Fencing smarts from the Emerald Isle
While a leading New Zealand brand seems to have a stranglehold on the local electric fencing market, a company from the Green Isle seems to be making significant inroads, particularly in the Northern Hemisphere.
Four years after he quit farming, Tim Deans, an engineering-savvy guy, has emerged from his Rangiora workshop with a new electric fence add-on.
His creativity was spurred by poor fencing on his property.
A need for temporary fencing and gates prompted a design that uses existing hot wires and pig-tail standards, but adds an element of greater security and versatility in awkward shaped areas.
Hence his patented Wack Y Post, with a central insulated sleeve that slides over then pins to conventional Y-section steel posts.
This in turn carries a stainless steel plate with wire guides and hook points for reels and gate fasteners. The layout of the plate allows ‘hot’ wires to be run in any direction and if required be run 360 degrees without intersecting.
The insulators are made of recycled plastic and the carrier plate is made from 304 grade stainless steel.
Deans says using the Wack Y posts for temporary fencing can increase overall strength and security. He says Y-posts driven to about 400mm gives a fence line more stability than a run of pigtail standards.
“This means that using the Wack Y Post system for key locations or direction changes, with pigtails for the straight runs, makes for a very secure fence,” he said.
The posts have been tested holding dairy heifers, horses and ponies and “always maintained their integrity”.
The fitment also allows units to be ‘stacked’ one on another to create a multi-strand fence if required, limited only by the length of Y-post.
Orange insulators make the fence easy to see in long grass and gateways.
The four guideposts and ring connector on each assembly make direction changes easy, eg around awkwardly shaped areas such as paddock corners or ponds or watercourses.
Used for feed breaks, Wack Y Posts can be run in lengths with intermediate breaks or to suit smaller mobs.
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