Picket Fence: Newsletter Challenge (11/21/06)

Cut the ten 2"x2"x96" pickets to the needed 49" length. Now take these ten 49" pieces and rip each of them length wise to produce two new 1" x 2" x 49" pieces from each. Repeat for all ten giving you twenty 49" pickets. Sit back and enjoy your new fence marveling at your creative lumber cutting genius.

Make a fancy angled edge on the top of each picket. The overall toe length of each can be 49" while the heel measurement will be 47"

Or just do the same thing with one 45 degree cut centered at 4 ft.

uuh thats what i meant

Place said pickets into machine and make saw dust,add glue and squeeze into 49 inch mold under high pressure and let cure .... repeat 19 more time the glue should make up any loss in material... Or you could just be not such a cheap scape and just buy the right ones to start with !!!

If you cut the 2 X 2 at four feet at a 45 degree angle then the top should be

one inch higher making the picket 49 inches long at the tip or top.

Cal Crombie

The length of the pickets is 8 feets i.e. 8*12 = 96 feets. If the picket is to be cut into two of 49 inch each, the only way seems is to cut is in a particular angle. Starting from 48th inch from one side to 50th inch on other side, cut it diagonnally. The lenght of the pickets would be 49 inch but, the cross section need not be a square throughout!

This would give you 10 pickets 48 inches long and ten pickets 50 inches long. You have the right idea, but you should start at the 47 inch point and cut to the 49 inch point which would give you twenty pickets 49 inches long.

In an effort to keep the answer simple and the result looking good use this as a template.

or better still use the metric pickes in the first place and then the answer is

Just how a picket should look!!!

This is easily the most elegant solution. I was thinking of a similar approach by cutting a traditional peaked shape at top, bottom and center.

"Coises, foiled again!"

Masu, you crack me up.

Here I was this morning trying to come up with a way to get my linear >---->>----> solution out of AutoCAD and into my post, and you went and got even fancier before I could finish. Just thought I'd go ahead now that I'm heading home and let you know.

Happy Thanksgiving, ya'll :)

Your template is an enlightened piece of creative problem solving. I'm only sorry that you don't give credit (paranthetic notation) to the author of your signature.

Bad Form Old Man.

In the middle at 45deg!

Rip the pickets to 2" x 1" simple.

Brad..

ECO the drawing! We do it all the time. Ha Ha

Dave

The answer is obvious - reanimation. You need to grow the pickets an extra 2". With some really good fertilizer and regular watering, you should be ready in a few months.

Set the final height tolerance to +/- 3". Cut each of the original pickets in half.

If you keep the actual lengths in a close enough range, you'll even get a six sigma result.

Follow-up question: how close do the actual lengths need to be to get a six sigma result?

OK, I'll bite. Since the spec is 49" +/- 3" and we are making the pickets 48" long, we'll focus on the LSL, 46". The difference between our mean and the LSL is 2". To meet the goal of six-sigma (+/- 6 standard deviations) our process standard deviation needs to be one sixth of the 2" difference, or 1/3". Using a stop block should make this easy to accomplish.

masu, you have way too much time on your hands!

If you cut a 2" x 2" picket in half at a 45 degree angle so the cut line bisects the centerpoint of the 8 ft. length, the resulting 2 pieces will each be about 49" from tip of angle to the flat cut at the opposite end.

Cutting them at a 45 degree angle is the simplest answer, but in practical terms that leaves a 'feather edge' which tends to splinter.

It would be better, actually, to cut them at an angle slightly greater than 45 degrees. This will make the pickets a bit longer than 49 inches. Then set a stop on your saw at 49 inches and cut them all a second time, trimming them to the proper length. This will leave a small flat top that won't splinter.

