Comments on: Burying the Wire

By: Mick

Mick — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 12:58:43 +0000

Hi,
We have had a system for about 5 years around our property and our Chinese shar-Pei in the last 6 months has decided it does not want to stay in the 2 acres it has to play in. We would like to turn up the boundary of wire so it would get shocked longer and maybe stay in the yard. The problem is if we do that it cant get out our door with out getting shocked. Is there anything we can put over that part of the wire to cancel out signal there or do we have to dig up and rewire that part of loop with a double wire? And if we have to do that can we just cut the wire and use a double wire and take it over to the “A” wire and splice it in there and splice in\to “B” wire that is right there? Thanks

ADMIN – Hi Mick,

There is nothing you can do to shield the wire in one section. But, as you say you can just sever the old wire, and run the twisted wire from the transmitter in the house out to where the boundary loop begins.

PS – When a dog unlearns the boundary the first culprit is usually the collar is no longer properly fitted and no longer contacts the dog’s skin so they no longer get the correction. You may want to give that a shot.

A case in point, my parents recently mentioned to me that their fence no longer worked after about 10 years and asked if I would replace it with something newer – the collars on their dogs were hanging loose like they were the doggy equivalent of Flava-Flavs. So of course the dogs were no longer getting the correction and had over the years unlearned the boundary rules. A little tightening of the collars and quick retraining lesson and the dogs were back to being happily contained.

By: Henry

Henry — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 02:39:49 +0000

I have installed about 3100 feet of insulated 14 gauge stranded copper wire around my 10 acre farm. Two road crossings in the loop are incased in half inch steel conduit. A portion of the wire loop is stapeled to the underside of a board fence (above ground across small streams). I used a tractor and a home made plow to berry most of the wire between 2 and 5 inches deep. Will this installation work with the signal generators you sell? which one(s) are best. If it will not work, how should I modify the installation?

ADMIN – Hi Henry,

Sounds fine – as long as you have a nice continuous loop the signal generator (base station) will work fine. With that large area and the deep burial – you want to use a system that can handle about double the size of your farm, so get something that would be able to do 20+ acres. Two good choices would be a PetSafe IUC-4100 or a SportDog SDF-100.

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 03:43:48 +0000

Hi-

I was wondering how close the dog gets to the boundary before the collar stops beeping? Thanks.

ADMIN – Hi Chris,

The boundary width is adjusted with a dial on the wall transmitter. You can adjust it typically between a few inches from the line up to 10 plus feet from the wire. For most systems, the first 10 to 20 percent of the boundary width is the warning zone. A good rule of thumb is to set the boundary so it is 3-5 feet feet on either side of the wire.

By: Sean

Sean — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 00:56:47 +0000

Hello again (previous question above)

Just got everything in, and am about to layout the wire, but I just got stumped by the logistics of actually weaving the wire through the chain-link. It seems like I would have to start with one end of the wire and just kind of pull it through weaving it through the fence as I go along. However after just a few dozen feet, I imagine the wire would be tough to pull and even risk damaging it by putting to much force and scratching the wire insulation against the chain-link.

Is there a better way to do this? Should I just make splices every 100 feet or so? Thanks!

ADMIN – Hi Sean,

I usually do a very loose weave, so am only weaving it through once every ten feet or so. This lets me pull the wire through pretty easily. An even easier way to do it is to just ziptie the wire to the chain link ever ten feet – that way you don’t even need to pull the wire through.

I would not splice every 100 feet. The splices tend to be the weakest point in the fence and so the fewer wire joints you have the better.

By: T nelson

T nelson — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 13:57:17 +0000

We need a system for a yard that is not circular. Primarily a long straight line to keep our dog from running in the street that borders our rural property. we don’t mind if he runs in the opposite direction as it has no streets. Is there any way to do this?

ADMIN – Hi T,

Yes, you can run a length of twisted wire out to the area you want to create your boundary. Then run a long thin loop down the length of the boundary you need. Make sure that the parallel sections are at least separated by 6 feet.

By: Sean

Sean — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 06:43:07 +0000

Hello, thanks for the informative site and advice. I just ordered the Petsafe stubborn kit and extra collar. I am going to need more than the included 500 ft of wire included with the kit. What are your thoughts on just getting some solid core copper wire from the home improvement shops? Would getting a thicker gauge lessen the likelihood of breaks?

The entire property is currently enclosed in chain-link, but the dogs have recently figured out they can dig under certain spots to chase the neighborhood cats. I was hoping to run the wire along the base of the existing chain-link, but there are a lot of weeds that grow along some parts of it. I don’t suppose the wire would take well to being clipped by a weed-whacker. Do you have any suggestions? I’m thinking I could either run it at the top of the fence, or maybe even just a foot above the ground.

