karmakanic
Silver Member
- Joined
- Jun 25, 2002
- Messages
- 232
- Location
- NE Texas
- Tractor
- Kubota L35 TLB, John Deere 550 dozer, Cat D-2 dozer, Allis Chalmers HD-11 dozer
Anyone looking for a quick and easy way to make a covered arbor? Try this:
Go to your local farm and ranch store and pick up some wire fence panels. The heavy duty kind, with 1/4" wire on 4" centers. Get the 5'x16' size. In our area, they're around $15.00 a piece. Pick up some small surveying stakes, or any other kinda stake at the same time.
Tote'em home and lay one down on the ground. Get a hefty friend to help with the next step. Have hefty friend stand on a 4"x4" (or other suitable heavy board) placed 12" back from one of the ends of the panel, and using a crowbar or other suitable long slender instrument of destruction, interlace it thru the wire and bend the 12" of panel so it's pointing straight up. Do the same to the other end. These will be the feet of your arbor.
Drag the fence panel to where you want it, and while one person stands and holds one end secure, the other person starts walking the other end toward the first. Basically you're bending the panel into an upside down U. It helps if one person or the other first lifts the panel in the middle to get the U shape started. The stuff is kinda tough, and it'll take a little doing to get it to bend.
After you've got the shape and the position you want, just use the stakes thru the feet to keep it secure. Then plant your favorite vines for the covering. It'll be a little wavey, especially if you're only using one panel, but once the plants get to growing it'll settle in. Or you could drive some uprights
(metal fence posts) in the ground at the corners and wire them to the panel to stiffen it up.
The attached pic shows one we build using 5 panels wired togeather. That makes it 25 feet long. It was done this past winter, so it's not covered yet. But we placed it in an area of honeysuckle growth, and if you know honeysuckle, you'll believe me when I say it'll be covered with vines by next summer.
Take care and have fun.
Dave Perry aka karma-kanic
Go to your local farm and ranch store and pick up some wire fence panels. The heavy duty kind, with 1/4" wire on 4" centers. Get the 5'x16' size. In our area, they're around $15.00 a piece. Pick up some small surveying stakes, or any other kinda stake at the same time.
Tote'em home and lay one down on the ground. Get a hefty friend to help with the next step. Have hefty friend stand on a 4"x4" (or other suitable heavy board) placed 12" back from one of the ends of the panel, and using a crowbar or other suitable long slender instrument of destruction, interlace it thru the wire and bend the 12" of panel so it's pointing straight up. Do the same to the other end. These will be the feet of your arbor.
Drag the fence panel to where you want it, and while one person stands and holds one end secure, the other person starts walking the other end toward the first. Basically you're bending the panel into an upside down U. It helps if one person or the other first lifts the panel in the middle to get the U shape started. The stuff is kinda tough, and it'll take a little doing to get it to bend.
After you've got the shape and the position you want, just use the stakes thru the feet to keep it secure. Then plant your favorite vines for the covering. It'll be a little wavey, especially if you're only using one panel, but once the plants get to growing it'll settle in. Or you could drive some uprights
(metal fence posts) in the ground at the corners and wire them to the panel to stiffen it up.
The attached pic shows one we build using 5 panels wired togeather. That makes it 25 feet long. It was done this past winter, so it's not covered yet. But we placed it in an area of honeysuckle growth, and if you know honeysuckle, you'll believe me when I say it'll be covered with vines by next summer.
Take care and have fun.
Dave Perry aka karma-kanic