I think ripping the pickets to 1" thick seems the best solution. Seriously, who has a 2" thick wooden fence anyway? Of course, when reality sets in, how often when you rip something does it actually come out perfectly straight? Unless you have some professional woodworking tools (and all your fingers) ripping 49" of wood in half may seem daunting. Since I am the one building the fence (as stated in the question, so there can be no wrong answer as to how I would do it) the angled cut(s) between each picket in a 8' board method would be easy to accomplish with just a hand or circular saw, and would be decorative. And if you screw up those cuts a little, some sandpaper fixes it easy. And you wouldn't waste any wood, despite its thickness being overkill.

Cut the 2x2's in half, lengthwise, to produce 20 1x2x96". Cut the 20 pieces to the length of 49" each.

What everyone seems to be forgetting is a normal fence picket is only 3/4" in thickness. Although the 45 deg angle is the correct solution for getting the right length. To get the proper thickness for a picket you would have to rip the length at the center perpendicular to the longest side. Otherwise your going to have a funny looking picket fence that is 2" thick. The bonus of this is that you will get double the amount needed for the project which will allow you to buy half the material suggested in the challenge thus saving some coin. Either way acounting for the gap necessary for expansion from moisture you not going to get a very long piece of fence. 20 pickets at 2" each with a 1/8" expansion gap will only yeild a 7' fence. Double that if you rip the pickets down to the correct thickness. Either way you will need more materials for the posts and cross ties.

Spacing on a typical suburban "white picket fence" is much wider, maybe about 12"-14" on center. Many subdivisions have covenants requiring that no more than 50% of the area of the fence can be opaque.

OOPS My bad. I was think Privacy while talking about picket. Also In reality three 45 deg cuts would be involved one at each end and one in the middle then split longitudinally for a total of 40 pickets. I believe is possible.

Oh and Thanks for the Correction.:)

Instead of cutting through the center of each piece and ending up with a length of 48" you can cut them in the center but at a 45 degree angle to the length. this gives you exactly 49" having taken an inch from each half to get the required length.

What about the nails? Will we be using galvanized, ring shank, or those twisted ones that "screw" in when you hit them with a hammer. I think the best bet would be to use screws anyway. A nice finish screw would not leave too large a hole, and as long as your pilot hole is not too large, the screw would hold great!

Cut the pickets each to length of 49." Then resaw each of the 10 pickets longitudinally to produce 2 pickets 1" x 2" x 49."

I am new to the discussion group. When I added my comment I had not read the other bloggers comments because I was trying not to be influenced by their answers. I was somewhat annoyed to find some very juvenile "answers" to the problem. Is this a waste of my time or should some of you go to a "less mature" site to blog?

Only you can decide whether this is a waste of time. Typically the problems have a fairly obvious solution, and many posters like to propose less obvious answers. The objective is to "tickle the brain." The question of whether other posters should leave is not really under your control, is it?

Some responses are witty, some less so. This batch doesn't look particularly juvenile to me, so if you have a specific example, we could discuss it. Welcome to the internet.

I never claimed to have control of the content. Perhaps your comments were some of those I criticized. I would simply rather see a higher standard than wade through the worthless fonder. Thanks

Rip the 2X2s into 1X2s and cut to the desired length.

You cut them in half on an angle of 45 degrees.

I actually did something very close to this. We had a dalmation puppy that was very destructive, so I decided to fence in the Christmas tree so the dog would not destroy it. I ripped 2x4's edgewise to 1/2" thick lathing. I angle cut the slats. I then mounted the pickets alternating the angles, so that two pickets would appear to the eye as a single peaked picket -- with a slot down the middle. Painted white, it was pleasantly attractive. I thought this was an original idea, but since have noticed numerous fences with this arrangement.

By the way, the dalmation and I never got along very well. It was an obstinate, glutinous, hard to train dog. I came across an article that listed dog breeds by their difficulty to train. Dalmations were 3rd from the worse. And the plot for that Disney film, 101 Dalmations, the dogs have short coarse hair than no one would find appealing in a fur coat. Dalmations were bred essentually to be a guard dog (used for coaches), and although cute in appearance, have powerful jaws which can do some damage as our other dog found out (a larger Old English Sheep Dog, a breed that is protective, tractable and a great family pet, except for all that fur - the underfur which is close to mohair in texture and which would make a great coat).

