Fired Road contractor. Build it myself?

[WoodChuckDad]

Short story- I had a contractor who was supposed to start last week dressing my dirt road and laying gravel---he never showed so I told him not to come

long story
I had several contractors come take a look at my road and give me bids on rolling out the gravel. Two bids that I considered for roughly 1/4 mile of road. The road is already rough cut by a bulldozer, including a switchback that will require a little bit of expanding. I have driven it in my truck with no problem but it is bumpy. Each bid came to about $8,000-$10,000 labor plus the cost of stone. Stone cost should be $8k-&10k. The road is currently 10-11 feet. One bid was going to open it to 11 feet and cut down deeper...they said that it needed to get below any roots that might still be there...then grade it and put down #3 for 2 inches and cover that with 4 inches of crusher run. Then compact it. sloped slightly for runoff. no ditching. If any culvert or ditch were needed that would extra. Price was $8,000. Bid was presented in an attached document to an email
Second bid was 12 feet wide. He said it didn't need to go deeper and didn't need the #3 stone. Said that would actually make it less stable. HE recommended 6 inches crusher run. Again, sloping outward and any culver would be extra. His bid was $10,000. Bid was presented in an email. I went with the second bid because he said he could move the equipment and start much sooner. There was no contract,
He was supposed to move his equipment this past Wednesday....the day before Thanksgiving. Said he had an employee who wanted to work friday sat and sunday. Sounded good. Wednesday morning he contacted me to get detailed instructions on getting to the property, to give to who was moving the equipment. Wednesday came and went....no equipment. and no contact from the contractor. Friday afternoon I went to the land to check things out. No equipment and no contact from the guy. Late afternoon I asked if they were planning to move and start Monday. He said they couldn't move the equipment earlier because of permits and holidays. But said they were going to try to get it done early Saturday. Weekend passed with no contact...Monday I was on the land working all day. Nothing. And no contact. This morning I texted him early and said we were not going to use him. He called within 5 minutes to smooth things. I said thanks but no. He texted me several times after that offering a discount and asking if he could make it right. I stuck to my gut and said no. IT was time for us to part ways.

I am now thinking that I can probably do this myself. I have a 73 horsepower tractor and an excavator. The road is rough cut....here is a picture.


I can use the excavator to widen it. I think I could buy a hydraulic blade for the rear of the tractor and use that to smooth it out before laying gravel. I could then have the crusher run delivered and rent a roller for a week. and roll it myself. I would save about 5 grand in labor.....burn a couple vacation days and eat several weekends but I would have a nice hydraulic blade when I am done, to help maintain the road and remove any snow that we might get.

Am I crazy?

 

[WoodChuckDad]

BTW. I had the road rough cut when I had a bulldozer there from the logging company doing clean up. They had already pilled up debris, The road had already been cut but was too steep so we changed the line and had him doing it again. My mistake on the line to take so I sucked it up but he did that in an hour so I wasn't out too much.

 

[davesl708]

From the looks of it from the one pic you will need at least one culvert to drain water under the road.
The first bid makes more sense. You need a good bed under the gravel to keep the road stable and not end up with sink holes in soft spots.

If you plan to do it yourself you need to get info on proper road bed construction. It is not as simple as bid two makes it out. Just dumping gravel on dirt will not work.

Good luck with the project.

 

[Tompet]

Are you in a big hurry? It just depends money vs your time...it's already roughed in and with your equipment I say go for it. Do one section and see how it goes with you prepping and having material delivered.

Btw, looks like beautiful setting!

 

[PILOON]

Around here contractors generally make roads using only excavators.
Of the dozen or so contractors I know none have dozers and most simply rent a roller compactor when a high quality finish is called for.
They dig and rake using bucket teeth.
Spread gravel by raking with teeth.
Grade by swinging bucket side to side.*
Compact by driving back and forth.

Stumps and slash they dig large holes and bury them.
The preferred finish is crushed re cycled asphalt, again compacted with excavator.
Re cycled asphalt is preferred as it prevents washout on hills as it re cooks to a very acceptable top dressing plus cheaper than crushed stone.

*They all hard coat the bucket bottoms to delay wear.

 

[EddieWalker]

I'm a do it yourself kind of guy and don't think roads are all that complicated, but if you cut a single corner, you will always have problems. Every problem with a road is from water. You have to plan for the very worse case scenario, and then double it. Look at how big the ditches and culverts are used by the County where the land is located.

From what I see in your picture, the real challenge is going to be digging out a big ditch on the uphill side of your road. You want it as wide as possible, and with slopes along either side that you can maintain with your mower. This is where most people run into trouble because they just dig it big enough to handle the rain, but then when the rains happen, it erodes and they cannot maintain it. Or it's too narrow to fix properly without damaging the road. 12 to 15 feet total width for a ditch is a good minimum.

If you pile the dirt onto your road, compacting it will be very difficult. I would only do that if I needed to build up the road. Otherwise, it's better to haul off. You want your road surface as virgin as possible. If you have to build it up, be sure to do it in layers and compact it. Clay type soils need a sheepsfoot to compact it, but with the right amount of moisture, the front tires of a tractor with a load of dirt in the bucket does a fair job too.

Never add rock until the dirt of the road is solid.

Talk to the owner of the rock supply what county code is for roads. This varies all over the country and you will get a lot of local suggestions, but the only one that matters is from those who do this for a living there. I would trust the supplier more then I would trust a contractor. I'm not saying all contractors are dishonest, but there are enough of them out there that will sell you stuff you don't need just to pad what they make.

Once you get all the dirt work done, which is 90% of the job, you can then spread the rock yourself, which is a very repetitive process that you may consider hiring out. Some rock suppliers will have trucks that spread it as they dump it. Others will just dump it in a pile and leave you to move it. If you can only move a yard at a time with your front bucket, you need to know how long this will take.

 

[teg]

Definitely do the work yourself. Find a dump truck driver that will spread the gravel as he dumps. I built a road down to our creek. I would not worry too much about getting it exactly right the first time. You can always rework the road as needed. If you plan to build a house there, putting down 3" rock and letting construction traffic compact it, is not a bad idea.

You need to study how the water runs on your property. How much water (area to the ridge)... How fast the water runs (steepness) all play a part in designing a road. For us, I had a few truck loads of 3 to 4" rock dropped in wet and or "filled" areas, then most of the rest of the road was able to just lay down Crusher Run on the ground but I did a ditch on the inside hill to keep the road bed dry.

You need read all about road building...

 

[WoodChuckDad]

I've been reading and watching some YouTube videos. After building my bridge, I'm not too intimidated. I think I can do this. And I was planning to do a ditch on the inside with a few culverts along the length of it to keep washout down.

 

[airbiscuit]

I like your plan. It might be worth another hour or two of cat time to widen and ditch the road. They can do more faster with less wear and tear on your tractor. Plus, if in doubt, go a little wider!

 

[Egon]

A rear blade will do a lot of work for you on that road. Just make sure it extends beyond the tractor tire's and can be tilted. Might be able to widen the road and dig the inside ditch with just the blade. The secrete is rolling a windrow back and forth over the width of the road and packing it in the intervals. Gage wheels would also help.

For the top finish crushed gravel will do just fine all by itself.

The blade will also see duty maintaining the road over the years.