I'm looking at having to replace the wooden fence enclosing my backyard. It was built at the same time the house was built (back in the late eighties/early nineties). Aside from the fact that this fence was never built very well to begin with, it has rotted to the point to where I have no choice but to replace it before next winter. Wouldn't be a big deal except that I will have to install all new posts, which means the digging of new post holes in ground I painfully only know too well to be riddled with large "auger-stopping" rocks. Having used a power auger on more than one occasion to sink holes in the yard (once so as to sink concrete pier-columns for a deck; plus on three other miscellaneous 4x4 post-related occasions) I have learned that for every two holes attempted, one hole will have at least one huge rock in the way requiring excavation and removal by hand-shovel; a very labor intensive and time consuming process for just one (out of shape) person such as myself. Therefore I'm currently trying to find out if there might not be a less labor intensive process I could use in dealing with these auger-stopping rocks? A couple of ideas for example: For use with a demolition or breaker hammer (jackhammer), might there exist a chisel attachment of ultra long length (pardon my grammar) such that it could be used to reach down as much as say three feet below the ground surface in order to be able to simply break up such rocks as they are encountered while augering a hole? Or, might there be such a thing as post-hole digging equipment, which, while reasonably affordable and portable enough to rent, would be somehow capable of simply cutting through such rocks? (One can see I'm scrounging for ideas here. ) Any help/advice/info/references-to-such would be appreciated.
TIA, Ken
- FYI: The fence _posts_ themselves have to be replaced for two reasons: 1) The builders buried the posts only two feet deep into the (soft, except during summer) ground, and the result has been that the whole fence has had a problem remaining upright since before we bought the place. 2) The builders did not (or so it appears) use rot resistant -e.g. pressure-treated, etc.- posts and therefore these will only have to be replaced eventually in any event.