A treatise on Electric Fencing

[Lookin4GoodLife]

Maybe I'm blind.... but I only see the one hinge, upper left door......regardless that hinge is not touching door mesh and wood is an insulator.
Wonders if you could tie a wire to mesh on hinge side of door to a grounding rod?

That on the upper left is the hook. There's a strap hinge up at the top right and one almost at the bottom right that's hard to see in the picture. I bet you're right in that all that 2x4 fencing there is insulated just being stapled to the door. Maybe I could put a piece of hardware cloth across there at the top of the door and run a wire down to a grounding rod that's out of the way. This is the first electric fence I've ever put in, so I probably need to rethink the whole thing. Howard E, all this info is appreciated and I'll do some more testing in various places with my tester and go back through all this when I re-design. I was basically concerned about my neighbor's cats and figured once they got popped once, they'd never bother the chickens again and I could just turn the thing off after a while seeing as how I live in the city. That was before I found out that a whole family of raccoons was eating my neighbor's cat food every night and just living high on the hog!

 

[Howard E]

Having seen your setup, have you considered simply putting a roof on this run? It would keep predators out, plus offer shade and protection from the rain. Might be simpler and safer in the long run.

Then re-purpose the fencer to make a larger perimeter for them to roam about outside the run?

 

[Lookin4GoodLife]

There is a corrugated metal roof on it. There is a gap up there where those 2x4's are that I did not fence when we put the roof on there. You're probably right that that would be the easiest fix. I originally only had chicken wire over the top laced together where it met, but realized if one of the cats got up there, they'd probably be able to fall through. That's when the hot wire came in. Yeah, this is my first time.

Edit: AND I don't want to mess up a good thread on electric fencing with my ignorance of coop and run building.

 

[Shezadandy]

There is a corrugated metal roof on it. There is a gap up there where those 2x4's are that I did not fence when we put the roof on there. You're probably right that that would be the easiest fix. I originally only had chicken wire over the top laced together where it met, but realized if one of the cats got up there, they'd probably be able to fall through. That's when the hot wire came in. Yeah, this is my first time.

Edit: AND I don't want to mess up a good thread on electric fencing with my ignorance of coop and run building.

For any gap up by the roof, how about building hardware cloth rectangle frames instead of chicken wire? Pictured below is an example on a small scale (interior window guard). Either 1/4" hardware cloth or 1/2" -- it usually comes in 2ft, 3ft, and 4ft wide rolls in varying lengths. Around here the farm supply stores sell it at a much better price than the big box hardware stores. Electric can be run across it by getting the insulators that either screw in, or the wood post insulators.

 

[Howard E]

I'm from the school that says the only dumb question is the one you didn't ask. Almost every question and example is a learning opportunity for the person asking, plus the legions of those reading, who might have the same type setup, or was thinking of something similar and can then continue or modify as needed to make it better.

The part about having run wire fastened to wood or wire on a wooden gate is a good example. Wood is not a good conductor of electricity, so wire that is nailed to wood may not be grounded as well as you would like it to be. Perhaps only a tickle is felt even from a powerful fencer? So ground it or even add a steel post in the mix to help ground it to make it all it can be.

BTW, adding a steel post now and then to any WIRE fence built using wooden fence posts is a good idea and part of a well designed, well built fence. The steel post acts as a ground rod to bleed off dangerous lightening strikes that might hit the wire fence and zip up and down it trying to find it's way to ground. Better it go to ground through a fence post rather than your prize bull, horse........or you.

This is why I felt comfortable connecting the ground lead or negative wire from my fencer to the woven wire fence behind it. That fence is connected to at least 8 or 9 steel posts, so is very well grounded.......more than enough to make my fencer work properly.

 

[Howard E]

Got another test of my garden fence yesterday. This one in daylight, so I know what happened. I noticed a large stray dog approaching my garden from the west........odd, since dogs are not usually attracted to gardens. But the chicken house and chicken yard, and 15 pullets within were on the other side of the garden, My guess is the dog was headed in their direction to check things out, but had to traverse the hot garden wire fence to get to them.

I didn't actually see what happened, as the dog disappeared from view behind a row of tomatoes. I had just moved to a different window to get a better view and got there just in time to catch a glimpse of the dog running back in the direction it came from.....with tail firmly tucked between it's legs. My guess is it got a full dose of hurt from the silent sentinel and wanted to more. That type of response is what you hope for.

BTW, this was in the middle of the day. Lady I'm married to doesn't think a hot fence is needed in the middle of the day. She might be right if this were only a garden, but it's doing double duty as a perimeter for the birds. So I beg to differ.

 

[oakhollow]

On the GFI (ground fault interrupt outlet), I found a number of references to it as a recurring issue by users with GFI outlets and AC chargers and actually called Parmak and asked them about it and they confirmed it could. I guess that is "could" and not "would"? If you setup is not tripping it, that would be ideal.

One other issue on AC fencers is the need for lightening protection. Was reminded of this last week when my aunt and uncle's home caught on fire after a lightening strike. And it didn't even hit their home. It hit the power line leading up to it somewhere and the surge jumped ship and caught a bedroom on fire where the service panel was. Interesting that there are at least 6 or 7 homes within a mile of that home and of those, at least 4 had lightening damage to electric devices from the same storm event. The surge in the line hit them all. Apparently AC chargers are sensitive to this, so if you have one, you need to put a lighting arrestor between it and the plugin......that is as per the folks that make these chargers. Some will go so far as to say the warranty on the fencer is voided if you don't.

I would suspect that gfi trip and ac charger more coincidental than cause and effect, generally if you are using a gfi, it is a wet area, and maybe rain is a factor.

Yes, power surges DO affect ac chargers, sometimes just blowing a fuse, sometimes sending off to Parmak for repair. I don't think I can manage a surge protector in my current setup, though it might not be too cost effective anyway, they are only good for 1 surge, repair at parmak is about $50. I keep a backup charger.

 

[Lookin4GoodLife]

Maybe a "brand name" power strip such as a Tripp Lite or other..... Most of the brand names have an insurance value associated with them that they'll pay for anything attached to it in case of a lightning strike. I've never had that problem and had to call one in, but maybe it'd be worth a shot.....

https://www.amazon.com/Tripp-Lite-Protector-INSURANCE-TLP606/dp/B0000AI0N1

Duh..... sorry, I re-read your post and saw surge protector..... This strip is only ten bucks but you'd have to keep it out of the rain. I dunno....

 

[Lookin4GoodLife]

Finally got around to testing my "weak spot" in my run. Everywhere I touched the ground probe on metal, I was getting a good "pop" on the meter. All my 2x4 fencing and all my hardware cloth is going to ground. When I touch anywhere on the wood, I get a little blip on the meter, but as expected, nothing much. Any raccoon crawling up the gate of my run and touching the hot wire above the gate is probably going to get knocked off the gate unless he's one mean s.o.b. And I think that's what happened. I haven't seen the coon around since the morning my hens didn't want to come out of their house. I did see a track in a sand pile I've got a ways off from the coop that looked like a coon yesterday, but I haven't seen him over at my neighbor's eating cat food in quite a while. I haven't gotten any more hits on my trap either, so I think he's giving my chicken house a wide berth after getting a good jolt.

 

[drumstick diva]

Great reading here - glad you have put it out for folks who don't know the in & outs of electric fencing.