RDrancher's Photo Thread

dave1949 · May 22, 2015

Sorry the rain has been holding you down John. On the bright side, the flooding is making more jobs for you if you can get to them eventually.

I'd gladly take some of that rain here.

RDrancher · May 22, 2015

It's starting to feel like ground hog day Dave. Every forecast shows a chance of rain for the next seven days....day after day after day. Lots of work though, that's for sure.

dave1949 · May 22, 2015

RDrancher said:
It's starting to feel like ground hog day Dave. Every forecast shows a chance of rain for the next seven days....day after day after day. Lots of work though, that's for sure.

There must be a weather pattern stuck over your region. Like the cold that came here and got stuck this winter. It does wear people down mentally when you don't get a break.

RDrancher · May 22, 2015

Yep. I think that it's having more of an effect on my wife's sanity than mine. #1...She can't ride her horses in the mud, and #2...She has to put up with more of me! :laughing:

dave1949 · May 22, 2015

Who else could hear your weather complaints? That's what spouses are for--right?

EddieWalker · May 23, 2015

Do you think they used the river rock because it's cheaper? I'm always amazed how often people spend thousands of dollars on the wrong materials when it would have just added a few hundred bucks to get the right material the first time. I see this in homes all the time when they use lumber too small for the span. The next size up is just a couple bucks times the number of boards they needed for grand total of less then $100 they could have done it right the first time. But now they have to spend thousands for me to tear it all out and redo it. Just crazy.

Eddie

RDrancher · May 23, 2015

The material is local and cheaper, and the trucking is cheaper too. I see this with a lot of rural home builders since by this time in the project they're trying to get the keys handed to the homeowner, get paid and get out. They include the driveway in the price of the home and then use the same cheapy guys that built the pad out of onsite expansive soil...with a little topsoil mixed in for good measure.

The only materials I purchase from the local pit are sand and small rip rap if it's suitable for the job.

RDrancher · Jun 7, 2015

It finally quit raining, but the first job this week got off to a rocky start. This customer has an easement around a small plot that a local farmer works. I built a new road through the easement a couple of years ago and included a culvert [pipe across the road. Every time the farmer plows the drainage changes a bit, so we decided to grade out a larger swale, install a second pipe and also lengthen the original pipe by two feet. I also touched up the road while I was onsite. The job is only seven miles from my culvert supplier, but with several major water crossings closed near Lake Ray Roberts, it took a seventy mile round-trip to pickup the pipe. That, and the little issue of sinking the tractor the first day turned a simple one day job into two.

RDrancher · Jun 7, 2015

With most of my jobsites still a tad too wet, I headed for this one in sandier soil on top of a hill. The county resurfaced the road and basically eliminated the bar-ditch along the frontage. The change assisted in washing out the customers arena and diverted the flow away from the natural drainage doing damage to the area between their home and barn. Here are the photos of the bar-ditch and graded area. I also regraded the arena and the area above it. I'll post those photos after I place sand.