Fence advice please!

[schellings]

Looking for some advice - I previously rented my house out to a friend of a friends and advised them that I would have to repair the fence as it was in a poor state. They said they'd do it and just charge me for the materials - Bad Mistake!! Anyway, i moved back in last year after they left without notice and noticed that they had omitted a corner of my garden for the fence - anyway, investigating this weekend while measuring up for new fencing and found out why they've done it. I tried digging into the ground (gently as I'm pregnant and husband is working abroad!) and found that that corner has the post with a huge bit of cement round it in the ground! I see metapost do bolt down posts for cement - what do you use to drill these in? Also, is it possible to break out the concrete and how would that be done\what tools would I need?

I currently have a mis-shappen 3 ft fence and was hoping to replace it with a 6ft fence for privacy as there is a lane that runs along my back garden. My husband says just get someone to put a 3ft one up again as the house will be going on the market as soon as we get it all up to scratch b a six foot fence will provide will be a bonus for selling. I will be using a builder friend who has never personally put up a fence, but like me has assisted. Will just be putting up one of those cheap panel fences as hubby will flip if I spend too much on the house - I know I need 8ft posts but have some shorter posts already in the right locations, what do you guys think about using those metapost extenders - I can guarantee that the existing posts are firmly embedded with oodles of concrete!

Any help greatly appreciated to relieve my stress as the pregnancy is third time lucky for me so am hoping for an easy-ish life with this fence!

 

[breezer]

a big hammer drill and masonary bit is used for drilling into concrete, and a sledge hammer is used to break up concrete.

but for the hassle involved i would get several quotes to get it done, it will be a lot easier

 

[schellings]

Hiya - thanks for the info - mentioned getting some quotes to hubby but he is tight fisted so says he will hire a drill and do the necessary when he gets home at the end of the month as he doesn't fancy sledgehammering it!

Have decided to stick with a 3ft one too as we may hit the same problems when trying to remove the other posts and dont want to just extend the old posts as they will not be in deep enough to properly support a 6ft fence. Thanks a lot for the advice though - its a great\interesting site to read through!

 

[king.module]

we haven't done this yet but we're going to have a fence about 3 or 4 ft high with the posts an extra 2-3 ft above the fence level and then trail some wire from post to post (like errr.... a wire fence i suppose).

we'll use these wires for climbing plants Etc... cuts back on fencing costs and the plants will get light from both sides...... maybe you could rig something up like that??

just a thought

good luck

 

[schellings]

I did think of buying those trellis for the top but all depends how sturd I feel the fence posts are in as wouldn't want to leave them something that falls down within the first year! Will have a play around once the fence is done and thanks a lot for all the advice - its much appreciated!

 

[leaky]

I have fenced around the whole house last year, Murphys law states that the old post with the block of concrete will always be where the new post needs to go, and they are a hell of a job to remove. I used Metposts at my previous house and would never use them again, they just don't hold the post secure enough. Cement the post in with post fix quick setting cement its much stronger, i recently saw a bitumun liner bag that fits over the end of the posts to reduce rotting, never used them before but looks a good idea.