Egon
Epic Contributor
Back blade with gage wheels and windrow back and till you run out of windrow.
Driveway help
- Thread starter 2diamondfarm
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Cycledude
Veteran Member
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- Nov 26, 2020
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- 1,600
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- Rib Lake Wisconsin
- Tractor
- LS XR4155, Ford 6610, Ford 8n
My gravel driveway is only about 300’
A few years ago I added a foot of new gravel on top of the old gravel, turned out pretty decent but about every 15-20 feet it had a slight dip or rise and try and try I was unable to get it as smooth as I wanted it.
My township has their own road grader and operator, he lives about a quarter mile down the road from me, so one day when I was driving by he was outside working on something so I stopped and asked if he could grade my driveway, less than an hour later the big John Deere grader pulls into my yard, took him about 15 minutes to make my driveway perfectly smooth with no more dips ! The wheelbase of the grader is at least three times or more longer than my tractors wheelbase and the blade is in the middle instead of hanging off the back. And it didn’t cost me anything !
A few years ago I added a foot of new gravel on top of the old gravel, turned out pretty decent but about every 15-20 feet it had a slight dip or rise and try and try I was unable to get it as smooth as I wanted it.
My township has their own road grader and operator, he lives about a quarter mile down the road from me, so one day when I was driving by he was outside working on something so I stopped and asked if he could grade my driveway, less than an hour later the big John Deere grader pulls into my yard, took him about 15 minutes to make my driveway perfectly smooth with no more dips ! The wheelbase of the grader is at least three times or more longer than my tractors wheelbase and the blade is in the middle instead of hanging off the back. And it didn’t cost me anything !
paulsharvey
Super Member
Without getting too technical; we first need to define "dips", and see what the cause is. Is it wash boarding, settling, erosion, or natural lay of the land/topography, wet areas?
Wash boards suck, and they will keep coming back over time, but can be fairly easily graded away. More cohesive material tends to not washboard as bad.
Settlement, there are lot of reasons/causes, but often, just scarifying the existing material and adding a few more tons is your best bet.
Erosion, can be somewhat dealt with by swales/ditches, cross slope/crown.
Wet areas are the hardest to deal with, but as much as it's Not the right answer, often the most effective, cheap way, is add additional material.
Topography, cut the highs, add to the lows.
Wash boards suck, and they will keep coming back over time, but can be fairly easily graded away. More cohesive material tends to not washboard as bad.
Settlement, there are lot of reasons/causes, but often, just scarifying the existing material and adding a few more tons is your best bet.
Erosion, can be somewhat dealt with by swales/ditches, cross slope/crown.
Wet areas are the hardest to deal with, but as much as it's Not the right answer, often the most effective, cheap way, is add additional material.
Topography, cut the highs, add to the lows.
paulsharvey
Super Member
So, I think what you describe is the bottom material and the top material acting independently. Did you/they scarify the bottom lift of old, compacted stuff, before placing the new material on top? You want the two lifts to act as a single homogenous base. Dont know if you have the ability to rip/scarify down through the crushed concrete to the original base, regrade and recompact, but I belive that is your issue.
Essentially, your top lift of crushed concrete is scabbing in areas, and getting loose
bdhsfz6
Elite Member
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- Apr 11, 2015
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- Northeastern Pennsylvania
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- Kubota MX5800 HST & L6060 HSTC Formerly L6060 HST B7100 HST, L2550, L3010 HST, L3430 HST
The blade is mounted on hinged brackets which are bolted to the cross bar. It folds down and rests against the tines when in use. It folds up and is held by latches attached to the bracket when not in
use.
Cycledude
Veteran Member
- Joined
- Nov 26, 2020
- Messages
- 1,600
- Location
- Rib Lake Wisconsin
- Tractor
- LS XR4155, Ford 6610, Ford 8n
Well he said the dips are about 20 feet apart so I wouldn’t call that washboard. I believe the main problem is his tractors wheelbase is simply to short to do a real good job of grading those dips out and using a three point hookup boxblade hanging off the rear of his tractor makes the job nearly impossible. Boxblades work great for lots of other stuff
OP
2diamondfarm
Bronze Member
The problem with a land plane.. and any other rear attached implement.. is that when your front end goes into a dip.. the back and implement can go up, making long swales in the overall run. It can be done without doing that, but it takes practice and knowing where to drag material into the low spots as you go. I also have the long driveway and same attachments as you. We just recently put down a few thousand tons of millings on the roadway.. I used my skid steer to do the majority of the grading and spreading of the material. It’s easier for me to have the material in the front and level it as I go, then fine tune it with a LPGS behind the tractor.
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paulsharvey
Super Member
Pictures help a lot. Those appear to areas that hold water. I would cut the grass shoulder down, to create "weep holes" and then scarify the low area, and add some material to it. I dont think the dips you are showing are the result of a short wheel base problem.
You mentioned that the subgrade may be organic or expansive; water sitting on it will certainly make the problem worse.
jyoutz
Super Star Member
It appears that the road bed is lower than the surrounding ground. This will be difficult or impossible to keep shaped up because all of the drainage is into the road. The only real solution is to bring in more gravel to elevate and crown the road bed.
paulsharvey
Super Member
Picture 1 and 3, both appear to me, that you could cut a weep hole to the outside, and add material. It's always hard to get perspective though pictures though.
gengine
Platinum Member
If that is the case, elevating the road is not doing anything but being a temporary solution. You need to be looking at stripping, adding fabric and pit run, then putting road base back on.
jyoutz
Super Star Member
Actually we have elevated the road with just rock on many forest roads and these roads have held up for years. Fabric isn’t cost effective when you’re doing miles or thousands of feet of roads. Elevating and crowning the road is the key. Water will drain off the road.
paulsharvey
Super Member
It is Far cheaper to cut a minor swale about 4 ft from the edge of the driving surface, ideally with an invert at or below the bottom of our base (so if we have 8" of base/rock, we want our swale atleast 8" deep), and then cut something like a 6-10% slope on our grassed shoulder. We can probably do that with our box blade, loader, whatever. If the ground adjacent to the roadbed, say, 6 ft away, is lower, than we can grade the shoulders to slope away without the swale.
A typical cross section on a paved road, is 2% cross from the center to the EOP, 6% from the EOP out about 4 ft; and if there is a ditch or swale; after our shoukder, we slope down at a 4:1 to the swale invert. Gravel/stabalized drives, might benefit from a bit more cross slope, like 3-6% from the crown out, but we also don't want to build velocity and wash our fines away.
A typical cross section on a paved road, is 2% cross from the center to the EOP, 6% from the EOP out about 4 ft; and if there is a ditch or swale; after our shoukder, we slope down at a 4:1 to the swale invert. Gravel/stabalized drives, might benefit from a bit more cross slope, like 3-6% from the crown out, but we also don't want to build velocity and wash our fines away.
OP
2diamondfarm
Bronze Member
I had a quote for that and it was $80,000
I can add some stone every year and just deal with it
jyoutz
Super Star Member
I would get a belly dump or two of rock spread along the road. Then use the rear blade on your tractor to shape it into a crown. That’s what I did. After a few loads, the road was elevated. Now it stays in good shape with just a few gradings each year. I do try to plow the snow so it doesn’t melt into the road bed. This shouldn’t cost more than $1500 or $2000 at the most.
paulsharvey
Super Member
Wow, and honestly, your driveway not only looks better than my current drive, but also every drive I have ever lived at...
