Need help with driveway

[romanerin2011]

Hey everyone,

New to the forums and new to owning a tractor. I have a late 60s model ford 3000 diesel tractor with a 6' box blade and a 7' rear blade. Right now I'm using my neighbors 5' box blade as I have to do 10 pt turns with my heavy duty 6' if I'm not digging up dirt.

So to my driveway problems. Me and my wife just built us a house, and currently you have to walk to the house as they're really isn't a driveway. I was working the driveway with my box blade digging up hard clay by my pond and dragging it 600 or so ft to my driveway to make a good base. I sorts had it going my way until I bought my rear blade. I decided to cut in a ditch on one side, so I angle the blade as far forward as it would go and tilted it to dig in. Well it cuts a nice ditch but I brought in mud and water on to my somewhat decent road base, and now it's completely muddy. We've had a stupid amount of rain the passed few month which hasn't helped. I need some expert advice on how I can get my driveway operational. Should I just get my box blade and skim everything off and just bring in dump truck loads of dirt or what?

 

[PILOON]

A lot to consider building a drive.
Drainage is a major concern followed by a proper base.
You want coarse stone at bottom followed by fines for the finish.
Geotextile is now commonly used under the base layer of base as it prevents migration of silt and muck to the surface as well as acts like snowshoe to spread loading of the gravel base.
I'd suggest that first and foremost you want to get rid of all vegetation and topsoil B4 adding any road base.
Ask around as to what is commonly done in your area.

Once a base is established another common technique is to use re cycled asphalt for the finish.
My drive is close to 20 years and we simply dumped loads of asphalt chunks spread with a mini excavator and compacted with the dump truck wheels.
Today they shred the asphalt for an easier compaction.

 

[MtnViewRanch]

Some pictures would really really help us out in giving you advice. Conditions and circumstances vary so much that we are all just guessing as to what needs you have.

 

[romanerin2011]

Well here's some photos. Hopefully I uploaded it right. MtnViewRanch do you live in mountain view ark? I got family up there.

 

[romanerin2011]

I guess it's hard to see by those. I took pictures of my ditch I dug in, my 2 culverts and the driveway itself.

 

[BuilderML]

I'll start by saying i have a 1200' driveway and fairly flat land. Which looks like what you have. Rule #1 your driveway can not be lower than surrounding area if you plan on keeping it gravel/dirt. Find what your finish driveway elevation will be. Remove organic material. Install your culverts in the low areas however many you will need to run across your driveway. Don't use small pipe try to go with 8"dia.min. Put in your ditch on the high side of the driveway,make the ditch wide enough and deep enough as once stuff starts growing it will fill in fast. Try to get your ditch to pitch towards the culverts if possible. If you can't no big deal water will find its level as long as your lower then the driveway. Which material you use to build up your driveway will depend on the depth of material you need to bring it up to finish height. Anything from 0-6" i like to use 3/4"minus. 6" and more i use 3" minus. I always us 3/4" minus to finish off the top. Compact away as your doing it. Let me say that if you can get away with grading the edge of your driveway versus ditches your much better off. By grading away i mean starting from the finish height of your driveway and blending down to the natural lay of the land. Makes it alot nicer to mow the sides if you plan on doing so. Also crowning the driveway or pitching to one side is needed. What i said above would be the basics it really all depends on the topography of your land. Enjoy your project. Also once you contaminate your driveway material with organic crap consider it wasted.

 

[romanerin2011]

Well it was building my base up with clay. And I did mix some crap dirt, mud, and water on my road when I was cutting in the ditches. There was really no way to keep from doing it. Also what is minus? Never heard of it. My plan was to build up road with clay then spread sb2 on top. Anyone got any tricks to drying a dirt road? And can someone point me to a good thread on rear blade use? What exactly is the purpose of a rear blade and having a good windrow going?

 

[romanerin2011]

Oh what you call minus I call sb2, looks about the same. Man how many loads of minus did you get to make you base? I was just going to build mine with clay and spread sb2 over it.

 

[k0ua]

You will discover that there are as many names for rock products as there are regions in the US. Many different names for the same thing.

To me 3/4 minus would be rocks that are 3/4 of an inch maximum on down to dust all mixed together. We call it 0 to 3/4 here.

Of course I don't have a clue what sb2 is...

 

[MtnViewRanch]

Well here's some photos. Hopefully I uploaded it right. MtnViewRanch do you live in mountain view ark? I got family up there.

I'm in Southern California, can't say that I have ever even been to Arkansas.

Well it was building my base up with clay. And I did mix some crap dirt, mud, and water on my road when I was cutting in the ditches. There was really no way to keep from doing it. Also what is minus? Never heard of it. My plan was to build up road with clay then spread sb2 on top. Anyone got any tricks to drying a dirt road? And can someone point me to a good thread on rear blade use? What exactly is the purpose of a rear blade and having a good windrow going?

My first thought is that the ground is way to wet. Sometimes you just need to wait.

Different reasons-applications for windrowing.