Author: ascona

Over the last few years the popularity of Waratah® has grown rapidly & FCANZ fencing contractors are realising that there IS a place for steel fencing products on traditionally timber focused New Zealand farms.

Farmers & contractors have realised that the old BHP black post has not been available in New Zealand for the last 15 years & the Chinese black painted post that replaced it, is a distant second in terms of steel strength & coating quality.

Waratah appreciate the support from FCANZ members for the REAL Waratah Jio steel post range and are taking another group of members to Australia to see where Waratah products have been made for over 130 years – and have some fun along the way.

This year has seen the largest numbers of entries from New Zealand contractors who have used Waratah fencing products in their day to day jobs. The photos received throughout September and October 2017 were encouraging.

FCANZ members were asked to install a fence that included Waratah Jio posts, Longlife Blue netting or accessories like strainers & stays. They then took a photo of the fence and sent it through to Brendon Crequer who judged the entries.

The all-expenses paid trip to Waratah Australia gives the winners access to 3 different steel mills & the technical teams that run them, time with an Australian fencing contractor & reseller, plus tickets to the final day of the V8 supercars event in Newcastle!

Waratah Regional Sales Manager, Brendon Crequer says; “This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to experience steel manufacturing on a grand scale & it is not available to the general public – members will see things that would never normally have access to.”

If you are not part of this year’s trip, start using Waratah products now, take some photos of your work & you could be on the next one!

If a trip to OZ doesn’t interest you, then maybe using the best quality steel fencing products will. Think about the products you use – your reputation as a contractor depends on it. There’s no point buying good quality wire & hanging it on a cheap imported Chinese Y post that will quickly corrode & then transfer to the wire, leading to ultimate fence failure!

The New Zealand market is flooded with black painted “Chinese produced Y-posts”. In fact, every “black” Y-post sold in NZ is produced in that part of the world. But it doesn’t stop there, “Chinese silver Y-posts” have also entered NZ market. Do they know the black painted posts are not performing or are they just trying to catch-up with a real Waratah? It makes you think doesn’t it!

Remember a couple of facts when looking for products to use or recommend:

If a reseller is telling you their steel posts are produced in Australia, check that it is embossed with ‘WARATAH’. Waratah are the only manufacturer in this part of the world of steel fence Y posts.

Of the NZ importers of silver Y-posts who actually state the coating weight, none of them can guarantee the minimum 600g per m2 that a Waratah Jio post has.

Black “Y-posts” are not coated in the same tar based coating that BHP posts were coated in? It was outlawed in the 90’s – what they use now is a thin black paint for protection.

Waratah has over 130 years of experience with farmers & contractors and like you, we pride ourselves on doing the best job possible. Congratulations to those lucky FCANZ members heading to Australia – we look forward to hearing all about your adventures!

  

One of the benefits of being an FCANZ member, or invited associate, is attending the Best Practice Association Days.

These events are well run, regular events that display new innovation and best practice techniques/training throughout New Zealand. In addition to the delicious lunch and morning tea provided, this is a true opportunity to grow as a contractor.

At a Best Practice Association Day, you can expect to see demonstrations of best practice, and new techniques. It’s this informative, practical advice that see’s members returning to annual events throughout New Zealand.
Keeping it fresh at the Cambridge event was what FCANZ Board member Greg Burton described. One member gave feedback that they found the day informative, learning new ways of fencing which then turned into new services in their business and lead to increased revenue.

Below are photos of the work Bevan Fencing Contractors completed after learning a different post and rail technique at the Cambridge event in September, near Hamilton. Over eighty people attended the event despite the pouring rain. With safety and wet weather gear on fencing contractors attended from as far away as Northland.

Board Member, Greg Burton, said the Cambridge event was something to look forward to. Greg felt privileged to showcase different types of fencing. “These Association Days are a great opportunity to share different styles of fencing, and to learn from each other.” Greg continued to explain that learning from each other allowed Contractors to put new techniques into practice, which increased their business and the quality in the fencing industry. “The owner on that job said to me he wanted something with a wow factor, something different, and this was challenging and exciting work. Something good to share with like-minded people,” commented Greg.

For more information about the recent and upcoming events, sign up for the e-newsletter, visit our Facebook page Fencing Contractors Association New Zealand, or our website.

