If I Only Buy One Piece of Equiptment...

[SPYDERLK]

Right now our local quarry #57 gravel is $37/ton delivered. They're 14 miles one way from here. At that rate to put down 2" of #57s on 40 acres would be right at $1/2 Mil.
When we had our 500 ft driveway which is very close to level it was quite a bit of work which is why 20 years ago had it paved.
I'm with others is figure out how much you need and maintain just that.
40 acres is a 12 ft wide driveway 27.5 miles long!

Our already well established driveway is 1mi long and takes about 10T of #57 per year to maintain here in VA with winter freeze thaw. Maintenance is using the power brush at an angle to sweep the edges toward the middle, then bucket sprinkling on a patina of gravel where needed, then field dragging 1 round trip with a 6' drag. I guess you could call driving on it part of the maintenance. - Thats free. - Drive in the right places keeps the whole surface too packed to grow weeds.

I dont know where the OP is located. His conditions could be better maybe.

 

[Rustyiron]

Congratulations on your new business
Having experience with a travellift, they like flat ground and get funny when one wheel gets above the other 3.
I'd hire a road grader for a day to things back in order. After this you can routinely "touch up" where needed using the previously graded areas as your visual guide. I agree with the guys that reccomend a land plane. This is a truly (another) "commercial" unit that I can recommend from having one.

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As for the machine, I'd think that a 4wd 80+ hp tractor with a loader would be a versatile choice for what you've described.

 

[Fuddy1952]

I'm just trying to understand "infrequent automobile use (5-15 cars/day), and less frequent use by a seventy-ton capacity Marine Travelift carrying up to 80,000 lbs of boat (up to 4 times a day)." Why the OP would need forty acres! That's an awful lot of LOT!
I just think maybe rope off an area (orange pylon cones and rope?) Seeing how it works...what's needed...adjust to suit.
Then make a decision on that 90% area that never will be used. Sell that gravel, soil+grass, etc.

 

[wpchrist]

I appreciate all the feedback. Let me try to answer your questions.

First of all, did I say forty acres? Yikes , I meant four acres lol. And almost half of that has boats on it, so most of the ongoing maintenance will be on the remaining 2 acres. It's sort of like 40 foot wide driveways running between the stored boats. I wonder if the smaller lot size changes what some of you might suggest? I apologize if my typo sent some of you in the wrong direction with your suggestions.

I do not have any tractor now.

I am in the sunbelt so snow isn't an issue.

It seems from the feedback above that the consensus is around either a skid steer with a bucket (and preferably tracks), or a tractor with a land planer. Rustyiron had suggested 80HP or larger tractor. Does that still stand given the smaller size of the lot?

As another point of interest, the boats are too big to trailer, so I can only work under them once they're moved by the Travelift and launched. Or I guess i could move them one at a time as i grade, but that's about an hour per boat, and seems unnecessary to me as they all get moved sooner or later anyways.

By the way, I have received two quotes for pros to come in and fix the lot with gravel, and two quotes to replace with asphalt. I'm not sure if the quotes are reasonable or not. One gravel quote was for $55,000 and included 39 loads of slag fines, cleaning up the big chunks in the lot, grading and a vibratory roller. The other gravel quote was for $10,000 and included an unspecified volume of crushed asphalt and grading.

The asphalt quotes were for a smaller area (345ftx45ft). One asphalt company offered to do a 2 in mill and pave with 2in binder - approximately 12 tons - for $42,000.00, or to do a 4 in with type C binder for $59,000.00. The second asphalt company quoted to excavate and remove base course, install 8in of crushed concrete base, structural fabric, and 3 inches of "intermediate B binder course asphalt for $118,000. The second asphalt company insisted that 8 inches of base and structural fabric were necessary. I do not know if that is true or not and would like to hear your experienced opinions on this as well.

Thanks again for all the help!

 

[herm0016]

I appreciate all the feedback. Let me try to answer your questions.

First of all, did I say forty acres? Yikes , I meant four acres lol. And almost half of that has boats on it, so most of the ongoing maintenance will be on the remaining 2 acres. It's sort of like 40 foot wide driveways running between the stored boats. I wonder if the smaller lot size changes what some of you might suggest? I apologize if my typo sent some of you in the wrong direction with your suggestions.

I do not have any tractor now.

I am in the sunbelt so snow isn't an issue.

It seems from the feedback above that the consensus is around either a skid steer with a bucket (and preferably tracks), or a tractor with a land planer. Rustyiron had suggested 80HP or larger tractor. Does that still stand given the smaller size of the lot?

