Content
Garden fencing perform not only in order to decorate your site. The sides prevent soil creeping and root penetration weeds... Fences are made from many available materials, and give them the shape of any geometric figure. Most often, the sides are made of boards, but the wood quickly rots in the ground. A factory-made WPC (wood-polymer composite) garden bed has a long service life and the best aesthetic appearance.
Pros and cons of using WPC for garden beds
To figure out why a WPC fence is better than a regular box for a garden bed made of a wooden board, let's consider its main advantage:
- Factory-made WPC fencing is quickly assembled like a designer. Each side is fixed with special fasteners.
- The beds made of composite will last for many years due to the resistance of the material to the development of fungus and mold. You can not be afraid for the appearance of rot or damage by harmful insects.
- At the factory, the WPC board goes through several stages of processing, which gives it an aesthetic appearance. The surface of the board has a pattern identical to natural wood. If desired, the composite can be painted in any color you like.
- If you make a WPC box yourself, you can buy it like a regular board. The wood-polymer composite comes on sale in standard lengths - 2.3 and 6 m. The thickness of the composite is 25 mm, and the width of the board is 150 mm.
- From WPC for a garden bed, a cheap and environmentally friendly fence is obtained. The smooth surface does not require sanding, as is the case with conventional wood.
- Compared to wood, the composite is more resistant to aggressive environmental influences. These fences are very easy to maintain.
The KDP also has disadvantages, of course. Be that as it may, wood is used as the basis for making the composite. If the soil is constantly oversaturated with moisture, then over time it will accumulate inside the material. This will cause mold to appear on the boards. The polymer included in the WPC is capable of degradation from prolonged exposure to UV rays.
Why the fence made of boards is less effective than WPC
No one wondered why more often than this, garden fences are made of boards? Because they are the most accessible material. Boards do not have to be bought by spending your savings on them. The remains of such building material are often lying around in the country. Perhaps the boards got free from a landfill or simply from a disassembled barn. Most often, the household summer resident will not let a new board on the fence of the garden, but will choose something from the trash. As a result, after a couple of years, the sides rot, and fertile soil flows out of the garden through the holes along with the water.
Even if the owner is generous and fenced off the garden with a new board, the box will look perfect only for the first season. In the second year, the most effective protective impregnations will not save the wood from gradual blackening. Over time, the fence will grow overgrown with fungus. And all this, from exposure to the same UV rays and dampness.
The photo shows an illustrative example of the appearance of a wooden fence that has served for two years.
Giving preference to fences for beds made of WPC, the owner of the site relieves himself of the annual painting of wooden boxes. Moreover, every 2-3 years they will have to be made new, and this is already a waste of time and own savings.
Features and popular manufacturers of WPC
The composition of the WPC is somewhat reminiscent of chipboard. It is based on waste from the wood industry. The only difference is the binder - the polymer. During the combining of sawdust with additives, a polymerization process occurs, as a result of which a thick mass with new properties is obtained. Further, using the extrusion method, a finished product - WPC is formed from the molten mass.
The filler does not necessarily consist of fine sawdust alone. Any fractions from flour to large chips are used. Sometimes there is a composite of straw or flax. Along with the polymers, the composition may contain glass or steel impurities. Color stabilizers give the finished product an aesthetic look.
The leaders in the production of WPC are the United States and China. On the construction market, you can find a product of the domestic manufacturer "Kompodek-Plus". The brands SW-Decking Ulmus and Bruggan have proven themselves well. Garden beds made of WPC holzhof from a Czech manufacturer are very popular with domestic summer residents.
In the video presented, you can get a closer look at composite fences:
Assembling a WPC fence for a garden with your own hands
The composite lends itself very well to processing, which allows you to make your own fence for a summer cottage. In addition to the KDP itself, you will need hinges. Their design consists of two dismountable elements, when connected to a traditional pivot hinge. The boards are connected with hinges, which allows you to give the box the shape of a different geometric shape. Two hinge elements are connected with stakes. With their help, the box is fixed on the ground. Stakes also help build fences from several boards in height.
The easiest way is to fold the factory-made fence. The set contains boards of certain sizes with fixed halves of the hinges. It is enough to connect them with stakes and install the finished box on the garden bed.
If a decision is made to independently make a box for a garden bed, you will need KDP boards. The hinges with pegs can be replaced with wooden posts and metal corners for fastening the corners of the box. In this case, the connections will turn out to be non-rotating, and the product can be given initially only one shape.
Consider an example of making a fence:
- The WPC board is sawn into pieces of the required length, in accordance with the size of the box of the future bed.
- Using factory hinges or homemade posts, a box is fastened from the boards. Moreover, at the corners of the product, the columns are made 200 mm higher than the board, and the inner columns are made 500 mm higher. This will allow you to build up the garden bed with several boards in a seamless way. If the board height remains unchanged, then you can limit yourself only to the installation of corner posts.
- The finished box is transferred to the garden bed. They make markings under the corner posts, move the fence to the side and dig small holes.
Now it remains to install the box in its place by immersing the corner posts in the pits and tamping them with soil. If no hinges were used for the connection, then the corners of the fence are reinforced with overhead metal corners and self-tapping screws.
Homemade WPC fence is ready. You can add soil and plant your favorite plants.
