dnetherland
Member
Soundguy,
Where do you get information on soil cement.
DN
Where do you get information on soil cement.
DN
Driveway prep suggestions
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Soundguy
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I of course cheated, and simply got a degree in civil engineering.. 
but....here's a lil light reading:
Soil-Cement Pavements Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) – Portland Cement Vs. Hydrated Lime | Portland Cement Association (PCA)
google soil cement stabilization for more hits than you care to read.
but....here's a lil light reading:
Soil-Cement Pavements Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) – Portland Cement Vs. Hydrated Lime | Portland Cement Association (PCA)
google soil cement stabilization for more hits than you care to read.
Gittyup
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Highly recommend Geotex under the stone. Really keeps the dirt down and the stone up. I put it under my drive, which also has a very steep grade to it. Put mine in 4 years ago. Looks like the day I put it in. No wash. No soft spots. No mud. After weeks of rain, it's always hard.
Thanks for all the ideas. It's definitely been helpful reading all your suggestions. It sounds like the best thing to do now is wait until everything dries up and top with additional stone. We did do some geotextile on most of the driveway before we put down the stone. I didn't put it on the steep grades because i was told that it could slide down the driveway under heavy traffic. I don't think the gravel is sinking in the ground, I think I just have a layer of mud from all the construction equipment and runoff from the adjacent ground. When I had the driveway put in, I cut trenches along the driveway but they've been pretty much destroyed from all the construction.
A contractor friend of mine has been suggesting 2A slag. He says is gets rock solid and doesn't wash out as easily as limestone. He showed be a parking area he did with it and it sure does seem to get pretty hard. At some point in time, I'd like to pave the driveway. But, that's not in the cards right now.
A contractor friend of mine has been suggesting 2A slag. He says is gets rock solid and doesn't wash out as easily as limestone. He showed be a parking area he did with it and it sure does seem to get pretty hard. At some point in time, I'd like to pave the driveway. But, that's not in the cards right now.
Soundguy
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whatever you top coat it with.. if you don't get drainage going.. AND stabilize it.. it won't hold...
soundguy
soundguy
mx842
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If you already have a good base that is solid the little mud that has squashed up through the gravel shouldn't be a problem in fact it will probably help more than it will hurt. All I would do is wait until it is a little wet and get a small load of, we call them #5's but it's a clean washed crushed stone that is about 3/4" to 1" in size. You don't want to put it down too thick only about a 2 inch layer just enough to cover the mud, any more and it will just be a waste. The idea is to just cover it so that this clean stone can be pushed into the mud as you drive over it. The stone will mix with the mud and once it dries out what you will have is something that is so hard you can't drive a steel stake into it. If you have any soft spots it would be wise to dig them out and fill them with crushed stone before you put the #5's down. After you drive on this for 6 months or so or it gets solid wait until it is dry and lightly blade it off to fill in any uneven or low spots and cover it with crusher run (blue stone) but see if the quarry you are getting it from has the crusher run that has the larger stone 1 1/2" to 2" mixed in for this layer. This will seal off the whole top surface and if it is graded well you should be good to go for a couple years maybe more depending on the weather. If the base is already solid the layers don't have to be real thick, 2" to 3" max is all you need to put it down any more is just a waste.
It is also a good idea to have a little stock pile somewhere that you can get a shovel full or two out of to fill in any low spots before pot holes develop. After that you may have to top the drive off every couple years maybe not like I said depending on the weather and how well you catch any low spots before they become a problem.
Where most people have problems with stone drive ways is they use the wrong stone on them. A good rule of thumb is use clean stone to cover any loose or wet material until it stops sinking in and once the base is solid and dry use a stone with a lot of stone dust mixed in to seal off the surface so that the water will run off and not be able to penetrate down to the base material where all sorts of problems can start.
It is also a good idea to have a little stock pile somewhere that you can get a shovel full or two out of to fill in any low spots before pot holes develop. After that you may have to top the drive off every couple years maybe not like I said depending on the weather and how well you catch any low spots before they become a problem.
