Ornamental Steel Fence Installation: The Iron Look With More Strength Than Aluminum

Where Steel Is Worth Choosing Over Aluminum

For a pool fence or a backyard on a quiet street, aluminum does the job and costs less. Steel earns its place in harder conditions.

• Commercial and multifamily perimeters where the fence is the security line.
• Frontage along parking lots and drives where a vehicle bumper may find it.
• Taller fences, since steel holds a 6 foot or 8 foot picket rigid over a long panel.
• Wide gates, because a steel frame stays square where a long aluminum leaf may sag.
• Properties with large dogs that hit the fence hard.

Coatings Are What Keep Steel From Rusting

Steel's weakness is rust, and modern ornamental steel deals with it in layers. The tube is galvanized with zinc inside and out. Over that goes a primer or electrocoat, then a polyester powder coat baked on as the finish. As long as those layers are intact, the steel underneath stays dry.

The practical point for an owner is to look after the coating. A string trimmer wearing through the finish at the base of a post, or a deep scratch from equipment, exposes metal. Touching up a chip with matching paint takes a few minutes and prevents a rust bloom later. Fences that are field welded and painted on site, an older method, depend on that paint alone and need repainting on a regular cycle. The factory-coated panel systems we install avoid most of that upkeep.

Setting Posts and Hanging Steel Panels

Steel panels are heavy and unforgiving of sloppy layout. Post spacing has to match the panel width closely, so we measure and mark the entire line before the first hole is dug, placing full panels where they are most visible and making any cut panel land at a corner or against a structure. Utilities are located first.

Posts are set in concrete, plumbed in both directions and allowed to firm up. Panels attach to the posts with brackets, which lets each one be leveled or angled as needed. On ground that slopes, we use rackable panels whose pickets pivot at the rails so the panel follows the grade with the pickets still vertical. Steeper ground is handled by stepping the panels. Gates are hung on heavier posts with their own footings, and latch hardware is fitted last. On commercial sites the fence often ties into an automatic gate and access control, which we also install.

Replacing an Old Iron or Steel Fence

Older steel and iron fences rust from the inside and at the joints. Look at the bottom rail first: water collects there, and you will see flaking paint, swelling at the welds, and pickets that have rusted free at the base. Posts rust through at the ground line, where they sit in wet soil or cracked concrete. Once a rail has perforated, wire-brushing and paint will not bring it back.

Replacement means cutting out the old panels, removing the posts and their footings, and hauling the scrap. New posts rarely fall in the old holes, because modern panel widths differ from what was welded up decades ago. Where an old fence ran between brick columns, we measure each bay and fit new panels to the masonry. Owners replacing a rusted painted fence are usually moving to a galvanized, powder-coated system so they are not repainting again in a few years.

Ornamental Steel in Charlotte Neighborhoods and Commercial Districts

Black picket fence is a familiar sight across the Charlotte area, on front yards in older neighborhoods and around apartment communities, offices and retail centers throughout Mecklenburg County and into Gaston, Cabarrus and York. Many HOAs list black metal picket fence as an approved style, though some specify aluminum, a maximum height or a particular picket top. Get the written standard before choosing.

The climate here is humid for much of the year, which is the reason to insist on galvanized steel under the powder coat and not painted bare steel. Red clay holds moisture against the base of a post, so we finish concrete footings so that water drains away from the steel instead of pooling around it. Lots here are seldom flat, and we check the grade at the estimate to decide between racked and stepped panels.