Farmweld Website Updated

After many months of enquiries about the garden arches, steel wall trellises and other wrought iron work we've had for sale, and been advertising in the Australian Country Style and Gardening Australia magazines I finally managed to spend a bit of time putting together another page on our website where I could showcase a few photos of our garden products.  Most of these have already appeared here in this blog however it was high time that the website also featured these lovely pieces.

Our new page is still a work in progress with a wrought iron tree guard and a hose stopper (an ornamental wrought iron stake to stop the hose from running over or through the garden or vegie patch when you pull it around) are yet to be added. I've got a number of other ideas as well for future projects but as we're beginning to head into our busy spring/pre Christmas season I doubt the workshop will have much time to spare. 

Visit our new page through the Products page or go direct by clicking here.  Remember to revisit the Gates page as well, it's been revamped with many new photos of our heritage gates and wrought iron garden gates, as has the 'News' page which now showcases a collection of some of our custom pieces including wrought iron courtyard gates, heritage woven wire gates that would suit any Victorian garden and more wrought iron pieces.

I'd love to hear your comments and feedback.

Wrought iron pool fence

It's amazing how much gets done when the pressure's on!  The night before Andrew went in for a hip replacement our daughter announced that she wanted to get married, the bombshell dropped when we found out she was giving us only 9 months notice - they wanted an autumn wedding.  Miss Independent was only 19, so our reaction after the initial shock, was "how the heck are we paying for this?", followed by "Oh, you want it here at home ... looks like we're going to have to do a major tidy up". Now, we live on 75 acres, work from the property and have been here 6 years. The property was run down to start with and there was still alot to fix up.  But most importantly the swimming pool didn't have a child proof pool fence - or more practically from our personal perspective a barrier to stop the wildlife and curious calves testing the solar pool blanket - but that's another story. 

I've never particularly liked standard tube pool fencing, and I figured that it was my turn to have Andrew make me something really lovely from wrought iron.  I'm glad my man likes a challenge, he on the other hand was far more practical ... "you want it, you give me a drawing and I'll make it".  The challenge was on!  After a couple of knockbacks from the 'welder extraordinaire', along the line of "that won't work", or "have you any idea how much that's going to cost?", a compromise was reached. [Sidenote: it's not only our customers that have to work with mercenary husbands]. 

 The pool fence is made, each panel from solid steel and wrought iron so it's quite heavy, and it came up beautifully.  It would have been nice to have had more wrought iron in the design, but unfortunately South Australian swimming pool regulations are such that there must be a minimum 1.2m clearance from top to bottom between where a child can get a foot hold.  I think the gold caps, which incidentally started out as a joke really set it off.

On a final note, I really enjoy watching Andrew beam with pride when people admire his wrought iron pool fence.

Cast Iron McKay Sunshine Gates and Simpson Gates ... the modern alternative

The old Sunshine heritage gates of the turn of the century are fetching very high prices at clearing sales and auctions. It's amazing to see some appear on Ebay in really bad shape, only to go for ridiculous prices. Could this be due to the fact that they're becoming harder to find? I recall seeing a pair of 2.4m (8' in the old imperial measurement) gates going for in excess of $2500, some being irreparable and others needing some serious restoration work. These prices were for gates that were pick up only, which would have restricted the interest and lowered prices.

Many of the original old gates typically require a significant amount of restoration to fix badly bent and rusted out bars. I'm not sure what makes these gates so appealing, they were extremely heavy old things, made from solid steel bars and joined with cast iron joints. I suppose the castings on some of the fancier ones were quite pretty but the ones with a steel frame and twisted wire (instead of bars) may not have been the safest of gates around stock.

Left: Farmweld's New Cast Jointed Gate

We've had many enquiries about cast jointed gates over the years and have finally succumbed to the pressure!  A Victorian insurance company approached us recently to make up a set for a customer of theirs and we agreed to take on the job. The castings cost an absolute fortune, so they're not a cheap gate to replicate, however what we came up with looks just like the original.

The gate differs in that we've used modern techniques. The cast joints are from iron, and the bars are steel pipe, so not quite as heavy as the originals. Don't get me wrong, the gates are still very heavy. The only down side is that the castings, like the originals are cast and limited to specific sized gates.  We'll be adding these to our range of gates, and will soon advise as to what sizes will be available.

 

Contemporary Farm Gate

Farmers and property owners are no longer happy to limit themselves to plain old mesh farm gates and are joining their city counterparts in looking for new and innovative designs to grace the entrances of their homes.

We had one such customer contact us for a brochure and in doing the usual follow up I happened to get hold of his wife instead. She had very specific ideas about what she wanted, but no one around made anything like it. The gates in our brochure were not what she had in mind. Not to leave it there, I informed her that we custom make gates to customers designs so if she could give me a photo, drawing or even a 'doodle' (as had another customer of ours a while back), we could put together some concept sketches and a quote.  She was rapt.  A picture was faxed through and after some modifications to make it fit, their dairy is soon to take delivery of this gate:

There are five solid cast steel balls set into the intersections which really set the design off. The gate is going to NSW and ironically the Pura Milk company which is local to South Australia uses this colour in all its branding.

