hole depth for play equipment

[Stephen Gower]

Having looked round the shops and not liked what I see, I'm thinking of building my own play thing for the kids in the back garden. I've been asked for a "Pirate Ship", so it'll essentially be a raised deck in a rough boat shape, but the masts at least will need to be a couple of metres high.

How deep would the post-hole need to be for high posts like that? I suppose, that in the future, I might put some ladder up them for the kids to climb if that makes any difference.

Cheers for any sensible advice!

[The Medway Handyman]

Working from a fence post backwards; A 6' post needs to be 8' so you can have 2' in the ground, with one bag of post fix/crete.

Knowing how rough little ones can be I'd say that is an absolute bare minimum.

[Dave Liquorice]

Rule of thumb for telegraph poles was 1/3 total length in the ground. But that is to handle quite serious top loading on the pole, say half a dozen pole arms and 24 open wire pairs.

You can probably drop to 1/4 the total length in the ground for your application.