Tuk50 you want to come over and finish putting together my cages for me? (just kidding) I had shoulder surgery in January and man it is a pain trying to twist those wires.

Ha Ha! I just finished making 16 more last week and I may need the name or your Doc..... LOL! My grandson helped me with the first few then just me and the dog... LOL.
I did invest in in one of those Harbor Freight small bolt cutters for 10bucks best investment this week....

Bolt cutters make it a lot easier. I bought my first ones about 30 yrs ago after my 1st set of cages. You CAN do it with side cutters, but it is tough.

Yeah! You are right... its like butter.. I hadn't realized how much easier till after I used them. The whole problem with shaping CRW is the thickness of the wire, but that is what makes them so good for cages.

The bend needs to be spread over a radius like a tubing bender. The pinch of just plain bending is what breaks the steel. Year after year will fatigue and break anyway. I have also used zip ties, try to find the UV protected ones.

An angle grinder with a cutting disc is quick and easy to cut the steel. Cheap at harbor freight.

what's everyone's vote on sizes for CRW cages? I'm seeing everything from 9-13 squares, including some that do 9, 10 and 11, for ease of storage.

Just wrap it around a 55 gallon drum

I've used 10, 11, 12, 14. It doesn't matter too much, some tomatoes need more space. Most of mine are 10, which gives about an 17" diameter, but lately I have made a lot more @ 12, which gives about 22" diameter. I have some smaller, made from ends or remainder of sheets, that I use for bean towers or gourds, cucumbers, whatever you need or want to keep off the ground.
Tom

I too have different sizes and tend to like the 11 or 12 squares..... on taller 5' and 6' I still make them a bit larger for stability, but the 3' and 4' ones can be narrower to crowd in smaller varieties, just don't set them without some type of anchor system. they also make good row cover domes and this year I used some to make an arbor to run gourds onto.
[IMG]http://i108.photobucket.com/albums/n39/tuk50/2011%20GARDEN%20PICTURES/may11019.jpg[/IMG]

tuk50 said: "just don't set them without some type of anchor system"

Some anchor every one. I don't anchor any, at least initially. If some get blown over then I use a 6' stake driven next to the cage opposite the direction it fell and attach it with a couple of ties. They don't go down again. I have never suffered much damage from the cages falling, usually just a couple of fruit fall off, if that. Most of the branches are inside the cage and don't get damaged.
I had another idea for securing the cages I haven't tried as yet.
[COLOR=red]I think you could use tent pegs on the bottom rungs of the cage to hold it. Think this would work?? It seems to me it would be a lot easier. Pros, cons???[/COLOR]

[COLOR=black]Tom[/COLOR]

one of the threads here brought up tent pegs, I have ordered some, waiting on them to arrive.

I haven't read anything about tent pegs before... sounds like a good idea... as long as they are long enough..
We just built a new home 2years ago and had about half a bundle of 3/8in x 20ft rebar left over so thats what I used by setting the cages then running a 20ft length through all of the row at once and bending a piece of rebar to use as staples. Wind is a problem here and beats my garden up .. we live at the base of a mountain range and the wind is always blowing.. LOL.. ALWAYS...

When I used to tie cages, I drove a 6' T-post on each end of a row and ran a taught piece of bailing wire through the row about 4' high. They might give a little in a strong wind, but they wouldn't blow over.

Not to hijack the thread. but have a question for tuk50. What is the horizontal CRW for above you plants? Would be a perfect place to grow mirliton.

Frank

Just messin around as they say! I had some odd pieces of crw left over and decided to make an arbor.... each of the 4 posts has planted beside it Luffa, Birdhouse gourd, Long handled gourd and Armenian cucumber, I thought at least something would grow over it and make a shade. I've now got a bird bath setting out there and a few more hanging baskets... we always have a party on July 4, and I try to do something different each year for that date.

Your system works good... I have used poly cord the same way before and put a turnbuckle on each row to keep the tension, but had so much rebar left over that I've started doing it at the bottom.

Is this what I am supposed to buy to make these cages?

