Auger and drive posts

rd_macgregor · Jul 10, 2012

I recently bought a hydraulic auger in preparation to putting in a horse arena fence. I got 9" and 14" auger bits to be sure I could make holes bigger than the posts (6" PT fence posts and larger diameter corner posts). However, a friend suggested an alternative approach that might avoid a lot of work tamping around the posts and also make the posts more securely set. He suggested I drill a 4" hole then use a post driver to drive the 6" posts into the holes. They'd go in a lot better than pounding with no pre-drilled holes and yet be very securely set in place without any backfilling/tamping.
Has anybody else tried this approach? Do you think it would work as hypothesized?
BOB

bigtiller · Jul 10, 2012

It sounds like a good way but it may be difficult drilling the hole plum.

gwdixon · Jul 10, 2012

I did something similar with steel fence posts when fencing our pasture. It was mid-summer and the ground was dry and rock-hard. Trying to drive a steel post would result in it bending more than half the time. The rest of the posts made about a half inch of progress with each driver hit.

So....an inverter was attached to my truck engine and a 3/4 HP drill with a 2" x 14" long wood auger was used to drill holes in the ground. Water was used to fill the holes and let sit for a few hours. The post slid right in with just a few whacks and were solid.

Price Edward Island is in a pretty wet location so the ground should be soft enough for the project to work out. The only way you will really know is to actually test the process. If it doesn't then adding water may help. The water will also help make it easier to straighten the posts if necessary.

DJ54 · Jul 10, 2012

A local fence contractor, now out of business had a setup on a F-450 Ford 4wd like that. KIWI brand I believe. Probably 90%+ of the time, he could drive posts, but had a hydraulic drill mounted on the truck, with a 4" auger, for tough spots. Worked like a charm. But, he did have hydraulic tilt on the drill, like the driver, so as to drill a plumb hole..

Haoleguy · Jul 10, 2012

Bob - Yes it is best to drive a post but many have used an auger.. Wheatheart and King Hitter drivers have the option for augers and the KH has a nice rock spike option. I have found that commercial fence builders pound straight away to save time which is money to them. Farmers and ranchers are mixed and do both drive only or run pilot hole followed by pounding. I have 1500 posts to pound early next year and I am currently working through cost/benefit for a commercial hire vs myself with equipment rental/purchase. I have found that the Wheatheart trailer units are generally availabe to rent...Gary

rd_macgregor · Jul 11, 2012

Thanks for the responses.
I still haven't decided the best route to go; getting the posts plumb is important, but I really dread the extra work of manually backfilling and tamping 100 or so oversized holes.
BOB

boggen · Jul 11, 2012

2nd person when dealing with posts. really saves a huge amount of time. reduces amount of walking, over all. and when hand tamping holes. one person on one side, other person on other side. and just hand tamper back and forth between the 2 of you.

when it comes to drilling the holes. second person is there to help keep things straight, and then also help plumb the hole level better. but honestly. trying to keep all the holes nice and plumb and just be 1/2" off to a couple inches. can be rather difficult. a larger hole lets you have wiggle room. and able to adjust for those off angle drilling some, and get things nice and straight.

farm fence for around a field or pasture, were you could care less about fence looks. and just use various limbs from trees you cut down over the last year or so. is a different story.

found getting a level that bends into a L shape. and having a roll of duct tape on hand. so you can quickly tape / pull off level on each post. to level in both directions works pretty good. freeing your hands for tamping.

to note it, one area may be nice and easy to put posts in while other areas may be pain in rear to put posts in due to how much the dirt is compacted or what is in the dirt. and what it takes to drill or hammer a post in will and can vary a lot.

for me, i have had places were i had to bring more dirt in, to tamper in around a post. due to how loose the soil was to begin with. other places i have had more dirt from drilling a hole with PHD. and had to shovel some of the dirt away.

i like idea of using a post hammer to drive posts in myself as well, but some times it is the old ugly doing of more work that gets the final results, that look better and hold up better long term. some times not. note if using a post hammer. for wooden posts. extra time may be spent with a saw and pointing the ends of the post. so the posts are easier to drive.

if you have long streachs of straight fence, looking down the line can help get things straight. but you may want to run a string or cable to help keep things straight. when ya having to look around a post that just barely sticks out and blocks your view of trying to keep things straight.

