# Cheap Cemetery Fence



## heresjohnny (Feb 15, 2006)

I have been wanting to build a cheap cemetery fence for quit a while, and I finally got around to it. The idea was to build an 8 foot section from a 2x4. The picture below shows a single 2x4 ripped into top and bottom rails, and 4 8' pickets to cut the final pickets from.










I chose to make 3', 3'4", 3'8" and 4' pickets. I build 5 8' sections, and 2 4' section using 6 2x4's.










Then I cast finials and post caps, since 41 finials would cost a lot to buy. I used 1:1 mix of silicon caulk and cornstarch to build molds for some small skull heads, and larger ghoul head I had picked up over the years. Since I had so many to make, I cast the skull heads in plaster. When they were set, I drilled 3/8" hole in the bottom of each, and glued in a 2" piece of 3/8" dowel. Then I dipped the whole thing in polyurethane, then painted flat black finished with a dry brushing of metallic copper acrylics. The post toppers were cast in paper mache paste, and finished the same as the skulls. The fence posts are built from 1 1/4" PVC. 3/8" dowels glued into the end of the rails are inserted into holes in the PVC posts. Some pictures of the finished fence sections are below.


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## Rahnefan (May 1, 2009)

Those are beautiful. Post pics when you put the fence up please.


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## Abunai (Oct 28, 2007)

Love the finials.


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

The little skulls look great. Painted nicely, too.


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## [email protected] (Aug 25, 2012)

Wow, great job. I keep my expectations low when people start describing how cheap a particular prop is. In this case, there's nothing cheap looking about it. I've never made anything from a mold so I'd be curious to hear more about how you made those great finials.


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## heresjohnny (Feb 15, 2006)

Thanks!



[email protected] said:


> Wow, great job. I keep my expectations low when people start describing how cheap a particular prop is. In this case, there's nothing cheap looking about it. I've never made anything from a mold so I'd be curious to hear more about how you made those great finials.


Details on making the finales are in this thread http://www.hauntforum.com/showthread.php?t=34076&page=2

Here are some pictures of the fence, put it up today.


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## ryschwith (Oct 27, 2014)

Silly tool-noob question: how did you cut the square holes in the rails?


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## Headless (Sep 4, 2011)

Love!


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## The_Caretaker (Mar 6, 2007)

They way I did it was to cut notches in the board using a dado blade then nailed on a piece of lumber. You can see my cemetery build in my flickr account


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## Grimm Pickins (Nov 4, 2013)

Very very cool!


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## heresjohnny (Feb 15, 2006)

ryschwith said:


> Silly tool-noob question: how did you cut the square holes in the rails?


First I drilled holes using a drill bit a little bigger than width of the square pickets. Then I used a jig saw to cut the corners out, I.e. to turn the round holes into square holes. I kept a picket handy to check the holes as I cut them. Not very precise, but good enough for Halloween cemetary fence. And it did not take that long.


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## ryschwith (Oct 27, 2014)

heresjohnny said:


> First I drilled holes using a drill bit a little bigger than width of the square pickets. Then I used a jig saw to cut the corners out, I.e. to turn the round holes into square holes. I kept a picket handy to check the holes as I cut them. Not very precise, but good enough for Halloween cemetary fence. And it did not take that long.


Ah, that makes a lot of sense, thanks. Hoping to start building these in January (too much going on with the holidays right now).


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## heresjohnny (Feb 15, 2006)

I am building additional fence this year, its worth noting the molds for the skull head finales still work great a year later.


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## hfed (Oct 13, 2015)

wow, really cool! I need to up my fence game after seeing these!


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## Iniquity (Oct 13, 2015)

Your post just inspired me. Thanks!


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