I can't write without telling a story so here's a story.

Several years ago I had a friend who was a rescuer for wild animals.  Like us she'd bought more crates of different sizes to handle everything from 'coons to squirrels to small deer.  In between being roughed up in the back of the truck and animals who weren't enthused about being in a cage the crates didn't last long so she went to a local fellow ( a handy man par excellance!) who looked at it and said "I can do better!"

His solution was to take solid metal fencing and join it together with something called a hog ring.  In the long run, I don't know how many cages he made but when one started coming apart it was simple to just clip on a new hog ring and truck on.  

So, just for the thought, here's a kit (you need special pliars) and here's what a hog ring looks like.  Would these work for you all for fixing a 'busted' crate?

And TSC has them or those who have a TSC handy.

Hmmm...holds promise...wheels turning...

What sort of solid metal fencing?

Argh, this is stretching back several years - a quick look around shows that it's probably one of the "Hardware cloth" family.  He had and used different gauges with different sized openings.

This set of pictures shows the type of fencing he used. (( though it might be a bit expensive to have it shipped )  This looks like it's a heavier gauge and might be strong enough for a crate. Going back to the first site this mesh in 10-14 gauge looks like it would be usable<?>

What my rescue lady friend used them for was animal transport; releasing a 'coon for example or taking a wounded animal to a vet so it wasn't critical that they stand up to long term use.  We had no problem repairing the cage after releasing an animal.

I was thinking more in terms of people who have crates that need some reinforcing.  I know that if either of my dogs wanted out of the crates I just bought, they'd have no problem, but reinforcing the edges with hog rings (finally found out what to call the blasted things) might help 'solidify' the crate and make a marginal crate usable. Plastic zip-locks are out, in my book, because they're too easily chewed and I'd be concerned with the embedded metal in twist-ties. Carabinier's, which several have said they use, seem like they'd be too loose and allow too much play in a side panel.

We wanted to build a larger container for three baby coons she was raising so we figured we'd give it a try.  The material we bought was of too light a gauge to hold up in the size we wanted 4' tall x 4' wide x 6' long - so when we started to put it together it basically just flopped all over the place.  Eventually went with something like the welded wire fencing and were able to contain the buggers!  ( Raising baby coons is a real enjoyable trip; there was one who wanted to investigate everything I had in my shirt pockets! and with 'hands' they had no problem grabbing and running with <whatever>! )  

If I didn't want a collapsible one for travel, I'd probably have bought something heavier in plastic / metal.

Lol. Not the hog ringing I was thinking of. I was thinking the heavy duty rings we would clamp in a hogs nose. Not sausage clips. I would not trust the rings used for closing sausage casing. The nose rings will absolutely hold if you can get them bent into place.

I remember when I saw them the first time that they reminded me of the nose rings we used for some of the more intractable pigs, but then when I was trying to remember what they were called all I could remember was the image not the name.  These "hog rings" they use for fencing material is quite a bit heavier than that used for sausage casing but nowhere near the size of those used for hogs - so why call them "hog rings"???

My long ago memory of the ones used for hogs is that they were something like a half dollar in size before they were "clamped"??

I looked them up on tractor supply and reinforcing the new crate is exactly why I'm looking for. Every joint, most of the welds.

Bumped one time since I'd like comments from folks who weren't around over the weekend.

Question, Al...can hog rings be removed once they're applied?

Screw driver to separate the prongs and then probably two pairs of pliers to remove them - but yes.