[url]http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202024090/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&keyword=wire%20mesh%20fencing&storeId=10051[/url]

Thanks guys, I have never made them before. So, I really do not know if this is what I would use.

No that won't work inless you have very small hands and or grow very small tomatoes or both.... lol... 2 x 4 in ch square it to small. If you are buying rolls of wire get the concrete reinforcement wire. it approx. a 6 in ch square. You can doing anything you need in to do in a 6" square.
also for every 1 ft of diameter you want your cage you will need 3 ft of flat wire. so if you want a 2 ft diam.( 24") cage you'll need aprrox.6 ft of wire off the roll.

[QUOTE=raindrops27;260075]Is this what I am supposed to buy to make these cages?

[URL]http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202024090/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&keyword=wire%20mesh%20fencing&storeId=10051[/URL]

Thanks guys, I have never made them before. So, I really do not know if this is what I would use.[/QUOTE]

You should be able to find rolls of CRW in the concrete/building supplies section of HD or Lowes. My local Lowes has it on the floor, but HD has it stacked way up on a shelf where you'd have to ask someone to get it.

When handling it, make sure you have work gloves and are wearing clothes you don't mind getting covered with rust!

and the gloves aren't to keep your hands clean, the stuff is rolled up under tension, if you put your hands on it and move it and the coils shift, you can get pinched bad. Don't worry much about it being rusty, it will rust all over as soon as it's outside and wet. They do not galvanize it or anything to prevent the rust as it's intended to be embedded in concrete.

Oh, glad to know about the rust.

At break, I ran down to my local HD and found a 150ft roll of the stuff, but left it right there as it looked all nasty, old and rusted over. It looked real bad. It was $107 I assume that is a good price. Will pick it up on the weekend

So let me get this right, work gloves, a wire cutter, old dusty clothes, bandages, and a first aid kit. Wish me luck guys.:twisted:

Melissa

And an up-to-date tetanus shot!

j

Raindrops, very important - safety glasses!

Oh, a real good big heavy duty wire cutter, with a hard sharp blade and lots of leverage. I got a harbor freight set of lineman's pliers that I thought would do it, didn't work, the good ones at home depot etc probably will work better. I ended up cutting with a dremel with a cutoff wheel, but that's slow and tedious and when the wire bounces as you finish cutting it tends to shatter the cutoff wheel. If I was doing it again, I might go as far as something like [url]http://www.homedepot.com/Tools-Hardware-Hand-Tools-Cutting-Tools-Bolt-Cutters/h_d1/N-5yc1vZaqw4/R-100094248/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053[/url]

And a couple of cheap spring clamps or something to keep the roll from trying to come undone all at once, clamp them on the wire just beyond where you are cutting, then release the end(when you start there are bent over wire ends keeping it rolled.) It won't unroll completely if you just let it, but the roll will suddenly get double the diameter, and it will be more trouble getting your cut piece unwrapped from the rest of the roll. With clamps in place, only the part you are cutting unrolls, and when it's cut, you can just spread it a little to get it loose, then it's still nearly the circle you want.

With some leather work gloves, a good set of cutters, large pliers if you are using the wire bent over to hold the circle shape, something to hold the wire you aren't cutting off in it's tight rolled form, and maybe some safety glasses (mainly in case a flake of rust flies toward your eye when you cut the wire), it should be fine.

[url]http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=10839[/url] is the thread that's got pictures of the roll of wire and the process. I used the pliers to make the bend he used the nutdriver for, and in some cases to squeeze the bend closed. There's another thread around here somewhere too.

I used the $15 bolt cutters. You could go bigger for more money, and who knows when you might need to bust up a padlock?

[COLOR=Red][B]Good[/B][/COLOR] bolt cutters make the job a [COLOR=Red][B]LOT[/B][/COLOR] easier.

Thank you for the help all it is much appreciated!

Melissa

When we make the tomato cages, we make 'tines' by cutting the bottom 2 squares so the cages can be set in the ground easily - every other square.

Messy now, but we've had ours over 10 years. Good luck with them.

When we built cages, we skipped the crw and used field fence. Even the openings on the bottom are accessible, and the stuff doesnt rust. We have been using for five years and they seem good as new.