The neighbor's one sentence about my fence line stuck for 5 summers

Built a cedar privacy fence back in 2019 and I was proud of those posts. My neighbor Bill watched me set them for an hour then said 'you're gonna fight the frost heave with those shallow footings.' I ignored him and sure enough by spring two posts were tilting like crooked teeth. Pulled all 12 posts last summer, dug down to 42 inches, and poured concrete collars around each one. Cost me an extra $180 in concrete but that fence has been dead straight through two hard winters now. Anyone else learned the hard way that depth beats width when it comes to post holes?

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rowan96921d agoMost Upvoted

Took me three years and a leaning mailbox post to figure out the same thing. Depth is everything, once I redid mine with big footings they've been solid as a rock through every freeze since.