Last longer and look better; but the price difference may be…prohibitive.
Don’t see RR ties much anymore, I guess they’re no longer in style…but talk about something that would LAST!
I still don’t hate the look, honestly. I mean from a design standpoint, you have to choose dark brown or pale green? Sixa one…
Went by HD and got some pressure treated 4x6. I looked at the 6x6 and they were too heavy and bulky to mess with. Also got the 1/2" auger bit and 1/2" rebar spikes.
Hoping these better quality boards will make the difference. They are tight grained, hard yellow pine for decks. $14 for an 8 ft. I had the HD guy use their Radial arm saw to cut me a couple 20 inch pieces for the sides of the flower bed.
thanks again.
My first experience with an Auger bit was an eye opener. It will jam into the wood really easy. Providing a nasty twist to the person holding the drill. Thankfully I had a solid 2 handed grip on it. Had to reverse the drill to get the bit unstuck.
I’m tempted to drag out my granddad’s brace and bit. Really for boring these types of holes in large timbers it can’t be beat. Doesn’t jam and it doesn’t twist your wrist. Trouble is his old auger bits are over 80 years old and very worn.
I’ll get err done. Just have to keep that strong 2 handed grip on the drill. I knew a neighbor that snapped his arm when I was a kid. He was drilling steel plate with a big 3/4 inch industrial drill. Bit jammed and there’s no give to steel plate. Even two handed it would spin you around (if your were lucky) or snap your arm.
A drill with a side arm helps a lot. Good variable speed and torque control is helpful too.
yeah side handle helps prevent injury.
also a sharp bit held perpendicular to the work at a speed to cut helps prevent seizing.
You could also try a pilot hole with a 1/4", then follow on with the half inch.
Ok, I’ll try it at a slower speed. It’s a new bit and factory sharp. Should go through pine easy enough.
Otherwise a pilot hole may help.
I’m not so sure. Auger bits normally have a screw at the tip that helps to pull the bit through the wood. A pilot hole may counteract that and actually make it harder to use.
I was probably going too fast. I’ll try again in the morning.
The landscape timbers are bad about warping and bowing up, the 4x6 is better. In fact there is nothing more pitiful than a bed bordered with Home Depot landscape timbers. I can’t imagine having trouble drilling through wood with a half inch auger bit. It should be like butter.
I was once on a ladder drilling holes for copper water lines in joists with a right angle drill. I was half asleep when I hit a knot and the drill caught my chin, knocking me off the ladder. Ouch.
I’ve used landscape timbers for building and fence framework on things like chicken coops, sheep buildings and the like, and yes, they do bow and warp like crazy when I’ve used them vertically or horizontally at the top of chain link, or even when on the ground when nailed together and used to attach said chain link to. As long as they kept the fence intact or the building standing even when a ram butted it, warping didn’t matter for my purposes. If I was going for looks, I wouldn’t use them.
But when simply placed or stacked for a border, I’ve never seen them warp and bow. I bet if you put rebar pins in them, they would start to do so. I used to work for Lowe’s and have bought a lot of them myself, and I know that probably 60% come in looking like bent crap to begin with. Then another 30% probably wind up that way.
1/2" should be fine, keep in mind that the treated timber (assuming it’s “fresh” from the lumber yard) will be at a fairly high moisture level, likely 30 - 40% internally. It will dry which will shrink the lumber as it does so, tightening around the rebar over time.
This is the secret to high quality Windsor chairs, the spindles are made of over dried wood, usually kept close to a burning wood stove and the legs are made from green(wet) wood, the legs and the mortises drilled into them shrink as they dry and the spindles expand as they absorb moisture before reaching equilibrium.
FWIW, we just redid our flowerbeds with poured and stamped concrete borders. Like this: http://www.proedging.com/files/yucca-copy.jpg. They look fantastic and didn’t take all that long nor cost much. Hard to get the stamping right but I was good at it by the end.
Something else that might be helpful if you have to drive the steel through multiple layers of the big timbers at once, is to paint the rebar with linseed oil or something similar. Years ago I volunteered briefly building a wooden ship. The keelson was a 10" x 12" or so oak timber fastened by drilling it with an auger and then driving 20" lengths of 1" galvi steel rod through it down into the keel. It would have been impossible (for me anyway) without the oil. It still took a sledge hammer so heavy I could barely manage it.
I installed a play set 6 years ago and used those as the border. Probably the same timbers and spikes you got. Honestly don’t know if I did it the RIGHT way, but I just used a regular drill bit the same size as the spike. I had to replace 1 because it curved but the rest have held up well.
I have helped construct several raised flower beds in community garden projects to enable access to wheelchair users. We used (sorry for the metric) 10mm auger bits and 12mm rebar driven in with a lump hammer.
Just a wee note: don’t use treated wood to border vegetable gardens. You don’t want that stuff in your food. You can use cast concrete blocks or composite deck boards to safely surround 'em.
