Boree Equine Horse Complex project by WNS Contracting in Cudal in Central West NSW.
WNS Contracting gave Australian Fencing Awards some key information on their Boree Equine Horse Complex project.
Challenges involved in the project
- CUSTOMER EXPECTATIONS – The customer is a perfectionist and this was the first time that he has ever contracted out work that he himself had the skills and ability to complete himself. This was a huge step for him and also for his trust in our abilities.
- AESTHETICS – Boree Equine is a professional Show Jumping stable. The facilities that they work out of directly affect their professional reputation. A client needs piece of mind that when they leave their horses (very expensive horses) at this establishment that they will be as safe and well cared for as they would be in their owners care. Presentation is everything. Additionally this section of fencing is between the front gate and the house/ stables; everyone who comes onto that property so you want it to be as perfect as possible. For the owner, who likes everything as perfect as possible, to drive past a fence that is not up to standard would be less than ideal.
- ACCURACY – The fencing section is 4 acres in total. It has 322 posts directly driven into the ground and 266 rails welded on. The whole fence is within 2mm accuracy. To achieve this was very difficult. We directly drove the posts into the ground with our post thumper; what made this method more difficult was that unlike concreting the post in where you can lean them 1 way or the other to get them perfectly in line, using the ‘play’ in the wet cement to get everything set just right, this had to be done while you were in the process of hammering the post into the ground. Subsurface objects, such as larger rocks etc could throw you off your line or twist the posts. However with the right equipment for the job everything ran smoothly.
- SOIL COMPACITION – The soil on site was heavy in gravel (like to the point where you could open a gravel quarry with it). The soil compaction with the gravel soil plus the fact that horses had compacted the ground further over the years had made the working environment somewhat hostile to work with.
- FLOW – The fence had to flow across the terrain, it had to follow the slop/ curve of the land all the while looking effortless. This was a key component of the aesthetics brief.
- SAFETY FOR HORSES – The horses that are stabled here are competition horses that are either in training or fully trained at attending high level competitions. The value of these horses is significant and injuries can affect their careers and thus their values greatly. When making an undertaking to take and train another persons horse for a fee, it is imperative that the horses you are entrusted with are kept in the safest environment possible.
- TIME – The business had its books full with horses there to be trained, so there really was not room enough to take down paddocks long before the build because those horses still had to be stabled somewhere. Time really was of the essence. The client took down the existing fences only 24-48 hours before our arrival and we negotiated a full schedule for construction so that it minimised disruption to the stabling arrangements of the horses. We constructed the fences pen by pen so to minimise the number of pens that were not able to be used at any one time. The quicker the construction time was, the smaller the impact was on the business, which obviously was very important to the client.
Products used on the project
- 65 x 65 x 4mm RHS galvanised pipe
- 115 x 2mm Cattle Rail
Outcome of the project
- The client was very happy with the end result.
- There was only 1 section that he requested a minor tweak to be made so that it followed the slope/ curve of the hill better.
- This was a tweak that his wife thought he was being too picky about, however both her husband and Will have the same appreciation for perfection in what they do and once the changes were made he noted how happy he was with how it came up and that 1 small tweak was literally the only thing that he could find on the whole fence to be improved.
This project by WNS Contracting has been nominated in the Australian FENCING Awards 2021.