Where most people have problems with stone drive ways is they use the wrong stone on them. A good rule of thumb is use clean stone to cover any loose or wet material until it stops sinking in and once the base is solid and dry use a stone with a lot of stone dust mixed in to seal off the surface so that the water will run off and not be able to penetrate down to the base material where all sorts of problems can start.
Our 1000 foot gravel driveway on a steep grade was prepared by putting down a 4" layer of 2" crushed stone as a base, with a layer of crusher run on top of it to fill in the voids, followed by a final 2" layer of #57 crushed stone. It has held up very well for more than 10 years with only minor seasonal maintenance.
mx842
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Talking about driveways.....I built mine over 20 years ago. When I bought this property it was during the dry season and it took me awhile before I could put in an access road to the back of the land where I wanted to build. I had walked it many times looking for just the right place to put the road and the only place that I kept coming back to was in a place that was a little low. The place was wild and the trees and brush was growing right down to the road so I had to do a little clearing of brush before I could ever get my truck off the main road. I cut my way in and once I could get my truck backed in I laid out my drive way culverts and dug out the ditch and put them in. I added an extra 2 4' sections because where I put the drive was in a slight curve in the road and also I didn't want any problems with getting big trucks in and out.
The county was supposed to lay the pipe but after waiting 3 weeks for them to get there I went ahead and laid it myself. Then when they did get around to coming by they took out the extra two sections I had put in and hauled my pipe off. The guy running the machine was an @$$*%#^ and said it was a county code that you could only install 20' in a residential drive way and when I asked for my pipe back he said he had already loaded it and now it belonged to the county and it was going to the landfill and no amount of crying was going to change that. I thought about dragging him off the backhoe and teaching him some manners but I didn't have time to visit the guys down at the county jail so I just told him in a few uncertain ways just what and where I thought was a better place to put them.
I had rented a mini excavator to cut and back fill the ditch. I had planned to cut out the ditch and put 7" or 8" of stone down under the pipe and then cover the pipe and about 20' of the drive way with the stone I had ordered but the ground was so bad it took almost the whole load of stone just to lay the pipe and cover it. Then I had this huge pile of dirt I had to get rid of so I hired a couple trucks, one to bring in stone and the other to haul out the muck. The ground on top looked good and didn't seem too bad but once you cut through the root mat there was no solid ground for several feet or more and after 3 days and 13 loads of rail road ballast stone I had about 35' of the 1300+ feet of drive way to the building site put in. The sad part was that I had not gotten to the part that was really bad yet.
I knew I had to come up with another way of getting through this other than what I had been doing because at this rate I was going to spend my whole construction loan getting to the site and there would be nothing left to build my house with. I pulled the plug on the truck hauling the big stone because I was just throwing good money after bad as that stone just wasn't going to hold up the weight of the trucks. After one load in and one load out it took another whole load to just to fill in the ruts.
I decided to try something else. I had a friend that worked for the concrete pipe and cinder block plant a few miles away and I called him and asked what they did with all the broken pieces of material that I saw piled up behind the plant every time I drove by there and he told me they used them as fill material to fill in a low area behind the plant that they had plans to build on later on. I asked him if he could pull some strings and see if he could get me a few loads to put on my road. After several days he called me and said come get what I needed just check in with the guard at the gate and he would tell the truck driver where to go.
I called my dump truck buddy and he was able to send me a truck and we started to hauling these broken blocks rather than the expensive stone we were getting no where with. After several loads the truck got stuck in the gravel part even after I would level it out each time he would come and go. I mean this thing was stuck bad and the 955 cat I had wouldn't budge it so I had to call a big wrecker to get him out. Once he was out I took the pile of broken pieces he had dumped and filled in the hole where he was stuck and it was like day and night as I was walking over the cinder blocks and then on to the crushed stone. The tracks would hardly make a track on the broken blocks but once I hit the gravel they would sink in and drag the belly pan. I hated to cover up all that money with these awful looking blocks but if we were ever going to get a road in there I would have to do it so we could press on.
