Drilling posts for ballustrade wire threading

[Dunny]

Hi there,

I am replacing some timber railing on a deck with capping and horizontal wire infill at 125mm spacing. I am looking for a quality finish so am looking for some advice on how to ensure I am drilling perfectly straight and horizontal through the 90 x 90 existing posts.

Any jigs or other tips out there?


Thanks

[HappyHammer]

Dunny,

How high is your decking? If it's a reasonable distance from the ground you might find that spacing (125mm) is too wide. I think the rules for stainless steel cables have changed recently on balconys to be much closer and posts need to be every meter now I'm told.

HH.

[Ashore]

Sounds like a good excuse for a new tool;) , the Triton cordless drill has a built in guide to sort this prob out

Rgds

[Doughboy]

Yeah I believe that the wires may need to be at 100 mm spacings but I am not sure on the post spacing.

There are drills out there with built-in levels, other than that a small square held in place with a clamp would do the job. Although I found that unless you really drill at a horrendous angle just have the missus eyeball it and unless you are drilling a 2 mm hole for 1.5 mm wire the hole will allow enough movement for the wire to level naturally.

Pete

[scooter]

Gday Dunny, & welcome :)

Do you have access to a drill press?

If the posts aren't already in place, you could rig up a long auxilliary table to support each post when drilling on the drill press. Sounds awkward but doable I guess if you're obsessive enough. :D

If not, you could use a well set up drill press (set so drill bit is 90 degrees to table front to back & side to side) to drill a guide hole through a block that's say 45mm thick.

You could then mark the hole locations accurately on both sides of the post, clamp the block over the top of one mark, and use it to guide the bit in a hand held electric drill. This will get your hole started, remove the guide block & drill to full depth. Do the same from the other side, if the guide block was drilled accurately the holes should meet pretty much OK in the middle of the post.

To reduce/obviate the margin for error when drilling deeply from both sides, buy a long series drill bit to get most/all of the way through the post. If going right through, clamp some scrap tight to the exit side of the post to avoid breakout.


HTH....cheers..............Sean

[woodsprite]

I went through the hoops with wire a few months back - wound up not using it BECAUSE despite the very detailed council regulations regarding to the allowable amount of sag between the wires and the details about how they measure the sag, I could not be guaranteed that even with 80mm spacing (which I was going to use) and the regulation strainer post spacings, that it would be approved. Plus is was going to cost 3 times the price of the powder coated rails I put up anyway.

If you decking is 1 metre or more above the ground, you need to be very careful with the spacing and stretch/sag issues. Ifd it is less than 1 metre, you can proceed as you wish as this is considered a safe height. At least that is the way our local regulations are framed.

As for the other stuff you mentioned, I thinkt he other guys are on the ball with that.

Good luck - wire looks fantastic!
Jeff

[Barry_White]

I think you will find at least in NSW you can't have anything horizontal that a child can use as a ladder if the deck floor is a metre or more above the ground and the the top rail has to be 1 metre above the deck.

The only thing you can use is verticle slats or solid panel. e.g Laminated Glass, compressed fibro or steel.

[Pulse]

Hey guys, went through all this pretty recently. Its all in the BCA may 2006 update.


1. no climbable members (ie horizontal wires) if deck over 4m above ground.

2. No railing needed if under 1m high deck.

3. A table for stainless wires is now in the BCA. The wider the pole spacing, the higher the required tension of the wires and the closer they must be. It is measured by hanging a weight off the wire to measure the deflection. It also has the different wire thicknesses listed. The theory is that it must now resist a 125mm sphere with a certain amount of force, rather than just having a maximum 125 spacing.

4. 865mm high railing for a landing less than 500mm long

Please atatchment for details

Cheers Pulse

[Bleedin Thumb]

I'm not sure if what you say there Barry is building codes but its very good safety advice. My knowledge is playground regulations which are a good starting point for safety anyway. If you go vertical slats the new regs state a 86mm max spacing to stop head entrapment.

EDIT Looks like Pulse has confirmed Building Codes, thanks.

[bpj1968]

did mine a bit over 2 year ago. same as pulse re 4 metres obove ground for the floor level. I was 3.5 at worst. At that stage spacing was 125 mm, by pushing a 125 mm ball through. No one at the council would give me an answer of how hard they pushed. One supplier of wire heard of inspectors standing on teh wire.

In the end I went 110 mm spacing, and posts up to 2.1M apart, it fitted the gap I had. The council inspector had to come out through a few phases and I kept talking and asking questions about everything. In teh end he asked the spacing, gave it a jiggle and said it looked good.

Looking back though I now have a 16 month old and I get nervous when he is out there. Will be putting mesh over the top.

When I drilled i just eyed it off and used a templqate with the correct spacings. I drilled jholes only slightly larger than the wire, and crimped eth fittings on after. It now means I can't remove the wire and fittings if need be.

[sleeping-wood]

I have seen a few jobs recently where a plastic insert has been inserted into the post or intermediate support, I am guessing to improve the wear that could happen to the post or wire over time or to stop noise caused by the wind moving the wire.
I am not sure but the plastic looks similar in size to the plastic upright used in irrigation sprayers. This really makes for a neat job.

[Dunny]

Dunny,

How high is your decking? If it's a reasonable distance from the ground you might find that spacing (125mm) is too wide. I think the rules for stainless steel cables have changed recently on balconys to be much closer and posts need to be every meter now I'm told.

