Doing fences Harv style!

TomPenny · Apr 28, 2006

Well we all know the post "doing what fencemen do" or something like that where Mr Harv show us how it was done. Before string was invented that is. I've read that post a hundred times.

A few days ago I started a project putting up 1700 feet of horse fence. The client didn't what a top rail fence just posts every 100 feet and t post in between.

So I get started setting the posts. I got my tractor/auger cement mixer, chop saw and a bunch of 2 7/8 pipe and I start setting post the way I know how, using a string.

Its been windy here in NE Texas for about a year. Real windy and the past several days where no exception. With the posts 100 ft apart that string was about as useless as a big ole boob growing in the center of my back. So I cut the string and started sighting them in and I think I was back sighting.

Anyway I'm only talking 12 or so posts but again most of them are 100 ft apart and they are dang near perfect.

Harv, thanks your and inspiration to us all and I for one am indebted to your teaching.

Oh I didn't set for height. One thing at a time please

here is a couple of pics 1 in line and 1 slightly off line to view.

inline

off line view

GabeTX · Apr 28, 2006

Nice line!

I wasn't fenceman enough to just sight the posts in on the fence I'm working on (longest line was about 890').

I got pretty good results using high-tensile wire--I just pounded one T-post at the start of a line, one at the end, and then tensioned regular 12.5 guage high-tensile wire between the two a few inches off the ground (T-posts will hold for a while, as long as the wire is low). Then snapped the entire length like a giant chalkline.

wroughtn_harv · Apr 28, 2006

I'm glad it worked for you Tom.

One of the things that I like to point out to the stringers is that they always can tell if they did it right by looking down the line. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

My friend Leo would have loved this thread.

Thank you.

TomPenny · May 1, 2006

[they always can tell if they did it right by looking down the line]
ha, well thats true.

I've continue on without the string. I only have 1 600 ft section to go and i'm done setting the post.

Next up is the T posts. I suppose you're going to tell me you sight those in too /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif do tell, do tell.

TomPenny · May 1, 2006

hey gabe I used to live out in Ponder years ago. I rented a ranch-hand house from a guy who owned the Pilot Knob ranch. Ever hear of that place?

rox · May 1, 2006

Now I know this is probably the stupist question you have ever heard but why wouldn't you just us a GPS reader?

wroughtn_harv · May 2, 2006

It's about space Rox. GPS I believe is along the line of three feet accuracy. We're talking sixteenths of an inch.

Tom, yup, do the t posts by eye too. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

About twenty years ago a client balked when I told him I did all the work by eye. He insisted upon pulling a wire banjo tight along a two hundred foot line.

When he returned the line was set and he was a proud as a pup with two tails. I didn't tell him that the wire accidently got cut while I was doing the second post. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

I haven't done them in forever except for temporary fences. But what I do is have someone operating the FEL while I sight them in.

If you use a string for the first couple of sections of a hundred feet just as a guide to help you get comfortable with sighting them in by the time you get the job done you'll be grinning when you see someone laying out a string line.