Wow. I did not even know this existed! I would be concerned about bending (when it hits a rock) and fiberglass splinters becoming airborne. Bending I think you can manage if you hold it in a PVC sleeve above ground while hammering. You know, to keep it from forming a giant C shape instead of going into the dirt.

The splintering thing I am less sure about how to resolve. And I might be exaggerating the risk in my mind.

I'm going to look for this at Lowe's next time I'm there!

 

That Pink Bar stuff is way cool! And you won't get that indelible metallic rust/dirt gray smudge all over your hands when you hold it. Or move it. Or look at it.
"Fiberglass" is about as specific as "metal". There are lots of ways to combine myriad materials (both chemically and structurally) to make that generic composite. So who knows what will happen when calamity strikes.

I'm not clear on what you want to achieve. My local HD sells rebar in 1-foot increments, from one to four feet, so cutting wouldn't be an issue. What's wrong with using just one rod of your current stock?

I use a small sledge hammer for driving the rebar into the ground. (It looks like a Thor hammer (though I am not worthy).) Learned the hard way, be darn sure you're not piercing your sprinkler line in the process.

 

My current stock - the garden stakes - are hollow. So although they are plastic coated steel, they are more prone to bending than rebar. With only one in use for some of my stones, I'm fearful that with a strong enough wind, it might be subject to being bent.

The 1/2" PVC sleeves in my stones are all 25"-ish inches - allowing for 24" of rebar/stake material above grade. I made a PVC jig for pounding them in so that the spacing matches the PVC sleeves, and allows me to judge if if they pounded in enough.

I need to go to Lowes regardless, as the closer HD doesn't carry anything other than .5" rebar, which is thicker than what will work with the 1/2" PVC sleeves I went with. I'll check out my options -

 

Thanks for that link! I didn't know about it at all. I'm very interested because I can't find 6' rebar in my area (which is perfect for my outdoor figures). Just 5' and then it jumps to 10' and I don't have the tools to cut a 10'. Anyone think the pink stuff can be cut with a normal handheld circular saw?

 

One of the marketing features of the fiberglass on Lowes site is that it can be cut by a circular or chop saw. I haven't tried it personally, but that was one of the reasons I was looking into it.

 

I have replaced all of my "garden stakes" with rebar. Have already had 40 mph gusts and my tombstones did not budge. I was going to try the pink rebar, but they did not have it in stock, so I went with the traditional rebar.

 

And for those that use .38" rebar - how far do you pound into the ground?

..deep enough.

It depends on the soil/ground. We have some very clay soil that gets pretty compacted, so I hammer them down maybe 6-8" in that. If it's soft soil or not even, I'll pound them down a foot in. But just make sure they are long enough to still keep your stuff from falling over.

The fiberglass rebar would be interesting to try, but I too worry about splintering since I use my good ol' Snap On dead blow hammer to pound them down.




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Huh. I didn't know about that fiberglass rebar either. Honestly I would love a sort of 'coated' rebar that didn't rust and make a powdery residue every time we touch it! My DH (dear hubby) uses a TON of rebar for our Halloween yard display, including for our tombstones. We often cut heavier gauge wire fencing and curve it around the back of the tombstone, then sort of thread short rebar through that fencing and into the ground. Depth depends on whether we hit a tree root, LOL! For our cornstalk bundles, we use quite tall rebar and that does get pounded down probably a good ten inches, at least. Actually, I bet more than that, hmmm...

Like others have said, I'm interested in the splintering aspect when cut/pounded into the ground. If that's not an issue, this pink stuff would be an upgrade, imho!

 

I was at Home Depot tonight and wanted to pick up some rebar. All they had were 1 foot pieces for $3 something. I wound up getting two 10 foot pieces of the pink rebar for 5.77. I should know how it works by this time next week.

 

interesting. In my neck of the woods, we use 18-24" sections of 1/2" rebar which slide into 1/2 schedule 80 pvc just fine. having hit sprinkler lines / wires with longer rebar, I only try to put about 9" in the ground and 9" in the stone, the pvc inside the tombstones take care of the rest.

 

I used the pink rebar tonight. So far so good. Nice and lightweight. No splintering when hit with a hammer. Nothing bad when driven into an underground rock. I am feeling hopeful about it so far. I used it to stabilize Linus Lucy and Charlie Brown. I don’t know… Charlie Brown looks a little to relaxed in this picture.

 

I used the pink rebar tonight. So far so good. Nice and lightweight. No splintering when hit with a hammer. Nothing bad when driven into an underground rock. I am feeling hopeful about it so far. I used it to stabilize Linus Lucy and Charlie Brown. I don’t know… Charlie Brown looks a little to relaxed in this picture.

What did you cut it with?

Now having had two of my stones using 1 of my vinyl wrapped hollow steel garden stakes give at grade and fold over with some high winds.... they are now replaced with 2' 1/2" rebar, since that was my only option from my local HD. I have 10 more stones - 20 more stakes to replace, and I'd rather not spend $4-ish per 2' piece of pre-cut rebar from HD.

 

Btw my other concern about the pink rebar is its Reuseability. I don't see it standing up to multiple hammering after a couple of years.

 

I got the pink fiberglass rebar. Cuts real nice with hack saw. Im going to get the liquid plastidip and dip the ends in that. I made a short piece of 3/4 pvc with and end cap glued on to use if I need to hammer them in the ground.

 

I was eyeing that pink rebar real hard too. Would make it a lot harder to overlook a piece before cutting the grass after takedown. Too bad I've already got about 100 of the regular rusty ones in use. Might hit the ones I have with some yellow spray paint next summer to make them easier to spot.