HH.

Hi Happy,

Deck is a metre plus off the ground so will need to check the spacings on that one with local council

Cheers

[Dunny]

Sounds like a good excuse for a new tool;) , the Triton cordless drill has a built in guide to sort this prob out

Rgds

Thanks Ashore - any idea about the model or name?

Cheers

[Dunny]

Gday Dunny, & welcome :)

Do you have access to a drill press?

If the posts aren't already in place, you could rig up a long auxilliary table to support each post when drilling on the drill press. Sounds awkward but doable I guess if you're obsessive enough. :D

If not, you could use a well set up drill press (set so drill bit is 90 degrees to table front to back & side to side) to drill a guide hole through a block that's say 45mm thick.

You could then mark the hole locations accurately on both sides of the post, clamp the block over the top of one mark, and use it to guide the bit in a hand held electric drill. This will get your hole started, remove the guide block & drill to full depth. Do the same from the other side, if the guide block was drilled accurately the holes should meet pretty much OK in the middle of the post.

To reduce/obviate the margin for error when drilling deeply from both sides, buy a long series drill bit to get most/all of the way through the post. If going right through, clamp some scrap tight to the exit side of the post to avoid breakout.


HTH....cheers..............Sean

Gotcha - cheers Sean

[Dunny]

I went through the hoops with wire a few months back - wound up not using it BECAUSE despite the very detailed council regulations regarding to the allowable amount of sag between the wires and the details about how they measure the sag, I could not be guaranteed that even with 80mm spacing (which I was going to use) and the regulation strainer post spacings, that it would be approved. Plus is was going to cost 3 times the price of the powder coated rails I put up anyway.

If you decking is 1 metre or more above the ground, you need to be very careful with the spacing and stretch/sag issues. Ifd it is less than 1 metre, you can proceed as you wish as this is considered a safe height. At least that is the way our local regulations are framed.

As for the other stuff you mentioned, I thinkt he other guys are on the ball with that.

Good luck - wire looks fantastic!
Jeff

Thanks Jeff

I was planning to use 1.57mm gal wire with gal fence strainers (just a country weekender property so I'm not too fussed about expensive stainless fittings) which can be easily tightened with a spanner.

Will get in touch with the council

Cheers

[Dunny]

Hey guys, went through all this pretty recently. Its all in the BCA may 2006 update.


1. no climbable members (ie horizontal wires) if deck over 4m above ground.

2. No railing needed if under 1m high deck.

3. A table for stainless wires is now in the BCA. The wider the pole spacing, the higher the required tension of the wires and the closer they must be. It is measured by hanging a weight off the wire to measure the deflection. It also has the different wire thicknesses listed. The theory is that it must now resist a 125mm sphere with a certain amount of force, rather than just having a maximum 125 spacing.

4. 865mm high railing for a landing less than 500mm long

Please atatchment for details

Cheers Pulse

Thanks Pulse - I thought this was going to be a straight forward job!

[scooter]

I was planning to use 1.57mm gal wire with gal fence strainers (just a country weekender property so I'm not too fussed about expensive stainless fittings) which can be easily tightened with a spanner.



Gday Dunny, if that's the case use Gripples. can't undo them like the strainers but mucho neater. Pic below
http://images.google.com.au/images?q=tbn:PzbozHKcjTcrUM:http://versales.com/ns/specialty/gripple/image5.gif

Cheers............Sean

[scottyb]

BCA says 125 mm but I would definitely go with a vertical spacing of no more than 95 - have seen a 2 year old stuck by the ears after poking their head through a 125 mm gap. 125 is way too big for crawlers also.

[pharmaboy2]

gee, more complicated regulations to add to the existing - who'd have thought?

FWIW, we had a 3.5m deck with 125mm spacings, and a toddler. Some points to note from the real world of having lived with said toddler on deck.

1. Bare feet - good thing, standing on 2mm wire hurts the4 bottom of your feet, and no toddler ever managed to stand on the second strand of wire ever - pain takes over and they jump off.

2. Head in gap - the tension makes getting a head stuck impossible - or at least very easy fixed - think about it, if toddler can get head in there, you can surely provide more strength than toddler to widen the wires to get them out - a lesson learnt for the toddler - this is a good thing. (not like the old steel balasters where getting properly stcuk was a real problem.

3. Tension is easy to get to just about any point as long as its a steel contrcuction with solid rail holding them apart - 90/90 timber posts without rail is the install that will be difficult, as the wire will need to be connected at ends to something with less give.

4 Tension is "bad" mmm kay. There is a balance, if its very taught with almost no deflection when a 12kg child stands on it, its stable to climb (with shoes on), howver when it bends, it swings, and is difficult to climb - I'm sure we've all experienced this climbing farm fences - the loose ones are the trickiest to climb!.

If crawlers are envisaged, I'd be sliding perspex between the wires as a temporary - or ply or anything temporary - as piece of mind with bubs is important. I got sick and tired of the shreaks from old women visting our place with my son on the deck - I knew he couldnt get through or over, but the relo visiting is convinced that you are incompetent and the child is going to go over the edge at any moment - so barriers for nervous visitors and even nervous wives perhaps.

BTW, even I would have been nervous had it been a 4 m drop to concrete - but gardens break falls (at least did for me as a kid many times ;D )