problems stretching fence

[turnkey4099]

When I worked on a farm and we put up barbed wire we had a tool that crimped the wire like Harv's and Turnkey's tools. BUT it was two pieces of round metal that had been formed into a square maybe 8-12 inches. The squares where attached to each other in the middle so they scissored. On end was the "handle" and the other end was placed on the barbed wire. You end on the wire would produce a bunch of crimps to tighten up the wire.

Later,
Dan

That sounds like the tool I saw in use. I did a lot of looking in catalogs and junk shops before giving up and building mine.

Harry K

 

[4720 OWNER]

Was noticing the fence wire part is on the outside of the posts. The calves i have would be under that in a heart beat. Fixed enough fence like that already. They are really quite naughty and trying to butcher out the worse.

 

[wafwot]

When I have areas in the field fence that aren't as tight as others, I take a claw hammer and cinch up the wires. You can draw up quite a bit of slack this way.

 

[bpattie]

just my 2 cents, I have stretched a lot of fence. You never want to over-stretch it either. the v crimps in the top are there to allow for normal expansion and contraction due to temp changes.

 

[Dave5264]

Cant speak to Tightening Mesh wire, but the individual lines of hi-tensile or Galvanized wire is easly tightened with inline wratchet style tensioners.

they're less than $5 each, one per line, one every 3-400' is plenty if you've got a corner in there, you could go farther on a straight run i think.

 

[bpattie]

it does not take much to stretch field fence. again you want to leave some of the V that is crimped in unstretched wire for expansion and I do shorter sections and tack them to post. then move on for another section, maybe 50ft at a time. I have used wire stretcher with a piece of 4 ft or so pipe woven in where I attach the wire stretcher.

 

[Luremaker]

Here is a photo of my fence stretcher for anyone interested. We find these at farm auctions on a regular basis around here for between $5 - $20. They are a bit of a pain with all the bolts.

 

[weldingisfun]

Here is a photo of my fence stretcher for anyone interested. We find these at farm auctions on a regular basis around here for between $5 - $20. They are a bit of a pain with all the bolts.

I built something like that using 2X4, three 3/8 inch bolts with wingnuts and two pieces of chain. Worked great!

 

[SuperDuty335]

Instead of 2 pieces of angle iron, I used 2 2x4s with bolts through them about every 6 inches. Tighten like crazy. I put angle iron at the back so the chain would pull evenly and not break the 2x4s. Tight like guitar strings.

This is all you need. The knots in the wire make an impression in the wood which keeps the wires from slipping. The only thing I do different is drill a hole in either end of the 2x4's to run my chain through.