Question for the fence builders

[samger2]

Gonna be starting our fence on Saturday and we have 25 post holes to dig. I live in a cookie cutter residential neighborhood...you know...those neighborhoods where they take all the good soil out, sell it and then back fill it with rock and clay? Needless to say the ground is awful to dig through. Having said that...what kind of auger would you recommend? I'm getting mixed answers. Some say to rent the two man auger because it'll be too much to handle with one guy with all the rocks in the ground. Others say to get the one man auger because the two man will be too large, heavy and cumbersome with all the rocks...others still say don't rent either of the two, get a different style...I guess what I'm after are even more suggestions...what do I rent?

I don't have access to a bobcat or a tractor where I can mount a 3 point auger.

Tips and advice are appreciated.

 

[ADVNTURR]

The best advice I can give is to pay someone else to do it. I spent a fair amount on equipment rentals to install my 480ft of split rail and it consumed a whole lot of time (due to my inexperience with putting in split rail).

If you're still set on doing it yourself, check around the local rental places to see if anyone has a Toro Dingo. It is a walk behind mini skidsteer that can be towed behind an XJ (it won't be happy about it though) which can be oufitted with an auger/shovel/etc. I think Bobcat actually has something similar as well. That is certainly going to be the easiest way to dig a lot of holes.

 

[Manic Mechanic]

I used a 2 man auger, drilled 6 holes to around 4ft IIRC. Ground was clay with occasional large rocks (fist size or so). It did just fine, took probably a few hours to drill, set the post, and fill. I suggest at least the 2 man auger if you can't get a tow set up.

-Eric

 

[RichP]

I had my local rental place deliver a ford tractor with a bucket in the front and a back hoe in the rear for $250 for 8 hours, used it to put in 18" road pipe at both ends of my 300ft driveway, dug up 12" deep where my son wanted to put his garden, dug some other trenches where I needed them to channel water around the house, used up all 8 hours. Going to rent it again for digging out some old footers and putting in new ones at some point so I can expand one deck and rebuild another I tore down 3 years ago.
For a decorative fence I wonder if those steel spike things you use for mailboxes would work.

 

[hubs97xj]

My non professional opinion:

I've never wished I'd rented a smaller piece of power equipment. The 2 man auger we used was not heavy or cumbersome. I thought it beat the hell out of manually digging the holes, and we didn't have the room (or budget) for something like a Dingo or Bobcat. I'd rent the 2 man auger, pick up a handful of shear pins, and go at it.

 

[bjoehandley]

Are you putting in a completely new fence, or replacing an old, rotten one? We've done it a few times here (my folks house) and we've almost always used a hand powered auger and have dug the holes 4+ foot deep (and one that is now 6'!) We're replacing a fence that we put in back in the mid 90's and instead of renting a power auger, Dad chose to use the hand one we've had for nearly 20 years because he didn't like the power one he rented in the later 90's.

On Sunday we took down the old panels, pulled the posts out of the ground (he went out and bought a hi-lift jack for that this time around, made removal a pretty easy, one man job), re-dug the 5 holes to 52" deep and one to 6' deep and finished painting all but one of the panels and a couple of the posts. Monday we put the posts in the ground, and put 2 of the panels up before we discovered that we mis-measured and put two of the posts in a few inches too far to the east:doh::banghead::smsoap:

Between the weather and me working yesterday, Dad left things alone. When I left for work this morning at 9am Dad had the posts back out of the ground and was starting to manually dig at least one of the holes. By the time I got home around 5pm, he already had the posts back in the ground where we should have put them! Now all that needs to be done is that the one last panel needs painting and then we can put up the last 3 panels and that me be tomorrow after I get off work:thumbup:






BTW, he is 69 years old and still did the work today alone and by hand, and we both (I'm nearly 35) dug, tamped, shoveled and painted till sun down Sunday and until we figured out our mistake Monday afternoon. I'll be honest, I found the painting the panels and refilling the holes more difficult than running the hand auger by myself:dunno:

 

[Rod Knee]

Call for underground utilities before you dig, otherwise you could end up with your picture in the paper.

http://www.oups.org/

 

[RedHeep]

I used a 2 man auger, drilled holes 4 feet and used 10 foot posts with concrete.