You never specified the finish width dimension, so I would rip the 2" width to

prouduce 20 1" x 2" x 8' boards. Then I would saw each to 49" long.

Set the picket on it's side. On the side facing up, measure 4', 1" on one side of the picket and 3", 11" on the other side of the picket. Draw a line from the first point to the second point. Cut the wood on the line.

1) Cut them all in half at 90 deg.

2) Revise the blueprints so you only need 48" pickets.

OR

1) Cut them all in half at 90 deg.

2) Mount them all 1" off the ground, which you should do anyway.

OR

1) Revise the blueprints so you only need 96" pickets.

-----

I reprogrammed the simulation so it was possible to rescue the ship.

- James T. Kirk on the Kobayashi Maru test

45 Deg Cut in center works just fine! Peace Everyone. Have a Happy Thanksgiving if you want to!

We really need to think about moving out of the townhouse with the postage stamp yard, and into a new house where we can build a real picket fence that's more than 5 feet long. You finish this fence and you still have to figure out what to do with the rest of the day.......maybe we should stay in the townhouse. Then I could take a nap after all that hard work.

Cut the 10 2" x 2" pickets in half width wise to make 20 1" x 2" (no kerf) pickets, then cut to length (49")

Thanks,

Don Avery

ESP Missouri inc.

An 8' length of 2"x2" timber is not a fence picket. Fence pickets, generally 3/4" thick, are cheap and time off work is precious. Go and buy the pickets you need. You can probably even get them pre-primed to save time painting.

Don't spend all weekend sawing timber.

Use the 2"x2" timber for something else.

Clearly to make 10 into 20 equal lengths you simply cut the 8ft pickets into 4ft ones. BUT, that means that each would be 4ft long, 48 inches, not 49 inches.

That is unless you cut at an angle of 45 degrees rather than 90 (straight cut across picket). This way the longer edge will be 49 inches and the shorter 47. The average length will still be 48 inches though and both halves will be identical.

Greetings Bretheren.

While reading the multitude of answers submitted to this brain strainer I was left with a strong suspicion that many of you are not really taking this problem seriously enough.

Perhaps some of you may be too close to the trees to see the forest. I would like to sugest therefore that a little more inginuity is in order here. This is a chance to move outside the square, to experiment with exotic flights of fancy, to find new meaning to our otherwise humdrum existence. So lets move on past the very obvious ripping and angle cutting and on to more exciting and interesting methods of overcoming the picket problem.

I propose that we take our 10 of 2" x 2" pickets to our nearest timbermill and exchange them for the equivilent weight of good quality kiln dried sawdust which we will transport back to our abode, observing due care and safety considerations at all times. Whereupon we will measure out our previously calculated amounts of sawdust mixed with the opimum amount of a suitable adhesive, such as a two part epoxy resin, placed into our previously fabricated steel mould, not forgetting the necessary release agent, and in the fullness of time the newly fabricated waterproof high tensile pickets are ready to be installed.

What could be simpler ? Wasnt that more fun than all that other old fashioned stuff ?

Stealing my Idea refer to number 4 which I wrote !!!

You first cut all 2X2 length wise making 20 1X2X8' pickets. Then cut your 49" long from the length making 20 1X2X49" pickets.

Cut each picket in the middle at the appropriate angle to acheive 20 pickets 49'' long.

I, for one, prefer the deeper "klunk klunk klunk" sound generated when running with a stick along a fence with two-inch-thick pickets. It's so much more satisfying than the puny "fwap fwap fwap" that comes from pickets made out of one-by stock.

But I also despise pickets with pointy ends. Pickets with square cross sections deserve square cut ends. Period.

