if you end up manually threading some sections it's a very convenient way of carrying and dispensing the fence. That said, I found it didn't work for stretching. You don't have enough feel to do it evenly and delicately. On my first section I pulled out the anchor post when I tried to tighten with the tractor, trying to get the bottom tight when the top was already tight, and after that I went back to using two come-alongs and two 2x4's. Unless your land is perfectly flat the top and bottom won't be at the same tension and this attachment has no way of dealing with that. With come-alongs you have a good hands-on feel for how tight the fence is getting and can get it just right. I did use it as an anchor point for tensioning and it was reasonably handy for that.

 

[DJ54]

I built my own unroller. Picked up some new cutoff stock at a local scrap yard, and along with some smaller stuff I already had, I had less then $30.00 in it. That and about 8 hrs labor, with quite a few breaks. Worked great for unrolling, but like others, I stretched with oak 2 X 4's, that sandwich the fence, then put a come-a-long on it. You can pretty well tweak it to perfection that way.

 

[Runner]

I used a piece of pipe with a chain through it and a 2 x 8 under the fence roll. Suspended it from my boom pole and it worked perfectly for unrolling 600 feet of fence or so. Worked pretty well for zero dollars spent if you happen to have a boom pole.