If you go to the countryside and pay your attention to the fences, you may notice some regularities. If you see a house standing there for a long time, for decades, it will be surrounded by an old wood fence, and if the house is new it will be most likely surrounded by the one made of metal, bricks or profiled sheet.
More and more people prefer modern materials nowadays. But the fence made of timber is always so beautiful, aesthetic, environmentally friendly, it’s very easy to install, it does not heat up and so on. Also you can decorate it in so many different ways. Here is some information on how to build a wood fence with your own hands.
Step 1 – installing posts
The step 1 is the installing of wood fence posts. In the place where you will put the fence supports it will be better to pull the laces and fix them to stand in line. Then take a garden auger with a screw diameter of about 4-5 inches and drill holes to a depth of about 3 feet. If hedgehogs live in your area, please, before you quit the fence posts in the holes check to see that there are no hedgehogs in there!
Then pull the posts down into the holes. Concreting posts does not make sense – weather conditions do not usually influence on them. For post to stand at the same height, use hydrolevel, a device consisting of two plastic flasks filled with water and connected by a hose.
For lags use thin metal profiles of about 1-1,5 inches wide. Attach them to the posts will bolts and nuts. Drill the holes in the lag and posts, insert the bolts, tighten the nuts. Finishing step 1 you should constantly check the horizontality of lags using the level. So, posts are now ready for installing the boards.
Step 2 – preparing the boards
The step 2 is getting the boards ready. Prefer using boards of 3 inches wide and 1 inch thick. The material of this kind is more beautiful and interesting. Pine boards seem perfect. To have less waste left choose boars of about 18 feet long. By the way, you will be able to make a bench or a wooden stand for flowers using the timber scraps that left after the process.
The height of your fence will be 5 feet 11 inches high which is enough to hide from prying eyes. Mark the board into the needed sections and cut it with the jigsaw. Since the board is only planed on two sides process the edges with electric plane putting the board on its side. To use less oil-paint modify all roughness with a grinder.
For processing boards against rot and mold put the antiseptic solution for enhanced protection of timber using a brush. After it dries, paint your boards. After the paint dries, proceed to the final step 3.
Step 3 – installing a wood fence
Attach the boards to the lags will be self-tapping screws with a drill with a length of about 0,3 inch (2 lags for each board). Spin them will screwdrivers. Start from the edge of the fence! Then take the hydrolevel one more time and attach the next board to the joists at some distance from the first one. Do the same for all the boards of your fence.
Then take a nylon thread, stick it with the staple gun to your side board, pull it and fix on the last board. You should leave some gap between boards because timber can swell and enlarge because of rains and humidity. Time after time check the level of vertical boards.
So, your wood fence is ready!
A wood fence always looks very beautiful at its border area. The most important advantage of it is that it can easily exist next to flower-beds, you can plant as many flowers and trees as you want near it. You cannot plant them near the metal fence – all the plants will be burned by its heat. You can express yourself in so many different ways and put, for example, put the wheel of an old wagon or absolutely anything else onto your fence. It will be also nice if a bit of humor will be added: you can put a funny bright plate onto your fence, saying ‘Human shots, dog bites!’ or ‘Now it’s the most wonderful time of the year!’ (and all your neighbors know that you never put the last one off your fence, of course). You can also decorate it with wooden fish or bunnies, hooks, baskets or any form of street art. Your ecologically friendly fence will serve you very well!
Video: How to build a wood fence?