Demolishing Concrete Wall

[centex]

I have been following herbenus's thread on demolishing concrete culverts. I have a similar problem that I am working on but this time it is a concrete wall. The wall is 6' tall, 25' long, and 10" thick reinforced concrete. It is in a creek across the upstream side of a concrete bridge. Because of the water I cannot or will not use electric tools. I am too far from a tool rental place and it is too hot and humid here to consider renting a pneumatic jack hammer. I would waste too much valuable time transporting the equipment and could not put in enough time in a day because of the weather to make this option affordable. I have been working on it with hand chisels, a pick axe, and a 20# sledge hammer but I will never get finished with this approach. I tried to push the wall down using a hydraulic jack but I could barely budge it. My thought is that if I can get maybe a 500# wrecking ball, I could swing it from my FEL with a 20' chain and break the wall up. Does this sound feasible and if so where would one go to look for a wrecking ball?

One might ask why a wall would be in front of a bridge. Well the bridge was once part of a state highway. The highway was rerouted and this bridge abandoned by the state many years ago and it appears that the landowner thought that he had a ready made dam if he just walled off the bridge. The only problem is that this is in Central Texas and the streams here are prone to flash floods and the soil is mostly sand and rocks which soaks up water and becomes unstable. The end result is that the creek rerouted itself around the bridge and washed out a 50' wide section of land for it's new channel. I am trying to remove the wall and get the creek flowing under the bridge again. Then I will need to move about 500 yards of fill to close off the current channel and reattach the bridge to the road. I see lots of tractor time here. The attached picture shows the bridge with the wall in front of it. By the way the creek is known to rise about 3/4 of the way up the trees behind the bridge or 20'.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Are explosives an option or a hoe ram on a piece of equipment such as a backhoe??

 

[gotrocks]

Well Don, here is my .02 worth. I don't think the 500# ball is the best approach. If you did move it at all with the hyd. jack then I would think you could move it even more if you "take another bite". When my son built his home a few years past he hit rock while diging the basement. We purchased 3 sticks of dynamite and blasted out enough to get the floor down to an acceptable level.

Yes, I know it is dangerous, but maybe you can find someone with experience that would set the charge and blast it for you. My guess is it would not take more than a few hours.

If the "reinforced concrete" is not too well reinforced????

Would a gap in the wall allow enough water to pass thru so you don't have to remove the whole wall?

Another possibility is a gas powered concrete saw. With a dry cut diamond blade you cut concrete and steel re-bar.

Well I guess I've used up my .02. Good Luck, be careful, God Bless US All.

 

[herbenus]

They do make hydraulic jack hammers. You might be able to rent or buy one and run it from your tractor. I can't tell you where to get one. Stanley makes one.

 

[Egon]

Can you undermine one side of the wall so it will push over and lay down. Might be able to use a large volume water pump for this.
Otherwise bring in some large equipment .
The wrecking ball needs sideways movement that the FEL cannot do.

Egon

 

[Hoeman00]

I looked at your profile but couldn't tell if u have Q-T on the loader?
If u have Q-T u could get a SSL hydraulic hammer and use it to bust up the concrete.
W/ a hammer u could do the work from bridge deck.
Also from past experience u can't do much digging or pushing in the sandy gravel mix in the stream bottom, even w/ a dozer(been stuck a few times).

 

[centex]

Thanks for all the input. I am replying to all of the responses so far in this post. I had given dynamite a passing thought but I thought that you would have to have some sort of special license to even buy the stuff much less use it. I do not want to damage the bridge that is behind and next to the wall. I have a backhoe attachment for my tractor but it will not accept a hyd jack hammer. I had discussed this with my dealer in regards to the low end JD TLB (the JD 110). It does have the hydraulics for a jack hammer but the jack hammer costs over $6000 so it is way out of my league. I would like to get my tractor on to the bridge to try an push the wall over but I have to finish filling in a washout behind the bridge before I can got onto it. This is a major job itself. I am attaching some more pictures to clarify what I am facing. I don't think a saw would work for me because the wall is 8' tall and I could not operate a heavy saw above my head. My idea for a wrecking ball is to suspend it with a 20' chain from the loader bucket once I can drive onto the bridge. I would attach a rope to the wrecking ball and pull it away from the wall, then release it. I am using slege hammers, breaker bars, a pick axe, and concrete chisels now. The concrete is hard but not all that good so I am making slow progress but maybe too slow.

The attached picture is a view of the bridge across the current creek channel which I need to fill in after I fix the bridge.

 

[centex]

This view is looking down on the concrete wall. The bridge is to the left in the picture.

 

[centex]

This is a closeup view of the wall from the creek bed. The wall is 6 feet tall above the water and another 2 feet is below the water. We are in a drought now and the creek is lower than normal.

 

[centex]

This is a closeup of the wall where it adjoins the bridge abutment. I had done about 30 minutes work with hand tools. The light colored area on the bridge abutment is where the concrete from the wall had covered it. That is about 1/4% of the wall gone.