How best to support fence posts whilst keeping them tight to corners / party walls?

[G C]

I need a bit of a steer on the best way forward if anyone has any ideas. I'm planning to put a fence up in our small mid-terrace patio garden after having the area tiled on top of a new concrete slab as part of renovation works last year. I need to support fence posts whilst getting them as close to the party walls & back corners as possible, to minimise loss of space in the garden.

Seems that best practice for concreting in a 4" fence post is a 12" x 12" hole with the post in the centre (ignoring just for now the issue of potential rot with putting posts directly into concrete, etc) - however this would mean bringing the fence in quite a bit on all sides and losing a fair amount of garden space in our tiny garden - particularly at the narrow flower bed at the back, so I'm looking for another solution.

The tiled concrete slab goes right up to the party walls on left & right sides, apart from the back wall where we've left a 70cm deep soil section at the back for the fence and bamboo / flower planting. On the right side with the higher 5ft wall I'm planning to fix the fence posts directly onto the wall. On the left side with the low 2ft wall I'm looking at bolt-down brackets fixed directly through the floor tiles and into the concrete.

How tight I can get the fence to both sides though, hinges on how close into the corners I can get the back fence posts. I've dug a small trial hole in one of the back corners down to about 2ft to see what's happening with footings etc, and it seems to go down fairly straight, so in theory the posts could go quite tight into the corners?

Is it advisable to set fence support brackets into concrete for example, and is there such a thing as an offset one designed for concreting in?

Any suggestions?

TIA

 

[JohnD]

Wooden posts will of course rot, and you will curse the day you concreted them into that tight corner

However, for your situation, a good solution would be a concrete spur, fixed into the ground, and bolt the wooden post to it with stainless studding.

Although the post will be in the corner, the spur will be spaced away by around 3 or 4 inches, so will have better concrete support.

The wooden post is spaced above ground level so suffers less from damp and rot. If it eventually rots and breaks, you undo the nuts, pull out the studding, swap in a new one. You can use dark brown masonry paint on the concrete to help it blend in with the stained wood.


Or you could just use a concrete corner post.

 

[G C]

Wooden posts will of course rot, and you will curse the day you concreted them into that tight corner

However, for your situation, a good solution would be a concrete spur, fixed into the ground, and bolt the wooden post to it with stainless studding.

Although the post will be in the corner, the spur will be spaced away by around 3 or 4 inches, so will have better concrete support.

The wooden post is spaced above ground level so suffers less from damp and rot. If it eventually rots and breaks, you undo the nuts, pull out the studding, swap in a new one. You can use dark brown masonry paint on the concrete to help it blend in with the stained wood.


Or you could just use a concrete corner post.

Thanks for the suggestion, you mean something like this then, with the concrete spur set into postcrete or similar:

 

[JohnD]

That's it!

I don't use postcrete myself, but I believe it saves time. I just use a spot board and shovel.

 

[Why Not Indeed]

Am I missing something? Why wouldn't you just attach the post to the wall?

 

[G C]

Am I missing something? Why wouldn't you just attach the post to the wall?

The back wall? It's only about 2ft high (and victorian, and not especially sound) - I doubt it would support a 4" 6ft post & fence.

If you mean the side walls then that's my plan for the 5ft wall on the right hand side in the pic, but for the other side?