At Home In The Woods

[TBDonnelly]

You guys make me laugh...and that's a good thing!

.......and I always thought Borax came from 20 mule teams. :confused2:

Don

 

[CurlyDave]

.......and I always thought Borax came from 20 mule teams. :confused2:

Don

I am old enough to remember when Ronald Reagan advertised 20 Mule Team Borax on TV. He was "The Old Prospector".

 

[buckeyefarmer]

If you have clay, put something on the ground around the foundation after backfill so the rain doesn't splash the clay all over the outside of the wall. It will make a mess on the walls.

 

[Obed]

Today I worked on grading the area underneath the back porch and deck. Framing for the back porch and deck are supposed to start soon. I have a deadline to finish grading this weekend so the two footers for the porch and deck can be poured this coming week. The deck and porch will run from the end of the garage (left in the first picture) to the retaining wall.

Here's what it looked like at the beginning. There are some very tricky spots due to the steepness. The area is boxed in by a long pile of dirt behind the house (not shown here) that limited the maneuvering room. I was standing on the dirt pile when I took these pictures. I've been concerned about grading this area all winter. Because of material supplies that have been in my way, I haven't been able to get to this task until this weekend.

I needed to cut off at least a foot of dirt at at the highest spot shown on the left. Doing so will make sure the bottom of the deck framing will be at least 12" above the dirt to minimize weathering of the framing due to rain water splashing up from the ground. I've seen plenty of decks sitting 1" off the ground; I don't want ours to be like that.

It didn't occur to me until this morning that I would have to leave some areas along the walls uncovered until the brick is laid. You can see the brick ledges on the retaining wall. I can't push dirt against the walls higher than the brick ledges until after the brick is laid. I was bummed by that realization because I wanted to have all the finish grading completed before the porch and deck go up while I can still access the area with my tractor. After the framing starts, I won't be able to get to that area with the tractor and will have to use a hand shovel. Yuk!

The last picture shows an orange flag that marks where the back corner of the porch will meet the back of the deck. I'm using the flag as a sort of grade stake. The height of the dirt there is about where I want it when I'm done.

 

[Obed]

I used a board and a level to determine my grade. The scariest part to grade is close to the retaining wall. I really don't like feeling the tractor lean much to the side. I try to keep the tractor going as straight up and down as possible but sometimes I put the tractor in some positions that weren't much fun. A skid-steer would be great for this job.

I first tried to cut down with my box blade that knob of dirt that the end of the board is sitting on. The box blade wouldn't cut it. I'm not sure why this section of dirt was so hard. I ended up turning the tractor around and using the FEL.

My goal is to have the dirt against the retaining wall slope away from the wall for 6 feet to minimize water that reaches the wall. Doing so will help minimize freezing forces against the wall during the winter.

 

[Obed]

This first thing I did was scrape some of the gravel off the gravel path and move it for later use. The concrete slab crew made the gravel path when they were laying the slab to help keep the clay off their boots.

This big rock kept getting in my way so I moved it to a low spot near the driveway culvert that needs filling.

 

[Obed]

You can see the big pile of dirt on the left. I ended up building a ramp against the dirt pile so I could dump the extra dirt over the top of the pile.

 

[Obed]

This area was filled with red clay by the excavator last fall. I'm not sure why he added fill here. He was not supposed to add to the natural grade and doing so here would just made the slope behind the house steeper. He added a good 12" of clay to this area. The clay has packed incredibly hard and has lots of rocks in it. I went back and between using the FEL and the box blade for digging the dirt. The tractor had an extremely tough time cutting through the clay. It was slow, slow, slow work. Often I would have to get my 6 foot steel digging bar and pry a rock out of the clay because that was faster than getting the rock out with the FEL. The boxblade was useless for digging rocks larger than a softball out of the packed clay.

The wife asked me why I did not use the scarifiers on the boxblade to break up the hard packed clay. Actually, I did not think of using them. However, upon reflection, I'm afraid that I would break them when they would inevitably catch on one of the rocks.

 

[CurlyDave]

My goal is to have the dirt against the retaining wall slope away from the wall for 6 feet to minimize water that reaches the wall. Doing so will help minimize freezing forces against the wall during the winter.

Obed:

You should have drain rock and filter fabric immediately next to that retaining wall, not dirt or clay.

I have not seen a retaining wall designed in the last 30-40 years which did not have this feature. The force on the wall will be 2.5 times greater without drain rock than with it.

You really need to consult the engineer who designed that wall on this point. Who backfilled the wall before you started leveling? He is the one responsible for placing the drain rock and he should be called back to excavate and put the rock in if that is what the plan calls for.

If nothing else, look at your plans yourself. If the rock is supposed to be there, not having it is a big deal.

 

[Obed]

I have an air leak at the tire rim. We've had the tire re-sealed a couple of times. I'm thinking the rim might be damaged and won't hold a seal. I might have to buy a new one. I can fill the tire with a bicycle pump and work for a few hours before needing to air up the tire again.