I got him to dump the next load right at the culvert pipe and I took the loader and worked the broken blocks in to the stone and that one load got me to the spot the truck had gotten stuck at and I couldn't wait until the truck came back to see what was going to happen. He came and backed in without hardly making a mark....well his front tires did sink in a little but he backed all the way over the spot he had gotten stuck and dumped his load without ant trouble at all. Over the next several days we made good progress and reached the point where the driveway turns slightly to the right where it meets what I thought was an old logging road but as it turns out was really an old woods road that was used back during the Civil War in the 7 Days Battle between White Oak Swamp and Malvern Hill battlefield.
The road is a gentle slope to this point and then it gets a little steeper and the dirt get a lot better. Even though the dirt at this point was good the old road was sunk in and bowl shaped so I just filled it in level to the top all the way to the house site. Finally I could drive all the way from the main road to the house site and I could finally start the house.
I could travel back and forth in my truck with no problem but my wife's little car would drag bottom when she would come check on progress so I had to do something to make it better for her if I wanted to see her or my new son again because at that point I was working day and night trying to work and build at the same time. By then I had bought an old single axle dump truck to haul gravel and dirt in when I needed it. There was a river rock sand and gravel plant nearby and if I went down into the pit they would load me bank gravel right out of the bank for $2.50 a load and I must have hauled about a bazillion loads of this stuff before I finally got a 4" layer over the whole thing but once it was covered I had one heck of a road bed that was not going anywhere. Concrete trucks, block and brick trucks, lumber trucks, heavy equipment trucks wouldn't make a dent in it after it settled down and by the time the house was built it was so hard and solid from all the heavy traffic all I had to do was fill in a couple low places and then I spread another light layer of bank gravel on top of what was there and it stayed like that for 10 years. I wanted to put that brown crush and run stone on the whole thing but I couldn't bring myself to pay them what they wanted for that stuff so after about 10 years I made it blue and spread a thin layer of blue crush and run over the bank gravel and that is all that has been put on it since I built it.
Once I am done with my barn build I hope to cover the whole thing again all the way to the barn with a fresh layer because the mud back there is really bad now and it has tracked all over the place especially around the house and my wife is starting to fuss about all the mud all over the place.
The county was supposed to lay the pipe but after waiting 3 weeks for them to get there I went ahead and laid it myself. Then when they did get around to coming by they took out the extra two sections I had put in and hauled my pipe off. The guy running the machine was an @$$*%#^ and said it was a county code that you could only install 20' in a residential drive way and when I asked for my pipe back he said he had already loaded it and now it belonged to the county and it was going to the landfill and no amount of crying was going to change that. I thought about dragging him off the backhoe and teaching him some manners but I didn't have time to visit the guys down at the county jail so I just told him in a few uncertain ways just what and where I thought was a better place to put them.
I had rented a mini excavator to cut and back fill the ditch. I had planned to cut out the ditch and put 7" or 8" of stone down under the pipe and then cover the pipe and about 20' of the drive way with the stone I had ordered but the ground was so bad it took almost the whole load of stone just to lay the pipe and cover it. Then I had this huge pile of dirt I had to get rid of so I hired a couple trucks, one to bring in stone and the other to haul out the muck. The ground on top looked good and didn't seem too bad but once you cut through the root mat there was no solid ground for several feet or more and after 3 days and 13 loads of rail road ballast stone I had about 35' of the 1300+ feet of drive way to the building site put in. The sad part was that I had not gotten to the part that was really bad yet.
I knew I had to come up with another way of getting through this other than what I had been doing because at this rate I was going to spend my whole construction loan getting to the site and there would be nothing left to build my house with. I pulled the plug on the truck hauling the big stone because I was just throwing good money after bad as that stone just wasn't going to hold up the weight of the trucks. After one load in and one load out it took another whole load to just to fill in the ruts.