As another point of interest, the boats are too big to trailer, so I can only work under them once they're moved by the Travelift and launched. Or I guess i could move them one at a time as i grade, but that's about an hour per boat, and seems unnecessary to me as they all get moved sooner or later anyways.

By the way, I have received two quotes for pros to come in and fix the lot with gravel, and two quotes to replace with asphalt. I'm not sure if the quotes are reasonable or not. One gravel quote was for $55,000 and included 39 loads of slag fines, cleaning up the big chunks in the lot, grading and a vibratory roller. The other gravel quote was for $10,000 and included an unspecified volume of crushed asphalt and grading.

The asphalt quotes were for a smaller area (345ftx45ft). One asphalt company offered to do a 2 in mill and pave with 2in binder - approximately 12 tons - for $42,000.00, or to do a 4 in with type C binder for $59,000.00. The second asphalt company quoted to excavate and remove base course, install 8in of crushed concrete base, structural fabric, and 3 inches of "intermediate B binder course asphalt for $118,000. The second asphalt company insisted that 8 inches of base and structural fabric were necessary. I do not know if that is true or not and would like to hear your experienced opinions on this as well.

Thanks again for all the help!

no way will the cheap asphalt stand up to the boats/travel lift. it will be terrible in short term and cost you 10x to fix later. go around and look at other yards? are they asphalt?

leave it gravel. I think more gravel/road base, grading and compacting sounds like a good plan, though that does seem expensive. when you call and say "what would you do to fix this" they see someone that does not know. spec something out and get quotes for that, like place 3-4 inches of road base, grade and compact with vibratory roller.

if you can do concrete pad 6in+ with rebar for the "parking" and asphalt for the "road" it may work. but i bet the asphalt will squish out a lot under the load of the travelift. look at a heavy truck route road that has asphalt intersections and see the "squish" in the lanes.

 

[MossRoad]

4 acre I can deal with...

Congratulations on your new business.

 

[Rustyiron]

How bad is this area now and how long was it neglected? Paving is not the answer!
With the much (MUCH) smaller area, I'd have to reconsider the HP requirement. Although with HP comes weight, a necessary requirement for dragging around an 8' land plane. I'd stay with this size for large area grading.

 

[jjp8182]

Not being familiar with boat lifts (particularly of that size), I'm wondering how much it's compacted the ground (and how much/deep of compaction it requires to be supported).

Which makes me think that if it's anything like large cargo aircraft on dirt strips the absolute last thing a person would want to do is disturb any areas that don't need to be leveled/repaired....and only consider hiring professionals who've done similar work to repair the areas needing it (and any minimum area around those spots). Otherwise they could undo a lot of the compaction that is supporting the traveling of the lift and in turn cause a lot of other problems.

From the little I know about major roadways/interstates and runways, there's a lot more to building & maintaining them than there is to maintaining a driveway given the weight/pressure that needs to be supported and the depth of the compaction it may require.

..but then I'm also not a civil engineer so.....

 

[Xfaxman]

I know nothing about grading but can drive a tractor. If I Only Buy One Piece of Equiptment to fix/maintain this lot, what would you recommend?

Check this out:

M415XT - Mauldin Paving Products

10' Moldboard, 3/4 yd3 Bucket, 84" Scarifier 118 HP Turbo-Charged and After-cooled Diesel Engine All-Wheel Hydrostatic, Two-Speed Drive Front and Rear Universal

www.4amauldin.com

 

[IndyJay]

Check this out:

View attachment 712763

M415XT - Mauldin Paving Products

10' Moldboard, 3/4 yd3 Bucket, 84" Scarifier 118 HP Turbo-Charged and After-cooled Diesel Engine All-Wheel Hydrostatic, Two-Speed Drive Front and Rear Universal

www.4amauldin.com

View attachment 712765View attachment 712766

Nice rig but a little bit overkill for 4 acres...

 

[pokey1416]

Tractor + this + chain harrow when you don't need the LPGS.

 

[leonz]

Having a drainage tile installer come in and lay drainage tile with a tile plow is more cost effective as the tile plow
will be driven over the acreage first to allow the laser grade control computer to fix the starting point for the drainage
tile and the end points where it drains into the road ditch.

Repairing the drainage is the first thing that needs to be done on this acreage before you do anything else as simply
adding aggregate and leveling it will not solve the frost heaving issues.

Having the drainage tile installer come in with a tracked tile laying plow will let you install drainage tile every 40-80 feet from
the drainage ditch by the road and then the property will properly drain for you and the ground will be firmer and you will
not have to deal with the mess you have now and you can have stone trucked in if needed in the most traveled areas.