Haoleguy · Jul 11, 2012

One other point I forgot to mention is that in my neck of the woods the best time to pound is Fall and Spring as the ground is softer. Winter can also be good if it's a mild Winter like we had here last year. Pounders can go through a couple of inches of frost. Some sharpen their posts and some do not. One other point to mention is that the type and quality of the wood to be pounded makes a difference in driving with no splintering. Also the better pounders have a cap on the post that they hit so that they do not continually put force directly on the top of the post. There are a lot of good youtube videos on post pounding.....Cheers, Gary

Eric_Phillips · Jul 11, 2012

I bought a used Shaver HD-8 to help put in my pastures. I pounded square PT 4x4 as is no points on the end. I was able to pound probably about 3/4 of the posts. The other 1/4 needed drilling and a breaker bar due to rocks. Pointed tips would have made no difference. I just got done helping a friend who used PT round 4" posts and again it came down to where the rocks were. I don't have any cap on the driver and the tops of my posts look fine. If you look closely at the ones that took some pounding to go in you will find the tops slightly banged up but it is not like the tops are all mushroomed out. I didn't try the auger then pound trick. I had a hard enough time getting the 12" holes I augered straight and in the right place enough to not have to shave the hole a little bigger to get the post where I wanted.

Fall and spring are usually best for pounding with the extra water content in the soil but last weekend I was pounding posts in ground that has not seen water in three weeks.

I would first try just pounding the posts. If you run into troubles then try the auger-post diver or just dig and tamp the ones that wont drive.

bcp · Jul 11, 2012

found getting a level that bends into a L shape. and having a roll of duct tape on hand. so you can quickly tape / pull off level on each post. to level in both directions works pretty good. freeing your hands for tamping.

Post Level-50740 at The Home Depot

View attachment 272992

Bruce

pacerron · Jul 11, 2012

rd_macgregor said:
I recently bought a hydraulic auger in preparation to putting in a horse arena fence. I got 9" and 14" auger bits to be sure I could make holes bigger than the posts (6" PT fence posts and larger diameter corner posts). However, a friend suggested an alternative approach that might avoid a lot of work tamping around the posts and also make the posts more securely set. He suggested I drill a 4" hole then use a post driver to drive the 6" posts into the holes. They'd go in a lot better than pounding with no pre-drilled holes and yet be very securely set in place without any backfilling/tamping.
Has anybody else tried this approach? Do you think it would work as hypothesized?
BOB

I put in a lot of high tension pasture fence posts using a 4" auger and then pounding them in 20 years ago and they are still fine today. I started out trying to just pound them in but rocks and tree roots soon sent me to buy a 4" auger to finish the job.
In those days the posts were black pressure treated creosote and tar. The posts were tapered a little so the fat end goes in the ground. That keeps them from trying to get back out of the holes over time from the winter freeze and thawing. They still will if precautions like putting the fat end in are not followed even driven 3 feet in the ground. Depending on the soil, clay here, some folks even put cross pins through the bottom of the posts to hold them in place.
You should check with local folks to find out what works best in your area and soil type.
You will get too many opinions that don't fit your area from this forum based on our experiences and how we all did it.

Luremaker · Jul 12, 2012

Eric_Phillips said:
I bought a used Shaver HD-8 to help put in my pastures. I pounded square PT 4x4 as is no points on the end. I was able to pound probably about 3/4 of the posts. The other 1/4 needed drilling and a breaker bar due to rocks. Pointed tips would have made no difference. I just got done helping a friend who used PT round 4" posts and again it came down to where the rocks were. I don't have any cap on the driver and the tops of my posts look fine. If you look closely at the ones that took some pounding to go in you will find the tops slightly banged up but it is not like the tops are all mushroomed out. I didn't try the auger then pound trick. I had a hard enough time getting the 12" holes I augered straight and in the right place enough to not have to shave the hole a little bigger to get the post where I wanted.

Fall and spring are usually best for pounding with the extra water content in the soil but last weekend I was pounding posts in ground that has not seen water in three weeks.

