Mailbox Rehab

My Mailbox used to look like this:

Leaning Tower of Mailbox

It was sort of floppy, but Hey!  I’ve been busy!  Then I got a notice from the mail carrier that I needed to fix it.

Fix your mailbox notice

It says,
13. Your box should face the road,
14. Your box should be securely fastened to its support
15.  Your box should be made level, and the post firmly planted.

Also notice that it’s dated mid-march and today is Mid May.  That poor letter carrier has put up with it for too long.

Today the mail carrier delivered a parcel to Rehab Jr and asked him to ask me to fix the box.  His reply was “My Dad is too cheap to fix it”.  Well….. ouch.  The truth hurts.

He’s pretty much right.  I priced a replacement mailbox in Home Depot and it was about $60 – $70 bucks.  No way Jose.  I’d like to build a brick one to match the house and other mailboxes on the street  (we sort of stand out in a not-so-great way), but that’s pretty far down the rehab priority list at the moment.   Still, I had to do something.

About a month ago I tried a temporary fix and put a furring strip next to it to give it support, not too effective.  See how the mailbox post plastic is cracked at the bottom?

not too effective

That temp fix didn’t work, so it was time to do it right.  First was remove the mailbox.  The crack at the bottom was caused by a dumb little metal post.  No wonder it cracked – no all around support.  This design was destined to fail.  As my Dad used to say, ” Damn Engineers!”.

Out comes the old metal support.

no all around support

Next I grabbed a scrap 4×4 and eight $.10 lag screw with 8 $.02 cent washers.  I pre-drilled holes and then screwed the lag screws through the mailbox plastic post into the 4×4.

Support post attached

Next was dig a hole.  The leftover post-hole digger from our farm owning days made short work of the hole.  It sure is good to have the right tool for the job.

TaDa!  Total cost – $.96.  Four cents shy of a buck.  Actually all this stuff was laying around in my garage, so technically did this fix not cost anything?

job done right

I have to fix the horse trailer lights before I take it back to the farm.  Stay tuned for more rehab fun.