To best achieve those ideals with the material at hand, I would rip cut each eight-footer from corner to opposite corner. (In order to do so, my table saw's fence would be set about 1.2 degrees out of parallel with the blade.) Then I would shift the pieces two inches and glue them back together to achieve ten 2" x 1.958" x 98" boards. Cross-cutting each of those to half their length would yield the required number of 49" pickets, but each would have an end that flares out. After setting the rip fence back to parallel and 1.958" from the blade, I would then trim the flare and rip cut each piece again on its adjacent face.

Voila! Plenty of perfectly square pickets -- without those unsightly tapered ends.

45 degree cuts will solve the problem and give several options for decorative patterns on the top of the fence.

When are you guys going to catch up with the rest of the world and go metric?

Neil Allan
Australian Hi-Light Tours

The answer is totally flawed if you cut at 45 degrees you end up with 48.08

He really did not pass his trigonomemtry did he ?

Using his method would result in the following

A 2" by 2" post measures 2.828" cut at 45 degree one corner to the (diagonaly opposite) and the length is 48 " using pythagous theorem yeilds 2.828" squared + 48" squared = 8+ 2304 take that result and square root and you get 48.08 "

What a loser he is !!! Hope he do not use his math skills on any building I visit !!

For the question writter go back to your basics. Might help if you really tried your ideas out before giving wrong answers !

I think you failed both trigonometry and carpentry. Check the diagram below out.

As you can see a 45º cut produces a 2" increase in length not 2.08"

You are trying to calculate the diagonal length of the post and even that calculation is incorrect. The diagonal cut, diagonal length, long side dosn't even form a triangle let alone a right angle triangle so Pythagoras's thorium doesn't apply. The correct answer to the diagonal length is 48.0416" not 48.08".

You wouldn't nail the post up with its diagonal vertical you would nail it up with its edges vertical, or would you? Anyway you should be using my metric template in post #8.

"I think you failed both trigonometry and carpentry."

Not to mention English.

But thanks for playing, "Guest"! It's always fun to see flamers get flamed in return.

(Why don't "guests" get called "anonymous coward" anymore?)

Simply rip the pickets length wise to 1" x 2" x 8'. Cross-cut the now 20 pickets to the required 49".

drawn to scale

I think that you would have to make 2 cuts per wicket, one cut vertically and then one horizontally, leaving excess which would make each piece 1" x 2" x 49".

Get out your handy dandy Lincoln or Miller SMAW machine and go to the lumber yard and get some handy dandy wooden welding rod and crank the current all the way up. Then simply weld the pieces together end to end and plasma cut to required length. HA hA !!!

1) Go buy a good table saw.

2) Rip each of the 10 pickets into 1" wide pickets - now have 20 pickets, 1" wide and 8 feet long.

3) Cut the 20 pickets to 49" in length.

4) Take the remaining 20 pieces left, hand them out to every engineer you can find, then use them to beat the heck out of their managers until they learn to ask questions of those who have experience before they make stupid changes.

I, for one, prefer the deeper "klunk" sound generated when beating the heck out of a manager with a two-inch-thick picket. It's so much more satisfying than the puny "fwap" that comes from a picket made out of one-by stock, and much less likely to become a "crack" as it splinters upon impact.

Therefor, I suggest cross cutting the eight footers to 49 inches first, and then rip cutting them to one inch thick. With the requirements of the fence thusly met, the remaining ten 47-inch-long two-by-twos can be used for batting (battering?) practice. The quantity would admittedly suffer, but the quality would be significantly higher.

Depending on how much time was available for the non-fence aspect of the project, one could also remove some material from the grip section of each bat (slabs and chamfers, perhaps) and glue the off-cuts to the business (admin?) end. User comfort and swing-weight inertia could be significantly improved. With some judicious lathe turning to relieve the stress risers at the grip area boundary, durability could also be significantly improved. Pointy-haired bosses, look out!

Cut the pickets lenght to 49". Cut each 49" picket down the middle lenght wise and you will double your number of pickets. They will be slightily under an inch thick. This will be dependent on the witdth of the saw blade used.