Dirt Moving bx25 & pit run gravel

   / bx25 & pit run gravel #11  
No problem for your tractor :thumbsup:
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #12  
Hi Folks,

Can anyone share their experience with "pit run gravel" with their bx25,24 or 23?

I am looking at building an RV parking pad/driveway extension.

Just no sure if this larger stone is going to do more damage to the bucket and hoe than its worth.

Thanks
bxn


With regard to your desired chore and your orange mule:


A. you do not want bank run because you may have a lot of boulders in it

that you cannot use except for decorations.



First remember that bank run gravel is bank run gravel and in no

way is it screened by the gravel pit operator.


Asssuming you are intent on purchasing a semi load of 44 tons

you have to remember that in order to do the job you have to

use physics to you advantage to save wear and tear on your tractor

and do it both efficeintly and quickly for your purpose.



Once the bank run gravel is dumped it will have a lot of moisture in it simply

as it was scooped out of the pit wall and it will be very heavy because of the

water content as the pit wall and floor will absorb a lot of rain water and the

cold temperature of the gravel will retain a lot of water due to its being well

below the surface of the gravel pit.


The load will be dumped in the trailer and automatically begin to settle in the

dump body due to gravity. All the fine gravel sand will begin to sink to the

bottom and settle as it is being transported to your home.


Once the load or loads are dumped you have to scoop it properly or you will

risk a mass slide of material that will bury you and your tractor simply

because of the wieght of the bank run gravel.



IN order to properly scoop the material you must use the ground that the

load rests on to your advantage and I will explain why so you see and under

stand the mechanics involved in doing it.

(No you do not scoop into the pile high because that defeats the use of the available leverage using the ground as a fulcrum and reducing the stress and strain on the loader frame and this also can and will create a mass slide of material).


(every time you do it this way the gravel will move and resettle and will wander where ever it has the opportunity to slide.


It defeats the advantage of the ground as a fulcrum and adds stress to the frame of the loader and pins.



After the load is dumped and settled a bit,

1. you must be in low range and approach the pile straight on along either the long width or the narrow width of the pile by lowering the bucket to the ground and-

2. NOT putting it in float to scoop.

3. simply drive forward starting at the left or right side of the pile to scoop the gravel that will be loose due its lack of gravel covering it.

4. roll the bucket back with the bottom of the bucket on the ground slowly to take advantage of the ground as a fulcrum prying the load loose using thr curve of the bucket as an aid in digging the loose material and back away and then dump it where you want it.

Continue to work left to right or right to left scooping the bank run up using the ground as a lifting aid until you are done moving the gravel.

IF you attempt to scoop material from the center and continue to scoop the material in the center of the pile you risk the sides of the pile collapsing against you while you are mucking out the pile with the loader and that is why I explained to you the need to scoop the material from left to right or from right to left top do it safely and be able ot reclaim all the material.



The added problem with bank run gravel will be the larger stones that will affect the ability of the BX to scoop it all with little difficulty.

The second issue is settling after building the pad as it will be uneven with the bank run gravel and will not settle quickly unless you intend on renting a small pad tamper.


Be sure that there are no small children or animals around as they can be buried quickly with a mass slide of the pile which can occur in milliseconds as
the bank run gravel pile after dumping will have a 40 degree angle which will slip quickly creating a mass slide of material.


And there is no climbing the pile with the BX as the wieght of the BX will also promote the sliding of material quickly and causing a tip over of the tractor.


A lot of folks will disagree with what I have said here saying I am nit picking and dont know what I am talking about but after having friends and coworkers die due to falls of material I always err on the side of caution and MSHA's recommended methodology for reclaiming material in a pile of any size.

You have to understand that gravel like water is lazy and will go wherever it wants to simply due to gravity if the pile is high enough.

A lot people died needlesssly because piles of grain and gravel shifted because of a gust of wind in the case of an exterior grain stock pile and rain adding wieght to a pile of innocent looking gravel wherein simply walking by the pile created enough vibration to create a slide of material.
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #13  
We don't have "Bank run" here in this part of the country, just crushed granite or limestone. I've handled a good bit of 5" to 12" rip rap stone with a BX24 and had no problem. It'll manage a full bucket load. You can move 20 tons of that in about 30 minutes.
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #14  
Thanks, LBrown59, I like the smiley at the end of your post, because that was my thoughs while I wrote that post out. But, its good advise, and I know because that was me six years ago, until my dealer pointed that very fact out to me, and if yall remember from all my post over the years, I took it to heart. Now if I can just get that new tractor that I got from develdog1, via barlows, dirty I will have done something. develdog1 had it for two years, and after he put 48 hours on it, I don't think it has so much as a scratch on it. But now my brother has done some work with it, so it must have some dirt on it now, but I won't know until July...
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #15  
Hi Folks,

Can anyone share their experience with "pit run gravel" with their bx25,24 or 23?

