Culvert Project

[scruffy]

Glenn, I would adamently recommend something sturdier than those steak knives! The blades are to flimsy, and liable to break off, cutting you in the process. NOT a nice thought. Can you weight your culvert down to get started? I would think that if you could find a way to temporarily push (sink?) them such as using your FEL to push them down, and utilizing sandbags draped over them to hold them in place while filling/tamping may be of some benefit. I've never worked with the 'plastic' stuff before, so that is all guessing.
In troublesome areas, I used to poke a 3" hole in the top of each end of culvert. Strange...no? Sure made a handy spot to hook onto to drag it (mostly by winch) back up the creek bed to where it was supposed to be! Also to drag down the road to place originally. No way could you lay it across a FEL, or a FEL w/forks, too much brush on each side.
I replaced one crossing 3 years in a row, finally the third time with two 48 inch culverts. The fourth year it was logs with fill over them. That stayed put. The culvert is still down in that canyon somewhere, it was too beat up to save, not to mention to far to try to pull out!

 

[gordon]

Glenn It would be a good idea on your head wall if you also used some rebar and drive it down through the bags from the top down to the bottom. What this does is tie all the bags together to form one stronger mass. Instead of a bunch of different bags. Just a thought----#4 rebar should work out fine.
Gordon

 

[Anonymous Poster]

I think they are trying to say that it is better for the overflow to take out some of the road fill (because the lowest spot is right by the culvert) than it is to let it carve out part of the bank. It sure would be easier to repair the road than the bank, and maybe less material will have been washed downstream. So the lower part of figure 16 is considered the right way to do it. The text that explains this is unfortunately not next to the diagram, but appears under the heading "Installation".

 

[glennmac]

Three days of rain.

There is now about 12" of water in the place where my pipes are floating. I picked a spot where the flow was slow, but of course that is where it will pond up the highest. Before I left for work yesterday, I put a 70 lb. sand tube on the top of the upstream end of each pipe just to weigh them down. Both bags had fallen off this morning. The only force that could have moved them is buoyancy that probably lifted and rotated the pipes. How irritating -- devices that are intended to be submerged ... that float. Does everyone but me install drain pipes in dry trenches and dry washes?

I can't really get near the pipe with my FEL. The soil on the banks is too soft and I am afraid of a cave-in if I take the tractor too near the edge. Also, the pipe is too far down to reach with the FEL even if I could get near the edge. This also means I can't do a "preemptive dump" of a large amount of gravel on top of the pipes to immediately fill up the gaps with tons of material in one fell swoop. I probably will have to hand shovel gravel on and watch the water wash it away. The labors of Sisyphus.

I can only hope it dries out some by Saturday morning. Otherwise, I'll have to wait until January when the creek freezes (if it does) to spoon in my gravel. That will mean I cant get to all the land I want to brush cut on the other side of the creek until Spring. Boo-hoo. And then the ground will probably be too wet and soft to risk tractoring.

Gee, all I was trying to do 3 months ago was get a machine to cut my lawn, and now look what I'm getting involved in. My, how things change. It's all that tractor's fault -- it makes me do and spend money on things I never even thought of before.

Glenn

 

[gerard]

glenmac, this may not be possible but have you though of putting in the culvert in what is now just land (ie parralell to the existing channel), then dig out the downflow side first to the existing channel, then the upflow side and divert the flow through your now installed culvert pipe? Then just fill in the existing channel with fill and you effectivley just shifted the channel. This depends on your layout of course and would be perfect if the stream curved and you could just "connect" it with a straight line. Just a thought.....

 

[glennmac]

Gerard, that's a good thought and would theoretically work. I don't have a sharp corner to cut, though, and the digging would be a lot of work. Probably would need a backhoe. Hmmm ... maybe this is a justification to buy that wonderful $5K toy. Nah, I could never sell that idea to the Secretary of War. I'm gonna just start shoveling gravel on Saturday and see what happens.

Glenn

 

[PBMAX]

Quick question, I hope. Some one mentioned having a hard time getting the culvert covered to the ends.

Here's my idea. Cut a piece of plywood to fit over the end of the pipe and it should be cut to allow the depth needed for backfill.(Example if you plan to have a total of 12" of backfill including pavement.)Then come down 12" from the top edge of the ply-wood this is the top of the pipe.Then cut a hole the diameter of the pipe.The place it in front of your pipe in the ditch and cut it fit over the pipe and between the walls of the bank(remember no bottom, you will be pulling this out later).(Spray both sides with deisel before actual use and mabye nail rope handels on the side that will face the dirt.)PLace the ply-wood say 2" or so back from the edge of the pipe.Then using quick crete build your self a concrete slope (mabye put in rebar over the pipe intrance).If you don't get the crete to soupy you should be able to form it by hand(yes, I have formed it this way.Its messy but can be done on small projects) compared to trying to build such an unusual shaped form it shouldn't be to bad. Once the crete dries remove the plywood and backfill to it.

Any clue as to what I'm saying.If I can figure out how to post a scetch I do that. This is one idea that would be easyer said than done!!!I know but we do what we have to...

Lil' Paul
Proud new owner of TC21D
Laziness is the Father of invention.../w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[glennmac]

Paul,

I think I can picture what you are suggesting. But what would keep the concrete from just sliding down the curved sides of the pipe?

Glenn

 

[Harv]

Dave -

I, too, found that diagram confusing, but in fact I based my overflow plan on what I thought was the principle they were eluding to. That is, instead of letting the excess water run amuck, guide it to where it will do the least damage and reunite it with the stream further down.

 

[Harv]

Glenn -

You're living my worst nightmare -- the creek is filling up before the pipe is down. /w3tcompact/icons/tongue.gif

I just got back from yet another 2 days at culvert-building. Culvert #3 is nearly completed. One more trip (scheduled for Saturday) should do it. By "complete", I just mean that they are usable. I still need to do more rock work on the face of #1, all three need more top cover (I haven't reached that magical 12 inches yet). I'm planning on just using clean dirt fill (42 acres and I'm not sure where I'm going to get the dirt /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif). Then there's the overflow issue.

Did this seem like a simple project when you first considered making your own culvert? This thing has mushroomed about 3-fold from what I originally thought it would be.

BTW -- the "big guys" divert a running stream while they install the culvert and then divert it back to the culvert when it's finished. Them boys have big toys!

So how 'bout this? You're putting down two pipes, right? Would just one of them handle the current flow? If you can just get one anchored, you might be able to divert the stream (with boulders, sandbags, etc.) entirely into one pipe while you work on the other.

My culvert #2 had a trickle in the stream bed, nothing compared to your flow, but I was facinated how quickly the ditch dried up on either side of the first pipe I dropped in. It was purely inadvertent on my part, but the pipe wound up in the perfect position to catch nearly all of the flow, as if the water knew what the pipe was for.

Did you ask anybody about these mysterious pipe "anchors" I was talking about? I'll see if I can locate some details on that.

Too bad you're not a teeny bit closer -- it would have been interesting if we could have double-teamed your project.