What Do I Need To Consider When Choosing T-Posts?

When choosing t-posts for your fencing application you need to consider animals and t-post strength.

ANIMALS AND T-POST STRENGTH

To begin, ask yourself, what animals are going to be fenced? Elk need a different fence than cattle or horses. Buffalo need a different fence than Black Angus cattle.

Once you have our animals designated, the next thing you need to consider is WHERE are those animals going to be- why does it matter where they are? Because a good fence needs to be able to bear the pressure generated on it be the livestock you are trying to protect/contain.

Here is our selection of t-posts to give you an idea of cost.

For example: If you are building a fence for loading or branding cattle- a barb wire fence isn't going to cut it. When you have that many animals in a confined space and you are pushing them in certain directions or cutting them from the heard over and over in order to vaccinate/separate them- there is going to be much, much more pressure on the fence you are running than if those animals were untouched, out on a pasture somewhere.

When the pressure on the fence is lower, you can run the traditional 4-wire set up with 1.25 t-posts because the animal is less likely to test a fence in that setting. With more pressure on the fence, you might want to consider going with panels depending on how the size of the area.

WHAT IS T-POST STRENGTH?

In the above clip, Purchasing Manager, Jesse Ova, explains t-post strength and what weight t-post would be good for running a barbed wire fence. He gives us 1.25 T-posts, which are a t-post with 1.25 pounds of steel weight per linear foot- by multiplying the entire length of the post (6') by that poundage, we arrive at 7.5 lbs- cool.

What's that knowledge good for? Bottom line it means this: the more steel you have (i.e. the heavier your post is) the more strength you will have in your post.

If you still have questions about what t-post is right for your project, come into the store or reach out to us in the comments and we will get you sorted!