Diy Building a Driveway Gate

How we built our homestead gate. 

We started with a scrap piece, of what I'm guessing is hog wire. Whatever, you call it it's welded and also came almost exactly the size we needed (this was a free scrap from a friend so the size working out was a blessing) so bam, light bulb for a gate idea... I first saw the wire and thought gate, then I gave that idea to my handsome Mr. who then put together the idea of building the support to hold the wire. 

Gate supplies -

Lumber (how much and what lengths depend on the size)

Welded wire

Drill

Screws

"U" nails - these are nails/tacks shaped like a "u" used for fencing, found in the nail department

Bolts

Hinges - 2 

Caster 

Side note - we live in Texas and during this build it was a regular 95 degree summer day, hence the flip flops and no shirt. While building anything you should be properly protected. My gloves may seem like "extra" but I'm allergic to the treatment in treated wood so I couldn't have direct skin contact. 

To start things we put together a perimeter frame with support beams for the welded wire. 

With support taken care of we (my Mr.) cut the wire to fit exact. 

The height was about an 1/8 too much, but this excess gave us the opportunity to hammer the wire into the wood for an extra tight fit. 

The support beams gave a surface to nail down the wire with the u-nails.

Giving a shout out to Kobalt. We purchased their post hole digger (the most expensive one they had at lowes) and it has worked out like a dream. Normally, we are not the type to get caught up in hype over the most expensive thing but most of the Kobalt tools come with a lifetime warranty. We have had to use it before when a handle broke and we got a brand new one without our receipt! The downside is that Kobalt is sold exclusively at lowes and they have the worst customer service, almost as bad as walmart. 

Both my Mr. and I are fans of adding support 45's because they help support (duh, haha) but the look of the 45 is nice so we added one to every corner.

The hinge side got an extra board on the frame for support.

We are hoping this extra support will help it from sagging in the future. 

Rolling right along we added a caster so the hinges are not doing all the work.

 The corner was lacking in support for the caster.

Problem solved with a scrap corner piece.

We used bolts to attach the caster, it's better to spend a little more when you build it then deal with it breaking later.

Caster on, our driveway gate is complete. It swings well enough, but we ultimately decided to change out the caster (that was solid rubber) for a caster with tread. 

We didn't even plan for all the 45's to meet up the way they did, but I love it. It sort of looks like the fence support and the gate support are the same board. 

Hope you enjoyed seeing our hard work come together. Remember, sharing is caring. If you have any questions leave it as a comment. Till next time folks, keep it classy.