In the fall of 2001, I began making plans for my upcoming Halloween display. The thing that I knew my display lacked most, was the perfect cemetery fence. Not only would it make the display more creepy, but it would also serve to keep the trick-or-treaters out, and the ghouls in. I originally planned on making a PVC pipe fence like the ones found on the MonsterList. I thought it would look good and not cost a fortune. So I bought some 1/2" x 10' lengths of PVC pipe and started experimenting. The first thing I noticed was how flimsy a 40" piece of PVC pipe was. It wouldn't take much, for a prankster or a kid hanging on it, to destroy my hard work. Plans quickly changed.
I found a Halloween website by Bob Andrews. He had built the most amazing home made columns and fence that I had ever seen. Bob's Site here I emailed him and discovered that his fence was made of all wood. Bob used 1" x 1" wood bars and 2" x 1" horizontal crossbars. Essentially the crossbars were twice the width of the bars.
So, I decide on 1" x 1" x 40" bars and square 2" x 2" x 8' crossbars for strength.
For the bars, I bought 1" x 3" x 10' lengths of pine. I split the 1" x 3" x 10' in equal thirds for the bar's width. Then for length, I cut them in thirds again into 40" bars. I got 9 bars for every 10' length and no waste.
For the crossbars I bought 2" x 4"s and split them in half. I made 8' sections of fence, but for along the driveway, I needed one 10' length of fence. So I just bought an extra 10 foot 2" x 4". Sections over 8 feet are difficult to handle and store.
The last thing I needed to decide on was what I would use for finials. I searched high and low and even contacted Halloween prop manufacturers. Everything I found was made of cheap tiny plastic and very expensive. I planned on 60 plus feet of fence and needed over a hundred finials. I thought I should checkout what real iron finials would cost me. They were actually cheaper. The only online company I found was Decorativeiron.com
The finials I settled on were 1/2" Square "Fleur-De-Lis". I bought in bulk and they cost 42 cents a piece. If you can find iron finials locally, do so, because you will save a lot on shipping.
Once I had my bars completed, I could now assemble a fence section. The bars are 6" centers, the first bar 6" from the end. Tip: Before you split the 2" x 4"s, use a carpenters square to draw the marks for where the bars would be nailed down. When your 2" x 4"s are split in half, if you keep the two halves together, the lines for the top and bottom will line up perfectly.
The bottom crossbar is 5" up, and there is 28" between the two crossbars. There is no formula here, I just laid out what I thought looked good.
To nail together, I put a sheet of plywood on horses and clamped the bottom crossbar flush with the bottom edge of the plywood. Whatever you do, make sure you have 4-6 clamps to assemble a section. I cut 3 pieces of scrap wood all exactly 28". With the bottom crossbar clamped down, I laid the 3 pieces of wood, one at each end and one in the middle. Then I slid the top crossbar above the 3 scraps of wood. When I was satisfied everything was lined up, I clamped the top crossbar down in place. This is how no matter how many sections I made, the crossbars were all perfectly 28" apart. The bars were nailed on top of the crossbars.
To attach the fence sections to the posts in the ground, I fastened L-brackets on each end of the top crossbar only (2 L-brackets per section). In this picture, you might be able to see that I have 4 L-brackets on this fence section. After setting up for the first time, I discovered that the fence tight on the ground and 2 L-brackets at the top of the fence were plently strong to hold.
That is the completed unpainted fence section.
For painting I used a flat black, and chrome or silver paint for the finials. I originally planned on painting everything black, but again after experimenting, everyone I asked, thought the chrome made the finials really stand out. Tip: If you do decide to use an iron finial, make sure that the iron is sufficiently covered in paint. If not, the area where you missed that is left exposed to the weather will quickly begin to rust in a couple of days outside.
All in all it was a lot of work. In fact, I was still painting the last fence section on the day of Halloween. But I couldn't be happier with the results!!! It is far stronger than I expected, and it really completed the look for my yard. Before I had just some gravestones on my lawn. Now it had the feeling that you you really were entering a cemetery. Everyone loved the fence and several people thought I had went out and bought a real wrought iron fence.
Final costs were approx. $150 for 66 feet of fence. Not bad for a fence that is strong enough to stay up year round. In 2002, I added glowing skulls to the posts. You can see pics in the 2002 section.
