Tractor "Play Day"

[TalonDancer]

To celebrate our GL3240's first 150 hours we arranged a "tractor play day"

Our GL3240 had already excavated some 128 tons of limestone blocks, boulders, gravel and soil, before it hit 'the wall' -- another 40 tons of limestone & indurated caliche which mother nature had not been thoughtful enough to pre-crack for us

So we brought in a big brother -- a Case 580 Super L with a honkin' big back-hoe rock ram -- to create a few cracks

Talon Dancer

 

[Texas Dodge]

That looks like work

 

[texasjohn]

You must be selling the stuff by the pound... otherwise you wouldn't be weighing it so carefully! Looks like a good play day was had by all

 

[TalonDancer]

You must be selling the stuff by the pound... otherwise you wouldn't be weighing it so carefully! Looks like a good play day was had by all

Well in a sense I am "selling the stuff by the pound" -- but to myself !

A large part of the justification for the L3240 was to be able to prep the building sites for the rain water tanks, garage and the house. The material we've excavated so far is worth real money. For example, the large landscape rock goes for around $150/ton around here. So the 20ish tons we excavated would have cost us around $3,000. But we're like the Indians with a bison -- we intend to use the whole thing

The 168 tons of raw material included:
*100 SqYds of native grasses (lifted as sod with the FEL)
*30+ CuYds of Top Soil (used to make drainage berms and planted with sod above)
*20+ CuYds of Gravel (used to fill deep ruts and level the construction driveway )
*20ish tons of large (1/2-3/4 ton) limestone landscape rocks
*10ish tons of smaller (<1/2 ton) limestone landscape rocks
*20ish tons of squarish limestone "blocks" suitable for dry stack walls
the remainder is caliche in various forms ranging from
*tough blocky chunks of various sizes (many don't fit in the FEL bucket) down to
*soft granular "soil" like fines used in road base.

The CFO likes hearing that there's a good junk of the cost of the L3240 in that raw material list

Of course we could have hired the Case with the hoe-ram from the get go and still had all that material --- in a couple of huge piles What _owning_ the L3240 gave us was the key tool we needed to take our time and process 3/4 of that material as we excavated it.

BTW that Case w/ a hoe-ram turned the last 1/4 (40ish tons) into rubble in around 4 hours for $400. I spent those 4 hours fishing the bigger stuff out of the rubble pile. But it'll still take me most of next week to proccess the rest of his mess

Talon Dancer

 

[texasjohn]

Great reuse of materials and use of tractor!

 

[Double Orange]

But we're like the Indians with a bison -- we intend to use the whole thing



Talon Dancer

Talon, there's an old saying...I don't remember it exactly but it goes something like this

If God Gives You Lemons!
Then Buy Tequila!

Glad to see you reusing what nature provided!

 

[crazyal]

Have I told you lately I hate you and your rocks, lol? Here's how we break up rocks (granite) here in VT.

 

[TalonDancer]

Have I told you lately I hate you and your rocks, lol? Here's how we break up rocks (granite) here in VT.

You say the nicest things

The CFO won't let me play with dynamite -- until she increases the insurance coverage

BTW the mass balance doesn't seem right. Is some of that "rock" in another county now?

Talon Dancer

 

[crazyal]

I built far enough away from any other houses so they didn't need to use blasting mats. They didn't let me play with anything that went boom but I got to watch. I was surprized by how quiet it was, just a dull thud and and the ground vibrated. At first I thought I would find a couple of cracks and not mch else. When we went back up to the house site I saw that pile of rocks, it may not look it but it's about 20 feet in diamter and 6 to 8 feet high. I did find some 100 lbs rocks that sailed a 100 yards or more. I was very impressed. Still at the end of the day all I had was a bunch of jagged rocks that wouldn't stack. Nothing like your nice rectangle rocks.

 

[TalonDancer]

Another good day at the quarry in 'God's Country'

This is most of the intermediate size rocks gleaned from the ruble of the tractor play day. We pulled the 1/4-3/4 ton stuff out yesterday. The "big boy" had already hauled out the handful of 1+ton stuff -- show off

BTW we also separated & spread 4 CuYds of gravel in some low spots in the construction driveway today.

For those curious about the absolute lift capcity of a stock LA 724 w/ Bradco pallet fork --- we actually removed a few rocks on some of the pallets to get them lifted

Talon Dancer

ps crazyal, this picture is for you