Does Fence Post Foam Really Work?

what's up everybody Joe Everest the fence expert coming today to talk about the expanding foam concrete you used to install fence post now it's been on the market for a while but it still hasn't quite caught on it's just a little bit too novel in today's video we're gonna look at the practical uses how it looks going in how it looks when it's set up and most importantly is it strong is it strong enough to hold up a fence long-term stay tuned as we expand on this week's frequently asked question I'm Joe Evers the fence expert my family's been perfecting their way of building fence for over 60 years three generations while there's more than one way to build a fence I'm here to share with you our way [Music] all right so for today's example we've got two fence posts commonly used when building wood fence we have a round steel fence post used for a residential chain-link and some types of wood fence but most importantly we've got a post master steel fence post it's actually my preference to use when we're building wood fence because it's specifically built for wood fences when load rated it's not gonna warp twist or rot like a wood post might I'm pretty excited to watch how the foam expands around these I'm most interested to see how it expands inside this post master steel fence post so let's look into it for the expanding foam product we're using Pro select by sicka that being said I would expect the process and the results to remain the same no matter which brand you choose the expanding foam products come in two parts a Part A and a Part B the process is you mix the two parts together roughly for about 15 seconds you would cut the corner and pour it in the hole now here's the thing is this moves really quickly you only have 15 seconds to mix it once it gets in the hole you only have ten seconds to make adjustments to the post the important part here is make sure your post is completely level and in line with where you want it before the foam goes in the hole so we're actually going to show you guys two different shots the first is the traditional post in the hole the foam goes in the foam fills the hole up the problem with that is you miss the magic that's going on below grade there's expansion there's a filling up every nook and cranny it's grabbing the post and we're gonna miss all that so the second shot is going to be in a clear bucket so we can see actually the magic that's going on below all right so we've got our post level both ways now what we're going to do is we've got Part A and Part B I'm going to roll these up to where it breaks this barrier then I've got 15 seconds to make sure these mix so I'm rolling back and forth I'm just making sure that we get a good mixture in here so one thing I notice is you can feel you can feel the heat start generating in here all right so now we're gonna go ahead and clip the corner go myself a little pour spout here we're gonna pour it in and around making sure we get all of it out of the bag thank you sure we poke around make sure there's nowhere in the bottom left that doesn't have the foam in it we're gonna check our level make sure our levels right and now we're gonna wait for the phone to expand let's see what happens [Music] all right so what we're starting to see we're starting to see a little bit of that chemical reaction we're seeing obviously a color change but we're also starting to see some expansion it's going from darker green the lighter green as it's forming that outer skin it's really building up its outer wall here and then they'll start pushing itself even further upwards it's also pushing against the outside edges of in this case the bucket but usually the wall of the hole and really forming a tight bond against that post alright so now it's really gaining momentum you know when we started it was less than half a gallon obviously and now we're all the way up to one and a half gallons and it's really not showing any signs of stopping yet [Music] still moving the ride-along just passing two and a half gallons it's really moving so it's pushing itself up it's pushing itself tight against the post tight against the outer walls it's really filling up any and all crooks and crevices it's grabbing all the surface around it man guys this is exciting to see happen that's the volume of what this is filled up is really incredible one thing you guys can't pick up on that I'm hearing is a little Creek's it grows from the bucket it's exerting so much pressure outward that it's a really putting a lot of stress on the bucket which tells me it's doing a good job of forcing itself outward and like I said working itself around roots and rock really bonding all right guys it looks like we're about done with the expansion phase you know it's almost filled up this entire 5-gallon bucket which is pretty interesting to see happen in real time now it's going to overtime it's gonna take about two hours to fully cure so while it is unexpanded it's not quite done yet it's gonna take another couple hours to really firm up and that's the lift by really nicely before we were actually to build fence on this post all right so we've got the post set the foam is done expanding and the manufacturer recommends leaving at least two hours for these foam to cure we're actually going to taking a little bit further we're going to give it a couple of days so I'll meet you in the future and we're back it's been a couple days we wanted to give these posts every chance possible to really get good and firm before we started putting Wade against him and really started test to him unfortunately they didn't even make it this far we should her this morning the posts are really wobbly what it feels like happened is the foam inside is actually constricted after it expanded we also see that in the five-gallon bucket that we showed you guys earlier the foam in that buck is also really constricted let's take a look so what's happened is the post foam itself expanded it filled the hole with in at some point the last couple days it's constricted again what you can see is this post is really wobbly there's a lot of movement there's a cavity all the way around that just isn't filled at all with anything so it's letting that foot postpone move we also see that the post itself has broken loose from the foam in the core meaning that the post foam itself didn't do a great job at expanding the hole and holding it it also didn't do a great job of adherent to the post itself I just didn't make great contact you know we can see this a lot better at the five gallon bucket there's a void all around the post hole actually it's large enough I can sink my fingers down in where the post foam had expanded and then contracted you can also see it also contracted from the post again I could stick my finger down between the post and the post foam over all this foam just didn't do a great job holding the edges of the post or holding the post itself firm you know we can see it up this other hole too that when the post foam gets started it holds that same shape all the way up the post what we can see is in this hole it started off a little bit smaller but then the post hole itself got bigger I can stick my entire hand down in the void between the edge of this hole and the foam it just didn't do a great job expanding itself after it got up out of the start of that hole we can continue to see that it is also cracking around the post it didn't make good contact at all you know again it didn't expand to fill the hole and it did make great contact with the post overall those are two of the main things I'm looking for when looking at how well this post poem is doing in the hole before we wrap up I just want to say thank you to our fence they provided both the fence posts the post foam material and also dug the holes for us for today's testing in conclusion after this test with this post foam I have to say it's not a great idea to use it on your next fence but that's not to say that after additional testing with additional manufactures of foam that answer doesn't change but as of today after this test I have to say using the expanded foam to install your next fence post isn't a great idea

Channel: Joe Everest

Views: 1,049,890

Rating: 4.8530498 out of 5

Keywords: fence post foam, post foam, does post foam work, fence post foam review, post foam review, foam post setting test, foam post test, does foam work for fence post, does post foam really work, sika post foam, fence post, joe everest, ozark fence, fence post foam reviews, post foam sika, sika post foam reviews, sika foam post mix, post setting, post fix, sika fence post mix, sika post fix, foam post setting, fence post installation, foam for fence posts, foam fence post mix

Id: RKePiUNJLhk

Length: 9min 1sec (541 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 29 2020