I am looking at building an RV parking pad/driveway extension.

Just no sure if this larger stone is going to do more damage to the bucket and hoe than its worth.

Thanks
bxn

I don't have any of the bx series, but the one and only time I bought pit run gravel, the load was mostly dirt with gravel mixed in. It was cheap, and worth less than what I paid.

At a small cost in money, but a lot of cost in time, I learned to leave the "pit run" in the pit.

For a RV parking and driveways, in most parts of the country, you start with what we call "road base" which is usually crushed rock about 12" and less in size. If your ground is stable, you could use 4" road base, which is crushed to 4" and less in size. This contains some fines, but is coarse, jagged rock. The jagged is important because it locks itself together much better than smooth rock which is what you get from "pit run".

You need about 4" of the coarse road base followed by another 4 to 8" of what we call "3/4 minus", which is crushed rock that will pass a 3/4" screen. There is a lot of fine crushed rock in this material, and that helps to solidify the road, by filling the gaps between larger rocks.

Your bx can handle road base and 3/4 minus just fine. As non-intuitive as it sounds, the density, and therefore the weight, of a bucket of large rocks is the same as a bucket of small, fine rocks.

Usually the driver of the delivery truck will spread the material as he dumps it. He does this every day, and is probably better at it than you and your bx, so let him do it. If you ask him nicely, the driver of the second truck will compact the material the first truck spread by driving over it with his loaded truck. In my area this is all the compaction necessary, and is even county-approved as a compaction method.

At the homeowner level, the only reason to ever work from a pile is if you want the last of the material dumped in a small pile for repairing small areas that settle over time. I always have a couple of small piles of road base and 3/4 minus for repairs around, but working large piles is for the big construction sites.

All you need to do is:

1. mark the area where you want the material dumped,
2. clean up the edges after dumping,
3. compact the last load with your front wheels, by driving over it with a full bucket.

Use that tractor.
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel
  • Thread Starter
#16  
Thanks all again for sharing the experience here.
bxn
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #17  
I got my M7040 back in Nov and every time I used the BB I made a big mess. Then I read a lot of posts on TBN and started to understand how a BB is designed to work.

My wife wanted the drive worked on. She didn't like the mud after every rain. I had gotten better with the BB and decided I could give it a try....that's what I bought a tractor for. So I called my gravel guy and he brought me my first load (45000#) of crushed rock. Not getting in a hurry and working slowly it started to look pretty good. I was having a great time and before I knew it the first load was done. I called and had load #2 delivered. About another hour and a half and it was done way before I was through having fun.

The crushed rock packed down real well, and the wife loves it. The BB is a whole lot friendlier, now.

Charlie
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #18  
In our area we have a couple of feet of clay topsoil. Beneath that is a layer of Duripan (an extremely hard hardpan that's almost completely water impermeable). This makes the clay become hypersaturated during winter rainy season. Almost no rubber tire vehicle can drive on the soil when it's hypersaturated. Gravel roadbuilding typically involves excavating a pit that's about 14" deep for a roadbed. About 12" of small river cobble, usually round granite cobble in the 4"-6" diameter is then installed as pit run and about 4" of crushed granite gravel is graded out atop the pit run. Sometimes my Land Pride scraping grader will snag on the corner of a piece of cobble that's worked its way up a bit and the BX2200 will stop. I just back up a couple of inches, perhaps lift the grader a fraction of an inch, keep going, and drop the grader back down. That's the only (extremely minor) difficulty my BX has had with pit run.
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #19  
I would let the pit run in the pit.It would be more trouble and effort than it is worth for a parking area.As said before most crushed or sized stone can be spread very well with a good driver.Use your tractor for prep work and some speading of the gravel after the driver spreads it for some fine touches' you'll get plenty of seat time.
 
   / bx25 & pit run gravel #20  
Listen to Curly Dave, he knows what he is talking about.. Those are the materials I used when I built my barn pad on a severe slope.

James K0UA
 

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