I would first try just pounding the posts. If you run into troubles then try the auger-post diver or just dig and tamp the ones that wont drive.

I second what Eric says. Drive in as many posts as possible. Don't bother sharpening the tips. I too have a old Shaver HD8 post driver and it works great for driving in posts.

NHmitch · Jul 12, 2012

There is a lot of good advice, and I think that how you put your posts in depends on what equiptment you have at your disposal, and what your ground is like where the fence is going up. We have put in probably several miles of fence line around several 6 different pastures at three locations for our horses over time, and we started using T-posts with caps, and while fast and easy, and the fact that they will virtually last forever in the ground until the rust out, or bend over, they are a fast type of fence. We did have a pregnant mare who was chased by a boarders horse and impaled herself on a t-post, and we were so lucky that all she needed was sutures, since it went into her belly. As far as the posts, we have always used a 6in auger and put PT 4x4's in. We started by tamping, and that worked OK< but we have very wet ground for 5 months of the year, so we now pour the red bags of dry quick-crete into each hole around the base of the 4x4, pour the water on top , and a few hours later, we have a rock solid post. We have to do this because we have very rocky soil, and wet soil, and without this method we would have fence posts that lean. If you can get a pounder, and try that way, it may work out well for you, are you thinking about a tractor/bobcat mounted pounder, or doing it by hand? Anyway, I hope that it works out good for you guys!

Baby Grand · Jul 12, 2012

My parents took me to PEI when I was 5 or 6 and I still remember the red soil.
I'm assuming that's what you will be working in?
Sandy loam with high clay content and very few stones?

talbotfcat · Sep 23, 2012

I am getting ready to install a 4 rail fence using 4x4's and a guy around here (Louisiana) told me to drill a 6" hole and instead of using quick mix cement he said to use "p" gravel to fill the rest of the hole. Anyone has ever did this?

gwdixon · Sep 23, 2012

talbotfcat said:
I am getting ready to install a 4 rail fence using 4x4's and a guy around here (Louisiana) told me to drill a 6" hole and instead of using quick mix cement he said to use "p" gravel to fill the rest of the hole. Anyone has ever did this?

I think the term is "pea" gravel since it is about pea size.

The idea is that the gravel allows drainage for water and the post doesn't rot as quickly. That was the norm when folks used untreated wood for fence posts.

It also depends on the soil. If you have clay soil there won't be any drainage anyway so the gravel doesn't do much except to allow air to circulate around the post and reduce rot after the water evaporates.

lost in wisconsin · Sep 23, 2012

When I was younger, I helped my grandfather put in pasture fence for calves. We tried the p gravel for one pasture. The method we used is we would set the post, pour in about 4-6 inches of p gravel and shake the post (not tamp the p gravel as you would when using dirt). By doing it in this manner, the theory is the p gravel stones would start "fitting" with each other and make for a tight fit. Personally, I still prefer the tamping dirt around the post as I believe you get a more solid base but then again not as solid as cement.

talbotfcat · Sep 24, 2012

I have used just dirt in the pass and also have cemented the post. The dirt process is so much work and the cemented post rotted at the soil line. I just thought pea gravel would be quicker and I could dig a 6" or 8" hole and than fill it with gravel instead of tamping it. Did I do something wrong that the post rotted at the ground with cement?

lost in wisconsin · Sep 24, 2012

Are you using a pressure treated or cedar posts? These will have better lasting results regardless of the method of installation.

JoeBuyer · Oct 8, 2012

talbotfcat said:
I have used just dirt in the pass and also have cemented the post. The dirt process is so much work and the cemented post rotted at the soil line. I just thought pea gravel would be quicker and I could dig a 6" or 8" hole and than fill it with gravel instead of tamping it. Did I do something wrong that the post rotted at the ground with cement?

On the wood post you did in concrete, did you have concrete below the post? If so, you may have created a "bowl" for the water to sit in and rot the post. I don't concrete any wood posts I put in, I only concrete galvanized posts and even then I always put the pipe in the hole, then put some dirt around the base, then add concrete. The idea is any water that gets past the cap or condenses inside will run out the bottom through the dirt and not be held back by the concrete. Concrete is somewhat porous, but it can "plug" and not let water through easily.