ADMIN – Hi Sean,

You can definitely use wire from a hardware store. (You can also pick up some additional marking flags and waterproof splices while you are there) You want to try and match the wire, so that it is a consistent gauge all the way around. When you mix gauges, the signal strength varies – thicker wire will have a wider boundary width than sections with a thinner gauge. You also want a wire that says that it is “direct burial” rated – the coating on this wire will protect it better from your soil (you don’t want to use regular house wiring, it will corrode). Thicker gauges aren’t particularly helpful – the kind of thing like a weed whacker that cuts wire will just as easily slice through thick wire as thin.

I would definitely run the wire above the spots where you use the edger. Usually a foot above the ground level is fine.

By: Kalee

Kalee — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 01:05:05 +0000

I only want to lay wire around my fence to keep my dog from digging out. The innotek system I bought says I need to create a double loop with 6 ft between, but my property line backs up on an alley that is concrete. Can I just put twisted wire along the back of the house to make the loop?

ADMIN – Hi Kalee,

Twisted wire cannot be used as part of the main boundary loop. The main loop is a single wire. Twisted wire is two wires. Thus you cannot splice 1 wire into 2 wires. Doing so only completes the boundary loop. Twisted wire can only be used to connect the boundary loop to the transmitter or connect one boundary loop to a second boundary loop.

To solve your problem, you can also run the boundary wire in the gutters so that your dog can safely walk underneath. If you have at least a 6 foot fence, you can also run your loop along the top of the fence and double back along the ground and that would give you the 6 feet of separation you need. We have several layout solutions on our site here: http://www.dogfencediy.com/installation/plan/

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 13 May 2010 00:07:59 +0000

I only need to lay wire on the front part of my property where my house will be in the middle of the wire I run. I know my run still has to be in a loop which I should be able to do by using the crawl space under the house but there are certain spots (driveway) where I know I will have to lay the cable on top of its self when I loop back to the house to complete the loop. Is this ok? I read somewhere that there needed to be a 3-5ft gap between cable runs but I wont be able to do that without putting it on my neighbors property. Thanks for all the great info on this site. -Bryan

ADMIN – Hi Bryan,

Unfortunately you cannot lay the wire back over itself, otherwise the signals from the two opposing wires will cancel each other out and you will get a dead spot! Wires need to be keep 6 feet apart form each other, so if your layout requires crossing your driveway twice, you will need to do it in two separate spots.

By: Brian

Brian — Thu, 06 May 2010 06:17:34 +0000

Hello! We are moving into a new house soon and would like to keep our dogs out of the living room. I’ve looked at the wireless indoor systems, but due to the area we want to protect, it just isn’t feasible. The line we don’t want them to cross is about 20 feet wide between the dining room and the living room. We have a basement under that area with the floor joists running in the right direction. If I put the wire for a typical outdoor fence up between the floor joists (since I can get there from the basement), will the signal be strong enough to get through the floor? There’s 3/4 inch plywood decking and 3/4″ hardwood on top of that.
Alternatively, I can put wire just under the hardwood as it is being put down this week. What do you think? Thanks, Brian

ADMIN – Hi Brian,

I would run it under the wire under joist, the signal will get through fine – if need be we can just turn up the boundary width dial a little to compensate for the layers of wood the signal needs to go through. I prefer to run the wire in the basement, rather than directly under the hardwood because it is more accessible if you ever need to make a change in layout. Congrats on getting everything finished and starting the move-in!

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sat, 01 May 2010 14:44:43 +0000

Hello,
I am planning my installation(going with the Innotek IUC-4100) and have a question in regards to laying the dog fence cable on top of/in the same trench as another low voltage lighting cable(12ga). I have a small channel/trench across my driveway, approx 20ft, that I would like to use to lay both cables in(in order to cross the driveway), then I plan on using an outdoor cement caulk to seal them both into the driveway in one place.
Will the low voltage lighting cable cancel out the dog fence cable?
I’ve read that other dog fence cables can cancel out each other if they’re too close and in parallel, but what about cable for landscape lighting. The most voltage that will be going through this should be no more than 15volts.
Thanks and I look forward to your response,
Patrick

Hi Patrick,

We rarely get interference from low voltage lighting, but what can happen if you have parallel sections of wire is that the dog fence signal gets induces in the low voltage lighting cable. Then everywhere that your low voltage lighting goes you would get the dog fence signal. The only way to know for certain is to lay out the wire, connect it up and then take the collar out and test if you are getting the dog fence signal wherever the lighting cable runs.