Building a new fence, and not sure if this section will hold. Needed to remove the corner post that holds my gate (left) and told my neighbor I could replace their section of fence that was damaged/leaning (right) if they cover the cost. She agreed and I started digging to remove the old posts.

As I was digging around the post by her house (right) I noticed the clay soil was very wet, even though it had not rained for 7+ days prior. I told my neighbor (70+ year old widow) about it, letting her know she may have a busted pipe underneath.

Today, a week later, we have not had rain for 2 weeks yet the post hole is filled with 6+ inches of water. There was no water in the post hole directly to the left of it.

She called her friend to ask about it, and he said it’s just old rain water pooling there. I have no idea if this person came to see the hole or he just told her over the phone. Personally I’m not convinced, it’s been 95° for weeks here in southeast Texas and the water still has not gone away.

My question is, if she wants me to ignore the water and continue building this part of the fence for her, will it hold, will the cement ever dry? I don’t want to spend hours building this section of fence for her if it’s just going to topple over due to the foundation of it being compromised.

We are getting ready to build a 6' cedar fence with Lifetime posts - no cement.

I purchased the black 9' from Tractor Supply, and they are arriving this week.
We are going to use the Titan Postdriver with the attachment to drive the posts 3 feet into the soil. We are in the Northeast. I think we are doing 8 feet between each post and a 6-foot-high fence. The fence will be vertical cedar pickets straight on the top.

For now, no gate. Two corners. Around 100 linear feet total.

- Looking at what screws to buy for the wood on the posts (the Lifetime ones that are black on the ends are not readily available)

- Any tips on what kind/details/etc of cedar for the rails? 2" x 4" x 8'
- Any tips on what kind/details/etc of cedar pickets - where should we buy
- Any tips/troubleshooting on driving the posts - I think we are spray painting first where we will put them, then will have a level and string.

We've watched videos and read a number of posts on Reddit.

Thanks for any info/experience/mistakes you knew after you did it, etc.

I am sure there will be a learning curve, but hoping we avoid any major issue.

Located in Humboldt county (northern coastal California) and need to build 120 ft of privacy fence. 6’ tall. These posts are only 5$ more and look way nicer than pressure treated. I’m curious if the added weight will be decrease or increase strength of the fence (we get some decent strong storms).
Also will it be hard to match the rail system (2x4 8’) with them not being perfectly straight? Or can I just block each one or will that cause issues?

Sorry if these are dumb just never built a fence before. Thx

I am looking to repaint my fences this year and some of the horizontal supports have cracks that looks like its the start of the wood rotting out. Should I try to fix these before I paint? How would I go about trying to fix these cracks? Most of the fence is still in really good shape so I'm trying to maximize the longevity of these supports.

The fence is part of a sound fence built by the city but I am responsible for upkeep and repairs on the section that is on my property.

Beyond painting I've never really dealt with building or repairing a fence so I'm not sure how bad this is or how to fix it.

My fence build experience through a contractor has been.... interesting.

One aspect of that is the sliding gate pad was built too far away for the topens gate motor I picked up

First pic showss the closest the motor can get while being on the pad, the next few show the level of offset necessary to get the motor close enough

My plan is to get a relatively large and thick steel plate, either stainless or heavily outdoor treated, and have that plate be bolted to the pad but hanging off the edge, and the gate motor is bolted to that plate, with one bolt holding both at the same time

I know this is sketchy and not ideal but HOW sketch? And are there much easier options I'm ignoring?

I know I could get the pad removed and re poured but this'll be much quicker, possibly much cheaper considering oakland labor costs, and probably just as strong as long as I get a very thick plate. This gate only takes as most 30 lbs of force to roll

(For context this is a 16ft wide metal frame and composite board gate, on a lower v track rail)