Become a member today, attend FCANZ events, and learn more about increasing your service range, growing the business and accessing practical business and employment support. See the article about member benefits and application form in this edition. Thanks to all our Partners and Members and FCANZ Team who proactively support these events.

 

 

 

 

 

Wellington Company develops an adaptor for Staple Guns when installing electric fence Insulators on a fence line.

From a conversation with a frustrated fencing contractor an idea was born.  The Development Team at Strainrite combined their design skills with their CNC Machine Centre and produced an adaptor that simply attaches without any alterations to a Stockade Staple Gun.  The adaptor lines up the gun with the insulator and gets a ‘hole in one’ every time.

This idea is a follow up to their Activator Strap – an International award-winning innovation which won the 2017 Innovation Award at the Mystery Creek Fieldays.

The ‘Holeshot’ has been a great success and feedback from contractors suggest that it makes installation of insulators up to five times faster, but moreover, avoids the tedium of installing insulators by hand.

A short video of the Hole Shot can be seen on the website www.strainrite.co.nz Search: Holeshot or on the Strainrite YouTube Channel:

So a fairly new “all the gear and no idea”, broken down old fencer, too old for steep farm stuff – that’s young fella work right?, got offered a plum job, a deer exclusion fence on Stewart Island. There are plenty of Whitetail on Stewart Island, as you know!
The Rakiura Maori Land Trust administer a wide portfolio of SILNA lands on Rakiura, and one property at the Old Neck offered the opportunity to exclude deer with a short fence from cliff to cliff across a peninsular – simple really!
The Trust’s consultant, Roger Lough arranged for us to inspect the site together in late July, and the challenges of the job started to become apparent, very exposed beaches with tricky approaches, no machinery access possible, thick “muttonbird” scrub and some restrictions on what could be cut e.g. Southern Rata or moved no cutting into dunes. Some positives included that it looked like a good line of 250 meters might be possible with no gullies or guts, and following a very smooth contour. In addition, the Trust agreed that the use of Waratah galvanised Jio Maxy posts and strainer/strut systems – on the first look very expensive product, but for this or other jobs where access for conventional machinery is not practical – very cost effective.
It was obvious that logistics for men, materials, and weather were going to be the key considerations. I generally quote all my work, my wife says that’s why I don’t make any money, but there were just too many variables for this job to have a fixed cost.
So I split my pricing into elements where I could control costs, things like accommodation and the actual fence construction, and the variable costs like transport, the clearing of the line, etc.
I was assisted by Brendon Crequer of Waratah and Ryan D’Ath of Farmlands to get the gear – and worked with Paula Blair, Farmlands Invercargill who did a great job.
At the 2017 FCANZ conference in Christchurch I resolved to approach someone up to help “on the line” with the fencing and after an intense selection process, I have a lot more sympathy for Steve Hansen now, I lined up Noaksee – and like the good bugger he is, he accepted right off. Noaksee had a trip south scheduled so it made sense to tie the project in with it, but working to a fixed timetable with Stewart Island weather was always going to be tough.
The Trust wanted to use 150 dropper deer netting, which weights 120kgs per coil and as it had to be carried up a beach, then up quite a steep track for 150 metres or so I broke the coils down into 33M lengths (40 kgs) and re-rolled them. The day I had to load them on the trailer it blew like hell and until I parked up into the wind it actually blew the load off twice – I lost a lot of sweat and made up new cuss words. The Jio Maxy’s are not light either so they were bundled into 3’s.
Just over two tonnes of materials and gear were loaded onto the Foveaux Freighter for delivery to the Halfmoon Bay wharf.
From there they were collected by Jim Barnett who operates a barge on the island. Jim had just finished pulling up his oyster farm due to
the Bonamia outbreak – a devastating blow. However, he rounded up a crew, and after two attempts due to the weather and the difficult beach at Sand-spit, got all the gear above the tideline. A major milestone.
I’d allowed two days to cut the line and two to construct the fence. Noaksee turned up as promised on a Saturday and we went through all our tools to ensure everything we needed was packed . . . a few wheels fell off, the motorised driver wouldn’t fit the Maxy’s. I had previously built a special driver to fit the 2.7 metre high Maxy’s so we had that covered but the fear of missing a vital tool or component was very real. It’s a long swim to get it! The second wheel to go was the weather, it completely turned and the Sunday ferry we were supposed to be on was canceled.

Foster Price, Price Fencing