Close board fencing on a slope.

[Downside]

Hi all,
I would appreciate your advice/comments on a diy fencing project.
I am about to erect 70 meters of 2m close bord fencing and arris rails on a sloping boundry line. The rails and gravel boards will or course follow the slope, but what about the feather edge boards? will it look ok to fit these at the same angle as the slope? or is it normal practice to fit them plum and then angle the tops and botts ( alot of labour ). The tops will be finished with capping.
Regards Graham.

 

[JohnD]

The posts and the boards go vertical.

It is usual to put the gravel boards horizontal too, and have the panels stepped rather than sloping.

You end up needing slightly longer posts. If they are concrete posts and gravel boards you can pack the concrete so it comes up the uphill side of the post and partially fills the slot so the gravel board rests on it. You can do this by levelling the board on bricks or scraps of timber while you finish the concreting.

I suppose you could slant the tops if you wanted to, or fix a sloping board under the capping to hide the tops of the individual boards.

 

[big-all]

you will need to step each board on the fence or angle the top and bottom to fit the capping[if fitted ]and to look neat on the gravel board

the gap between the posts will also reduce as the angle increses

 

[Downside]

Thanks John and Big-All,
I prefer not to step, as its continious boarding (not made up panels ). For most of the run the slope is around 5 degrees, so I may have to do a small amount of trimming, or I may be lucky in that the small step in each board will be hidden by the capping.
Regards Graham.

 

[fencer]

Put the featheredge boards up vertical and plumb they will follow the slope of the gravelboard, each featheredge will then be stepped down the slope. This does make the fitting of the counter rail and weather capping a pain (also leaves gaps between featheredge and capping due to drop of the slope) I tend to screw a batten to the completed bay then rest circular saw baseplate on the batten and run the circular saw down the batten taking the tops off the featheredge level with the posts leaving a clean slope on the featheredge bay between posts.
Your putting up closeboard fencing (as you know), the two replys you had were on about thickboard panel fencing.

G fencing

 

[mattb75]

Jumping onto this thread - I'm planning to install some new arris rails and closeboard fencing onto a slope this week. The slope is on an exposed corner plot and gets a lot of wind buffering. The closeboard fencing already there has blown in a couple of times, so I was wondering whether I should use concrete posts or stick with the wooden posts style previously used. If I do use concrete posts how do I attach the arris rails to it to keep the posts hidden from one side of the fencing?

There is also a slight height variance between each side of the fence so I think I'd like to use gravel boards to hold back the soil - would this work if I used wooden fence posts??

 

[fencer]

Hi mattb75,
It really doesn't make to much difference what posts you use concrete or wooded, but you could get over length morticed posts, this will enable you to concrete a greater depth in the ground on the slope, so would help with the wind blowing the fence over.

If you want to use concrete posts but have them hidden, you will need notched/rebated posts (not morticed), on the face edge they have rebates that the arris rails sit into, then you bolt through the rail and through the post (put the nut + washer on rear of post).
Gravel boards (concrete or wood) fitted in the normal way on metal cleats or bolted wood cleats.
OR
with wood posts just save some cash and use 3"x2" normal rails on 4"x4" plain posts, nail the rails to the face edge of the wood post and have a continuous run of featheredge from one end to the other.
Gravel board (wood only) fitted on wood cleats.

One tip if you can get away with it don't use concrete gravelboards on a slope, you have to use a grinder/cutter to angle the ends to fit between the posts.
Hope thats of some help to you.

G fencing

 

[mattb75]

Cheers fencer,

Just done a quick search for the concrete posts - think I'll go with the wooden option to save the cash!!

Quick couple of questions,
Is there a proportion rule of thumb for the posts? i.e. should I always have a minimum of 25% of the post in the ground?
and,
Whats the best way to fix the posts (wooden) into the ground, concrete them in (postcrete or similar) or use those metal bracket you put the posts into?
For info the fence will be 2m in height

 

[fencer]

mattb75
As a rule you need to have 2ft (600mm) of the post in the ground, so for a 6ft (1800mm) high fence you will require a post length of 8ft (2400mm).
I only ever concrete posts in (the met posts veer off line in stoney ground), you can use postcrete (the stuff from focus sets in 10/20 mins) or mix your own with ballast/cement, I tend to use rapid set cement that goes off in 10/20 mins (comes in a yellow bag) when doing closeboard, I can then featheredge the bays the same day (get paid sooner then).

Top tip of the day... keep the post hole as small as possible, best achived by using a graff/fencing spade (A in the link below), uses less concrete + posts wont move in wind due to massive hole & ground disturbance.
http://www.drivall.com/fencingtools/fencingspades.htm

Need anymore help just call, happy fencing.

G fencing

 

[mattb75]

Hi again fencer,

Thanks again for the tips, I've got hold of a fencing spade and am about to go and buy several bags of the rapid set po5tcrete stuff so I can get cracking in the morning when my timber is supposed to turn up.

Finger's crossed for a painless installation

Thanks again