Dirt Moving best way to dig out area for future shop

[Creamer]

It took me about 8 hours (this included time setting posts and stringing to check level and depth as I didn't have a laser) to get mine cleared out with my little 1710 (with diamond tread rear tires) and a box blade using the scarifiers. I added a little weight to the box blade and it worked great going through hard dry clay that had not been touched for at least 25 years - it looked like forever. I would get the box full every time so I had plenty of digging capability.

It was a 40 x 60' building with one side dug into the dirt about 2' and the other just enough for the 6" slab plus three inches for rock and underlayment. The concrete guy then came in with a miniexcavator with an 8" bucket and dug the footers and vertical support column holes. He dug and laid the rock, underlayment, and reinforcement one day and they poured the next morning. Very quick and simple.

I would never use the loader for digging like that - too much strain on the loader and you don't get as level of base. I ended up with a nice flat base that was level to about an inch of dirt that was undisturbed. It made for a very solid floor that I has not cracked or shifted at all in the two years it has been in place and I have set some very heavy loads on it - upwards of 1000 psf in places.

I was getting quotes like $2500-3000 to do this work and so I bought the box blade and had some fun - much less costly and I learned a lot. It was my first time doing anything like this.

 

[Phillip w]

My dad built a 40x60 years ago. The terrain had a down hill slope with some trees. He cheated and hired a guy with track loader. Took that guy about 3 hours as i recall to push the trees and have the sight ready to go. The north end of the building sat below the origional landscape by about 5 ft. He contoured the north end with a gradual but somewhat steep bank into what i call a swail. The barn set. About 18 inches or so above the swail. The guttering and run off Al emptied in to the swail and went around and drained on the west side of the building. We ran alot of bottle calves back then and we would stack square bales of hay in the north end if the building. The building never got wet inside and with the landscape and hay breaking the wind in the winter time, the barn stayed somewhat decent inside as far as temps. We still used heatlamps when it was cold. The key to this post is to set your building in such a way as to have plenty of drainage as others have also mentioned.

 

[drizler]

A tooth bar on the bucket works wonders. Other than that you went about it the best way with what you had available.

Something like a pihrranah tooth bar will dig pretty well at least mine does. As long as it痴 not supremly bony mine will do that much without too much trouble. I do use the hoe though whenever the going gets rough which sure helps .

 

[bspeedy]

I have no idea what your site is like but make sure you want to be digging down the high side and not adding dirt to the low side. Think about water flow you don't want your shop to be the low spot. When I had my 50x50 shop built nearly ten years ago one corner was low. Instead of digging down to make it level we hauled material in to make it higher.

This is key. I see so many nice properties with a (as I call it) barn in a ditch. Buildings should be above the surrounding grade, not below.

I added six dump trucks' worth of dirt to my barn site. My excavator added 4 loads and thought it was good. I asked for two more loads and I'm glad I did. No water issues and it sits just above the surrounding grade.

 

[cat fever]

As said,
Tooth bar and FEL. Myself, I thought it would be easier to build the barn then dig out the dirt.:confused3:

 

[Phillip w]

This is key. I see so many nice properties with a (as I call it) barn in a ditch. Buildings should be above the surrounding grade, not below.

I added six dump trucks' worth of dirt to my barn site. My excavator added 4 loads and thought it was good. I asked for two more loads and I'm glad I did. No water issues and it sits just above the surrounding grade.

Its all in how you deal with the run off water and the water coming of the roof. The ag factory i used to work in was built in the same fashion as my dad built the barn years ago. The different is the put in "drainage grates" in the swail that fed into a 24 inch tube that carried the water a way. The factory never got wet inside.