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How to use poles to hang your backyard string lights
A while back I made some Planter Barrel Posts for my patio string lights using 4” x 4” posts and whiskey barrels. It’s one of the most viewed posts here on our little blog.
But I didn’t like that I had excess stings lights that hung over my fire pit. I wanted to take this extra section of string lights away from the fire and stretch them back toward my house.
Thankfully, Backyard Therapies reached out asking if I’d like to try out a couple of these 9ft String Light Poles for string lights. And I said…. SURE!
They sent me a set of two poles which were very simple to assemble. Each pole has a 2 piece ground fork, 3 pole sections and 2 pole top options.
Assembly is super easy, you just screw all the pieces together. The pieces are made from galvanized powder coated steel, so they’re heavier than I expected. There are also a few rubber washers included but it turns out that these are not needed.
The instructions say to push the pole into the ground by stepping on the fork. This method worked for me, but I will say that my soil was wet and I had to jump on the forks several times to get them all the way into the ground. You may need to use a rubber mallet if your soil is hard.
Then it’s as simple as attaching your string lights to the top of the pole. One watch out here, the poles are 9 feet tall and just a couple inches in diameter. There is going to be some flex in the poles and heavier string lights may cause greater flex in the poles causing the string lights to sag.
As an alternative to stomping the pole forks into the ground, I thought it would be fun to test the poles out in a whiskey barrel like those that I used for the 4” x 4” posts. I grabbed a few rocks from my yard and used a 60lb bag of concrete for weight. I simply stood the pole in the barrel, balanced the forks on the rocks and poured in the concrete.
Then I poured in enough water to get a peanut butter-like consistency while using a level to keep the pole as plumb as possible.
I moved the barrel to my patio and attached the lights to the pole. Then I plugged them into this Outdoor WiFi smart outlet from BN Link. Now we can turn on the lights before going outside or set a timer for the lights to automatically turn on and off to a schedule.
These string light poles a terrific option to hanging your outdoor string lights. We’re happy with the easy assembly, durability and cost. The poles look nice and were an easy solution to the string light set up in our backyard. Thanks for reading, please let us know if you have any questions!
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