I decided to try something else. I had a friend that worked for the concrete pipe and cinder block plant a few miles away and I called him and asked what they did with all the broken pieces of material that I saw piled up behind the plant every time I drove by there and he told me they used them as fill material to fill in a low area behind the plant that they had plans to build on later on. I asked him if he could pull some strings and see if he could get me a few loads to put on my road. After several days he called me and said come get what I needed just check in with the guard at the gate and he would tell the truck driver where to go.
I called my dump truck buddy and he was able to send me a truck and we started to hauling these broken blocks rather than the expensive stone we were getting no where with. After several loads the truck got stuck in the gravel part even after I would level it out each time he would come and go. I mean this thing was stuck bad and the 955 cat I had wouldn't budge it so I had to call a big wrecker to get him out. Once he was out I took the pile of broken pieces he had dumped and filled in the hole where he was stuck and it was like day and night as I was walking over the cinder blocks and then on to the crushed stone. The tracks would hardly make a track on the broken blocks but once I hit the gravel they would sink in and drag the belly pan. I hated to cover up all that money with these awful looking blocks but if we were ever going to get a road in there I would have to do it so we could press on.
I got him to dump the next load right at the culvert pipe and I took the loader and worked the broken blocks in to the stone and that one load got me to the spot the truck had gotten stuck at and I couldn't wait until the truck came back to see what was going to happen. He came and backed in without hardly making a mark....well his front tires did sink in a little but he backed all the way over the spot he had gotten stuck and dumped his load without ant trouble at all. Over the next several days we made good progress and reached the point where the driveway turns slightly to the right where it meets what I thought was an old logging road but as it turns out was really an old woods road that was used back during the Civil War in the 7 Days Battle between White Oak Swamp and Malvern Hill battlefield.
The road is a gentle slope to this point and then it gets a little steeper and the dirt get a lot better. Even though the dirt at this point was good the old road was sunk in and bowl shaped so I just filled it in level to the top all the way to the house site. Finally I could drive all the way from the main road to the house site and I could finally start the house.
I could travel back and forth in my truck with no problem but my wife's little car would drag bottom when she would come check on progress so I had to do something to make it better for her if I wanted to see her or my new son again because at that point I was working day and night trying to work and build at the same time. By then I had bought an old single axle dump truck to haul gravel and dirt in when I needed it. There was a river rock sand and gravel plant nearby and if I went down into the pit they would load me bank gravel right out of the bank for $2.50 a load and I must have hauled about a bazillion loads of this stuff before I finally got a 4" layer over the whole thing but once it was covered I had one heck of a road bed that was not going anywhere. Concrete trucks, block and brick trucks, lumber trucks, heavy equipment trucks wouldn't make a dent in it after it settled down and by the time the house was built it was so hard and solid from all the heavy traffic all I had to do was fill in a couple low places and then I spread another light layer of bank gravel on top of what was there and it stayed like that for 10 years. I wanted to put that brown crush and run stone on the whole thing but I couldn't bring myself to pay them what they wanted for that stuff so after about 10 years I made it blue and spread a thin layer of blue crush and run over the bank gravel and that is all that has been put on it since I built it.
Once I am done with my barn build I hope to cover the whole thing again all the way to the barn with a fresh layer because the mud back there is really bad now and it has tracked all over the place especially around the house and my wife is starting to fuss about all the mud all over the place.
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Thanks guys. All this info is a great help. MX, that's one heck of a story about your driveway. There's been more than a few times that I wished I had a old dump truck to do some of this stuff myself...these delivery charges start adding up. Plus, you can never have too many toys.
mx842
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you are right about that, big boy toys are a mans best friend.:laughing:
I don't think I saved much money though, the truck needed some work and by the time I got it running I probably didn't break even, BUT! the good thing was that I could haul stuff like that when I wanted to and didn't have to wait for someone else to haul it to me. Also I did take advantage of a lot of things that came up that I never would have been able to go and get, like load after load of firewood, fill dirt, free mulch and a bunch of other stuff.
The engine finally blew up and at that point it wasn't worth fixing but I am always looking for a good deal on another one just to have around.