Custom wrought iron design, coffee table legs

A while ago I posted a photo of a custom  designed wrought iron door panel which we made for a lovely customer who was building a house at Nairne, SA. This customer was so happy with what we created for her, she asked if we could possibly design something to support a table top that she and her husband had, and wanted to make into a coffee table. Here's what we came up with:

The design brief was that it should not only structurally support a very thick and heavy slab of timber which I believe is about 6cm thick, but that it should also complement the piece of timber. I think the design of the legs will work quite well with the heavy look of the table top. Another one I can't wait to see finished.

I have suggested that a matching chandelier might be worth looking at ... nothing like value adding.

NEW - heritage style country gate design ... the Estate Gate & Chicken Coop Gate

We're pleased to announce the latest design in our gate range, the 'Estate' gate. We've had a number of customers with wider entrance ways who have liked the simplicity of the Railway gate, but also loved the older flat bar heritage style of the Eleanor - which unfortunately is not as stable in longer lengths. The double gates below have been sandblasted so that they will rust up evenly, as the customer wanted a set of old looking gates.

We've created a country gate with a stronger RHS frame, flat horizontal bars and a softly curved handle at either end. The diagonal supports are decorated with a ring in the centre. In future Eleanor gates over 12' or 3.6m will also be made with an RHS frame to give the gate more support and rigidity. Pricing of the new Estate gate will be the same as the Eleanor.

A few days ago I mentioned a chicken coop gate that we were making. Our customer wanted something a little 'different' and whimsical in design. Here's a photo of the gate ready to go to it's new home:

These are going to be very lucky chickens!

Wrought iron door panel and new gate topper ...

Our latest custom design ... a custom made wrought iron door panel was required by a client who is nearing completion of her new home. This design would also lend itself quite nicely to a decorative wall panel. We can't wait to see the photos of the completed door in situ.

One of our distributors sent us a samples of a couple of new wrought iron gate toppers. I got to doing some photography today so here's a section of one of them, as well as a section of another ornate wrought iron panel that we've used in some of our courtyard gates.  Both toppers that were sent to us are lovely and my initial reaction to the more ornate gate topper was that it would look lovely over a bed head.  More detailed info about these two items are in our wrought iron flyer. Please contact us via our website if you'd like more information.

Heritage style wrought iron entrance gate

Farmweld has been busy creating more gates, this one however is not just suitable as a country gate but would also look lovely with an older heritage home.

The 'Eleanor' is made mainly of flat steel and features wrought iron ends and a centrepiece with spear. As with the previously released 'Florence' garden gate, this gate can be left raw and allowed to rust to give it that truly aged look or be powder coated to your choice of colour. The design is to be added to the Farmweld website shortly and more information is available by contacting Farmweld direct.

The gate is so new to the range that only a drawing is available at this stage and pricing is still being costed for sizes ranging from small garden gates through to the larger entrance gates. If you'd like a gate like this to grace your home, cottage garden or country property then contact Farmweld for more information ... just follow the link to our website at http://www.farmweld.com.au/

Opening Statements!

Garden Gates ...

As our business grows and we talk to more customers, we've noticed that there's not only a demand for our entrance and paddock gates, but also garden or personal access gates. In times past many a farmer showed his appreciation to his wife by making her a lovingly made garden gate to display in her own domain. When times were tough these gardens were sometimes the main solace and distraction for these ladies and their families, being the only green patch on the whole property. Although these gates were usually simple it was not uncommon for the husbands to decorate the gates with beautiful scrollwork, making them quite a feature in these more often than not, cottage gardens. Although we've been making smaller versions of our bigger gates, we're now in possession of a scroll bender which has opened up the scope of what we can offer our clients. Here's an example of the top of a gate which we designed for one customer ... need I say that the resident welder loves his new toy!

Opening Statements!

As a relatively new small family business I thought it might be a good idea to add a blog our existing website. We started 'Farmweld' about 18 months ago and originally decided that our objectives would be to make quality products primarily for small property owners. Their needs are different to bigger farmers and their frustrations, as well as our own, with poorly made equipment made it obvious that there would be a demand for well made stock equipment - especially for handling small herds of sheep, alpacas or cattle as well as gaps in the equine aka horse industry for horse equipment like jump wings, float yard panels and well made and safe roundyards.
Having a bit of an artistic streak I found that it would also be nice to make something different to the norm. Farm gates seemed to only come in mesh or less commonly bar type gates and in many cases the quality was poor. These days gates only come in standard sizes, but lets face it how many old properties have 'standard' size gate openings? In the old days, most 'cocky's' would do their own fencing and gateways were made to accommodate the landscape and needs of the property owner. Many would also make their own gates, expecially the lovely garden gates with timber, or odd bits of wrought iron work or scroll work. Many people going through a sea change or tree change and needing to upgrade gates and fencing have found that replacing an odd sized gate is alot harder than originally thought and in some cases a good excuse for some retailers to charge ridiculous amounts to custom make a gate.

I guess that's where we saw that there was a need, a demand as such. Farm gates needn't be boring and more attractive gates needn't be unfunctional. That's where our range stemed from ... the desire to make something functional, strong and yet attractive. A farm gate that would keep in livestock and also be welcoming ... the birth of Farmweld's Heritage Style Country Gates.