A chainwire fence, also called chain-link, chain mesh or cyclone fencing, is a woven barrier made from galvanised steel wire formed into an open diamond mesh. It is one of the most widely used fences in Australia for good reason: it is tough, quick to install, sees straight through so nothing hides behind it, and it costs less per metre than almost any permanent alternative.
The trick is that not all chainwire is the same. Two fences that look identical from the road can be built to very different specs, and the specs are what decide whether a fence shrugs off twenty years of weather or sags and rusts in five. Here is what to look at.
The four specs that matter
Material and coating
The workhorse is galvanised steel: the wire is coated in zinc, which sacrifices itself slowly to protect the steel underneath. That is what lets a chainwire fence stand outside for decades. For harsher settings you can step up to a heavier galvanised coating, add a PVC coating over the top (which also lets you pick a colour, black being the popular one), or in genuinely corrosive spots move to stainless. More coating costs more, so match it to the environment rather than paying for protection you do not need.
Gauge
Gauge is the thickness of the wire, and it works backwards: the lower the number, the thicker and stronger the wire. Heavy commercial and security mesh sits at the thick end; lighter temporary fencing sits at the thin end. Thicker wire costs more and weighs more, so the right call is the lightest gauge that still stands up to how the fence will actually be used.
Grid size
Grid size is the width of each diamond. Small apertures are hard to get fingers or cutters into, which is why high-security and industrial fencing uses them. Mid-sized mesh suits sporting grounds and recreation. Larger apertures are the cheapest and are fine for a straightforward residential or rural boundary where you just need a clear line.
Selvedge
The selvedge is how the wire is finished at the top and bottom of the fence. A single twist is a knuckle (smooth, safe to touch, good for schools and homes); a series of tight twists left as barbs is a barbed selvedge (a deterrent finish for the top of a security run). Fences are specified as knuckle-knuckle, knuckle-barb, or barb-barb depending on whether you want them friendly, secure, or both.
How the mesh is actually made
Understanding the weave helps you judge quality. Chainwire is made from single wires bent into a continuous zig-zag, each one hooking around its neighbour on one side and the next wire on the other. That interlock is what forms the diamond pattern and gives the fabric its give. The wire has to be both strong and ductile: strong enough to hold tension across a long run without breaking, ductile enough to be drawn thin and twisted into shape without cracking. Good chainwire wire has already survived enormous forming pressure by the time it reaches your boundary, which is a large part of why it holds up so well in service.
What it is good for, and its one weakness
Chainwire earns its keep almost anywhere: residential and rural boundaries, tennis courts and cricket nets, sports grounds and parks, school perimeters, animal enclosures, storage cages, construction sites, and go-kart and racing tracks. The one thing it does not give you is privacy, because you can see straight through it. Where that matters, privacy slats can be woven through the mesh. Where it does not, the transparency is an advantage: an intruder has nowhere to hide, and on a farm you can check stock and crops through the fence without walking the line.
The takeaway: when you are pricing a chainwire fence, ask about gauge, grid size, coating and selvedge, not just height and length. Those four numbers are the difference between a fence that suits the job and one that only looks like it does.