I do, however, live in coastal carolina, so I was done with 54 holes in about 90 minutes with a friend's help.

Make absolutely certain that you measure where to put your holes accurately, several times. Use engineer line to stake out the fenceline when you put your posts in. If you use an inaccurate measuring tool (like I did) you will end up cutting a whole bunch of rails to custom lengths because your posts are not 8 feet apart.

Trust me. I put in 420 feet of privacy fence the hard way.

 

[lesslimited]

If you can rent one of these, they're much better than the the hand held one- or two-man augers.

http://www.littlebeaver.com/details.php?cate_id=26

I've probably done way more than a thousand deck piers, and quite a few post holes with one of those. The only thing you're lifting is the auger and gearbox, the motor stays on the ground and provides a stable anchor for the torque bar.

The mechanical ones are better, we had a hydraulic one for a while but it was too heavy for one person to load and unload, and didn't seem to have any more power.

 

[xcm]

have fun with a handheld auger in rocky soil...

use a pike/digging bar, a post hole digger, and a good friend, its only hard work when its your turn, then your just standing around.

25 holes aint shit, work is good for you.

 

[xcm]

also, keep the holes skinny, every bit you go wider than that post, is extra concrete youve got to mix... a 1 bag post, or a 2.5 bag post will both hold up the fence.

wear gloves, calous's suck and the dry dirt tends to make them develope more when digging.

i was a proffessional digger, 5 years. probably miles of fiber conduit trenches through occupied schools in some of the worst neigborhoods of LA. hollenbeck, south LA, watts. fun times, some of the best sleep ive ever got!

 

[kastein]

I would also use a post hole digger and a digging bar. The soil around here is so rocky there is no point in using an augur unless it is one of those honking huge ones the utility company has on their truck for phone pole installation. Back when I was a kid I dug a 36 foot long 24" trench for electrical wiring to the garage with one instead of renting a ditch witch.

No one around here bothers concreting fenceposts, we just use pressure treated posts and pack the dirt in every 6" or so while filling the hole back in.

 

[samger2]

Well...I've already got a manual post hole digger and a spud bar. After speaking to a few people I've decided to rent a hydraulic tow behind auger that has a reverse gear so I can back out if and when I get into rocks.

 

[bigalpha]

Aren't the fence holes supposed to be about 3x the width of the post?

 

[bjoehandley]

Aren't the fence holes supposed to be about 3x the width of the post?

I don't see why, a 6" hole is plenty big for a 4" square post when your just refill the hole with the dirt you took out.

 

[bjoehandley]

I would also use a post hole digger and a digging bar. The soil around here is so rocky there is no point in using an augur unless it is one of those honking huge ones the utility company has on their truck for phone pole installation. Back when I was a kid I dug a 36 foot long 24" trench for electrical wiring to the garage with one instead of renting a ditch witch.No one around here bothers concreting fenceposts, we just use pressure treated posts and pack the dirt in every 6" or so while filling the hole back in.

This Iswhat we normally do, but the posts were primed and painted before we planted the. We also found that wet ground makes it easier to get most of those rocks out too.

 

[bigalpha]

I don't see why, a 6" hole is plenty big for a 4" square post when your just refill the hole with the dirt you took out.

I would be hesitant to build a fence with just dirt packing the posts, especially if it was anything other than a split rail fence. I wouldnt put up a privacy fence with a 6" hole packed only with dirt.

 

[samger2]

We're definitely setting the posts in concrete. Plus in a matter of a few years I can only imagine the posts would begin to rot if they weren't set in concrete.

 

[bigalpha]

Then make sure it's set to code so your local government can't give you hassle. Plus, you don't want to be redoing this just because you skimped on some concrete.

 

[kastein]

I don't see why, a 6" hole is plenty big for a 4" square post when your just refill the hole with the dirt you took out.

tough to effectively pack the dirt back in with that little room. If you are going to backfill with dirt instead of using cement you HAVE to be able to compact it well.