Culvert Project

[Rowski]

Harv,

I'm curious, why not make a "ford" type crossing where your shallow culvert are going. Line the ford with really coarse gravel. This is presuming your just crossing with the tractor.

Derek

 

[Harv]

Derek -

By 'ford', do you mean something like 'swale' (this is all unfamiliar terminology to me /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif)?

My creeks are quite shallow, but they really rip much of the year. In our swale discussion I think we concluded that it would be unwise to cross a stream with any real flow at all.

At his point, of course, since my pipes are all in place, it's sort of a moot question for me. That is, until the rains come. If my culverts wash away this winter then I'm free to start all over again, right? /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Harv, on the bag redi-mix for culvert ends. I use the bags as they come, plastic or not. Take a pitch fork and poke some holes in the bags for moisture to get in. Take some half inch rebar at various lenghts and stake the bags together vertical as the stack rises. On the top row make sure the rebar ends are far enough into the bags so that are not exposed to rust. After you are all done wet the bags down and the whole thing will lock up for you. The paper will rot off in time and the rebar will tie the bags together nicely.
Hope this helps

george,
keoke

 

[Blu21]

Harv,I know you like pics so I shot this just for you.I know your project is different. This is one type of ford,the main water flows through multiple pipes and when the river rises the water flows over the road.Yes it is safe to drive over as you see it but after a good rain it does get impassable!See the guy fishing,he told me its a good spot for trout.Tom

 

[scruffy]

Tom, where I grew up (pacific northwest) we always referred to that type as a low water bridge. Beats putting in a summer bridge every year, particularly nowadays with all the federal and state regulations/surveys/permits you have to contend with.

 

[glennmac]

This double culvert is gonna happen!

But it started out badly this morning. The gravel guy arrives with this monster truck and 15 tons of the crushed limestone process. (Its a mixture of limestone sand and 3/4" limestone rocks.) Of course he will not go down the embankment to my creek area. So we decide to dump the pile in the corner of my backyard adjacent to my embankment "road". Well, he crosses about 80 yards of my front, side and back yards with his 50,000 lb. rig, leaving 2" deep tire tracks pressed into the dirt the whole way. He then comes back with 12 tons of topsoil and enhances the Grand Canyon effect. (I deliberately increased my topsoil order after he dumped the gravel so I would have enough for next week's rut filling project.)

Then its off to the creek to adjust the placement of the two 10' long, 24" wide pipes that are bobbing in about a foot of water. I have to cut away chunks of the bank while standing in the creek to straighten it and to get rid of some sticker bushes and other vegetation hanging over the edge. Then, I realize that one of the pipes is backwards -- I want the other end upstream. So I lift up one end of the pipe -- it only weighs 110 lbs but it has water in it and is clumsy and slippery -- and then struggle to get it into a clean-and-jerk position. I get it over my head and then walk under it go get it vertical, so I can flip it end over end. Well it flips, but so do I -- right into the creek with the pipe falling on top of me. Soaked, but intact. In any event, the proper end is now upstream, and the pipes are squished together between the banks.

Then I start my loader runs to get buckets of gravel. This is fun; I'm glad the pile is far away. I decide to put the first load in the middle of the pipes where they are abutting each other. Good decision.

This is where I discover my most useful tool for this project -- the 72" heavy iron pry bar I just bought primarily to move boulders. One end is flattened like a chisel, and the other end is round like the head of a giant nail, about 2.5" in diameter. I stick the pry bar between the pipes and find I can lever about a 4" opening between them, and all the gravel falls down between them. Just what I want! I use the chisel end to rod the gravel under the haunches of the pipes. I do the same on the sides where they are not quite touching the banks. I use the round end as a narrow tamper, which fits into all the narrow spaces. As I built the gravel up, I begin to use my 10" x 10" tamper. I also have a Rube Goldberg arrangement of sand tubes on both ends of the culvert.

I had just covered over the tops of the pipes before I quit for the day, and the rest will be easy. About another 6-8 inches of gravel, and then 4-6 inches of topsoil. I'll definitely be done tomorrow.

Lesson learned: when you have two pipes it is crucial to get gravel between them as well as on each side. When you have narrow clearances between the pipes, and between each pipe and the high bank, you can only work with a very little bit of gravel at a time. This is because you can only effectively rod small amounts into the narrow areas. It would have been a major mistake to have had the dump truck dump the load on the pipes (if he could have reached the site.) If that had happened, I NEVER could have rodded the gravel throught the narrow openings.

I'll post pictures once I have them developed.

Glenn

 

[glennmac]

The culvert bridge is done and my tractor has been to the other side. And back.

Finished with the gravel and then put on some topsoil. I need to do a little more sand bagging. Could those of you who suggested attaching the sandbags together with rebar please explain exactly how that would be done. Do I try to hammer the rebar through the bags or do I attach the rebar outside the bags.

This is my first tractor project. The rewards are both immediate and long term. It was fun to do, just me and my 2910. One hundred years from now, what evidence will there be that I was ever on the planet. Well, maybe my culvert bridge will still be there for someone to admire.

To me, it is the finest culvert bridge in the world.

Glenn

 

[gordon]

Glenn congrats on the new bridge. To answer your question, just hammer the rebar down through the bags. Nothing fancy just practial. It makes the bags one big mass instead of a bunch of single bags once the pressure of the storm water hits them.
Gordon

 

[Harv]

Glenn -

Congratulations!!! /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

If anybody can appreciate what you just accomplished it's me! I can totally relate to the exhilaration you felt when you made that historic first crossing of the new bridge. It's like setting foot on a new continent, ain't it?

I've gotten that same rush 3 times now in the last two weeks, and each one was a total feeling of triumph. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

This was also my first tractor project, and I can also relate to the sheer joy of putting the new toy to such a worthy task. When my crushed rock was delivered there was no way the truck could get close to the culvert sites, at least not the last two. But I was just as happy to have him drop the load near the house, leaving me and my big orange buddy to transport it to where I needed it.

Actually, I loved it on the first two culverts, but the third one was so far away it got fairly tedious to make so many long runs. I was getting pretty comfortable in the seat and tried to run the loads out there in seventh gear. Each time I crossed the first culvert, I usually forgot about the little dip on the far side, which dropped the front end of the tractor sharply and then broght it up again just as quickly. The result -- part of my payload scattered on the road. Oh, well. now that part of the road is nicely paved. /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

As for the rebar staking, I just pounded mine top to bottom through as many bags as I coud hit with each stake. Because of the pipe itself, I had to angle some of them, but structurally that works out just fine.

I eventually added another row of sandbags filled with the limestone to help contain the dirt fill I topped it off with. The top of the attached photo shows the rebar not quite pounded in all the way (for illustrative purposes, of course), and the bottom shows pretty much the completed culvert (number three) with extra sandbags and soil.

What shall we do next? /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[glennmac]

Harv,

The coincidence that you started this thread just when I was beginning my culvert project was very helpful. So were your pictures. You certainly are to be commended for the diligence, creativity, humor and forethought you put into your posts.

By the way, since we have polluted several threads with this tangent, your soil in that one ditch picture does look rocky. What elevation are you at? Your property is becoming troublesome to my boxblade theory: ie, that boxblades work best on nonrocky, dry, sandy and/or friable soil. I see four possibilities for my theory:

1. My theory is wrong. This is impossible, for I have a later-developed theory that none of my theories can be wrong.
2. You did not boxblade that ditch with the rocks.
3. You did boxblade it, but it didn't work very well.
4. Your property is actually in New England.

Glenn