 

[EdinLa]

Go with a skid steer with the land plane attachment. You are going to need to be able to move around specific materials to targeted areas.

I just had a huge project go through my 40 acres and the guys with road knowledge used a skid steer to put in place and and spread their initial rock to stabilize their base, and then groomed the top.

They then brought through several tens of millions of dollars of equipment with quite a few pieces of equipment over 50 tons loading and unloading on the pad. ....Their strategy was to stabilize at ground level or in holes with 'bull rock', and use smaller gravels and topsoil to stabilize the top. They also used heavy timber mats on the perimeters to support the excessive weights. ....It has worked just as planned and they are getting ready to tear it all out in the next few weeks and restore it all to prior conditions, leaving me a 40 foot driveway built to withstand some of the heaviest loads in the industry.

With this in mind, I would suggest affordable equipment and a lot of time learning how surface stabilization is done in heavy equipment use situations.

 

[azbinder]

I would probably use a 6' 3 point landscape rake with guage wheels (Landpride LR1684 or LR2684)
on a 30-35 hp 4wd CUT. I had a Kubota B7800 (30hp) t/l with a 60" rake w/ guage wheels. Worked wonders on my gravel drive.

 

[herm0016]

Tractor + this + chain harrow when you don't need the LPGS.



View attachment 712914

who sells that frame? i have the harrow.

 

[Metalmaster10]

I recently bought a business that has approximately 40 acres of gravel lot. The lot sees infrequent automobile use (5-15 cars/day), and less frequent use by a seventy-ton capacity Marine Travelift carrying up to 80,000 lbs of boat (up to 4 times a day). The gravel lot was in rough shape when i purchased the business and i would like to repair and maintain it. I know nothing about grading but can drive a tractor. If I Only Buy One Piece of Equiptment to fix/maintain this lot, what would you recommend? I've thought of perhaps a tractor/box blade, or a skid steer ("Bobcat"), or a backhoe, but am not experienced enough in grading to choose intelligently. If you have a recommendation, could you please include model and/or minimum horsepower. Oh, i should maybe mention the lot seems to have undergone some haphazard repairs along the way. There are spots with #57 slag, fine slag, fist-sized concrete chunks, #8 stone, sand, etc. Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

I will throw in my 2 cents.
#1, a good sized compact tractor. Not a sub compact. It will be more versatile across your needs.
Things to look for:
#1, weight. You are looking primarily for "ground engaging" uses. This takes torque and needs weight to apply that torque to the ground.
#2, get a shuttle shift transmission. Not a hydro. Same reasons as above. Yes, lots of folks will chime in with storied benefits of a hydro transmission. However, simple facts are that a solid gear will out pull a hydro all day long. If you are grading 40 acres, that is serious work on a transmission. You can look on YouTube, there is a kubota dealer who did a pull test with 2 similar tractors. Hydro vs gear. NO comparison!
#3, fill your tires with rim guard. It's not expensive and will make a WORLD of difference in your stability and traction.
#4 look at frame size/ weight more than HP.
My 36 hp tractor with loader and filled tires weighs 7,000 lbs. But there are sub compact 32-35 hp "tractors" that weigh around 1700 and would not even pretend to pull the land plane that you will need.
#5, RENT.
Go to the local rental store, rent a compact tractor and landscape rake for a weekend for $200.
Just see what you think.
If you can find a land plane to rent, do that too.
It might help you choose what you want, and just as importantly, what you don't.

 

[fishdrivel]

40 acres of graveled parking lot. Seems odd.

Sound like Qatar in the Middle East

 

[solidrockfarm]

I will suggest you look at what your future plans and goals are. Is it just maintenance , or expansion, grading for drainage, do you need to tow anything in the future. Sounds like the boats are something you will never have to move yourself or will you? Small equipment does light work, heavy equipment can do heavy work.

 

[Bill the Elder]

40 acres of parking lot would be larger than a huge shopping mall lot, wouldn't it?
A 4 (four) acre parking lot would be tremendous.
40 acres would be over 1.7 million square feet, enough room to park well over 80,000 cars!?!!!

I'm thinking out loud here.

I enjoy reminding people that a football field is a little over an acre in size so this parking lot is the size of 40 football fields. That's a big parking lot.

 

[herm0016]

I enjoy reminding people that a football field is a little over an acre in size so this parking lot is the size of 40 football fields. That's a big parking lot.

as a reminder: its 4 acres, it was a typo. its only a few posts in.