Do I Need a Dozer or Therapy?

[oldnslo]

A little Nitrogen fertilizer mixed with diesel fuel and a blasting cap and the dam is gone and the dirt is spread in a matter of seconds.

 

[sdkubota]

A little Nitrogen fertilizer mixed with diesel fuel and a blasting cap and the dam is gone and the dirt is spread in a matter of seconds.

I like the way you think!:drink:

 

[Ken45101]

A little Nitrogen fertilizer mixed with diesel fuel and a blasting cap and the dam is gone and the dirt is spread in a matter of seconds.

Until Homeland Security shows up with a SWAT team, black helicopters and a tank.....

;-)

 

[Bob Rooks]

A little Nitrogen fertilizer mixed with diesel fuel and a blasting cap and the dam is gone and the dirt is spread in a matter of seconds.

It's called ANFO.

 

[joshuabardwell]

Well, I certainly appreciate all the input; it's been very helpful. But in the end, no matter how I tried to do the math, the numbers just didn't add up. And so unfortunately, I've hired it out to a pro. I always hate doing this because it FEELS like money flushed down the toilet, when in reality it isn't. At least I still have fun tearing out trees with the 49 backhoe on the back of my JD5425, largely thanks to Eddie's posts here from several years ago.

Don't feel bad. Paying a pro to do the job just means you get to sit around and drink a beverage while he does all the hard work three times faster than you would have done it. Think about what you're going to do with all the money you didn't spend!

 

[Blackhammer]

Here recently I have had my MTL down for service and repairs, I have been using the mini excavator a lot more. I have gotten amazing at spreading material, but the excavators strong suits is defiantly digging. If you want to tackle this project your self, renting is the best option. Buying and selling equipment is such a pain, and it could take months or even years to sell a newer more expensive machine. I have the same argument with my wife all the time on purchasing equipment specifically for jobs. Rental on a d6 dozer will cost about the $6500 the pro quoted you for a month. You just need to prioritize equipment usage during that month. Also plan on spending about $1000 on fuel. Make sure you know when the rental ends. The way the rental prices work is the weekly rate is about the cost of 2 1/2 days, the month sometimes is cheaper than the 2 week rate, but usually very close to the 2 week rate. Doesn't make sense , but that is how they do it.

 

[Gordon Gould]

As a land owner it is pretty hard to justify the price of a dozer. But how do you justify a swimming pool or a travel motor home ?? Their enjoyment prehaps. That works for the dozer too - at least for me. And you don't have to buy a cheap piece of junk to get a good deal. In fact it probably won't be. Take your time. The dam isn't going anywhere. Find a good dozer that needs an under carriage and has an owner that can't afford to or doesn't want to spend the money to replace it in a pure business sense. Negotiate hard and buy it as is. Then put the u/c on it. Expensive, yes. But you end up with a good machine with good resale value or one that will last the rest of your life.
Thats what I did with my early '90s Dresser TD7G (Think JD 450 size) and I am having a blast using it and in no need of therapy, swimming pool, or motor home..

 

[MtnViewRanch]

This is what I was told a looooooooong time ago. "If you need the tool more than once, than you should have the tool". I actually have tried to live by that as much as I financially could, probably one of the reasons that we have so many.

 

[BigJim]

So here is a follow-up, posted in the hope that someone as ignorant as I will in the future search this forum and find this message and learn from my mistakes. As you all know, I really wanted to do this project myself, but in the end, was "convinced" by the powers that be that this would have been a foolish and wasteful endeavor. As it turned out, hiring a "pro" was foolish and wasteful endeavor.

In retrospect, I made quite a few serious errors in the way I handled hiring this job out. For starters, I relied on word-of-mouth, which is generally preferable to merely selecting someone based on who has the biggest ad in the yellow pages. My dozer man came highly regarded from a contractor whose work for me I had been pleased with, so I expected that this guy would be good.

The dozer man estimated it would take him about 50 hours at $125/hr, so I budgeted about $6K for the project. I should have know full well right then that hiring this job out by the hour was just volunteering to buy the guy a new dozer. As things turned out, he burnt through the $6K and got maybe 1/3 of the way done, but I'm getting ahead of myself here.

My advice to those who want to hire this sort of thing out is as follows. Get estimates from several contractors and make certain that they are firm-fixed quotes, not by the hour, and make sure they are in writing and make sure they are signed off by both parties prior to beginning the project. That way, the contractor is motivated to estimate accurately because he's only getting paid one amount regardless of how many hours it takes him to do the job. My mistake was simply accepting the verbal low-ball estimate and verbally agreeing to the job. As a result, I wasted $6K to get a job less than half done.

Another alarm that should have gone off was when the guy showed up with a D5. I might have bought a D5-class dozer had I done the job myself, simply because I wouldn't care how long it took me. But when I am paying someone by the hour, I very much care how long it will take. This project really needed a D6 or larger dozer, but more than that, it really needed someone who knew earth moving well enough to know what the right tool for the job was (which would probably be a giant motor scraper).

In the end, I kicked the guy out after eating up my $6K, and now I'm stuck with a mess. The dam is about 3' shorter than it used to be, and the pond basin is now about 2/3 as large as it used to be, but the net result is that I still have a pond and a dam, both of which need to be removed and replaced with level ground.

So I'm not sure what I'm going to do next, but I guess I learned a thing or two. My mom always told me that education is the most expensive part of life. I just hope this post helps those that find themselves in a similar situation in the future. Don't repeat the mistakes I made.

 

[MarkV]

Sorry to hear it all went wrong. Around here you are not going to get a set price on excavation/earth moving projects unless it is really high. Just too many variables involved to know what you are getting into. The better guys have a pretty good idea, the lesser tend to underestimate. Sounds like you ended up with the latter for this project. I expect to pay about what he was charging and up depending on the size of the equipment. I always ask what size equipment is being used. I will also ask for a reduced price if we go over the estimated hours. Hope you get it sorted out.

MarkV