Grading First Time Road Grading.. any tips

[CowwFace]

Hey Men,

Ok, it's round 3... in this corner ... 1/4 mile of the most stubborn road mankind has ever seen... in the other corner.. ME.. with tractor and rear blade... My neighbor commented to me that it's like riding a horse driving on our road... so I've gotta get better at this.

I'm using a Kioti rear blade, I'll post pic's of it. Right now I've got the top link a bit shorter to tip the bottom of the blade out (away from tractor) to dig less and "grade" more. I'm going to try the blade turned around 180 today and see what I can do with that as well.

And of coarse I'm in the process of fixing the giant scratches I put in the fender ... have to have priorities in order.. gotta look good messing up the community road!!!

I'll keep you informed of the saga as it unfolds..

Phill

 

[CowwFace]

Oh, and hey Phill...take a pic or three for us to see...

Ok, While waiting for paint to dry I walked down to road and got a pic of the top 1/2 that I'm having trouble with.

You can see the hill at it's steepest part.. and I will admit that it had a bunch of washouts running down it's lenght that I did get rid of.. but the drainage ditch along the right of this photo is where I'm having most difficulty. I can't get that little mound of dirt along the left edge of the ditch to scour further to the left.. I just end up pushing it back into ditch... partially filling in ditch. I think it's the offset adjustment that is out-smarting me on this one..

Phill

PS: also one pic of first coat of fender paint. I'm using the Dupli-Color Chevy orange DE1620 Engine Enamel and it sure seems to match pretty well. I'll know for sure when I pull the tape.

 

[/pine]

I would collect and relocate (stockpile) the material

 

[CowwFace]

I would collect and relocate (stockpile) the material

Hey / Pine,

So use the FEL to gather up that ridge and dump it in a pothole or something? I'll give that a try as soon as the fender paint is dry... thank for for the new eyes!

Phill

 

[sandman2234]

I realize that pictures are often misleading, but it appears you could use a little more crown in the road. From the center of the road, it should slope to both ditches. Which reminds me, why didn't you want a ditch on the other side? Does the neighbors "non-culvert" drive take up the whole lenght of the roadway? Ditch to close to his drive, skip the drive, then ditch again. With a little rain, he will invest in a culvert!!
The road I maintain has ditches to both sides, now that I have dug them, but in the beginning it only had one. The road washed away to that side, so the crown is on one side, but I don't have a rear blade with an angle that it would take to recrown the road. As far as the bucking like a horse statement, consider a couple of different avenues.
1) Another implement, double edged grader such as a duragrader
2) Build and install training wheels on your blade, basically making a "land Plane" out of it.
The training wheels will offset the tractor tires going down into a rut and the blade following it, giving you a more even surface. The work great (and aren't called training wheels, just similar)

David from jax

 

[/pine]

So use the FEL to gather up that ridge and dump it in a pothole or something?

usually "lose" material will just wash out of pot holes...I had a similar problem and I just stockpiled it out of the way...as time and nature passed the condensed (by rainfall) material can be used where needed...

I used the float function of the FEL to collect/load the material then piled it out of the way

 

[AchingBack]

The condition of the road looks ideal for a 7' landscape rake set on an angle, with gauge wheels.

 

[CowwFace]

Ok I'm DONE!!

I finally just did a hail mary and shortend the top link as short as it would go, and but the blade all the way down and drove! Turned out pretty good. The neighbor w/o the culvurt and I chatted and we thought we would try to crown the road about 2/3 to the left of the road.. and see if we could get enough watere to sheet over to the one ditch, before it gets to the steep part of the road where the water gets enough velocity to wash out the road itself.. well see.. he if it dosent work, more reason to get back on the tractor!

I finished up by spinning the blade 180 degrees (had to make the top link longer again for this) and put it at slight angle and it smoothed out the road quite nicely! Thanks for all of your help guys!

With all the spare time today, I'm getting "Mr. Ulgy" ready to sell.. it's a 1974 IH pickup. 1/2 ton 4x4 that will go just about anywhere!

Carry on,
Phill

 

[CowwFace]

I realize that pictures are often misleading, but it appears you could use a little more crown in the road. From the center of the road, it should slope to both ditches. Which reminds me, why didn't you want a ditch on the other side? Does the neighbors "non-culvert" drive take up the whole lenght of the roadway? Ditch to close to his drive, skip the drive, then ditch again. With a little rain, he will invest in a culvert!!
The road I maintain has ditches to both sides, now that I have dug them, but in the beginning it only had one. The road washed away to that side, so the crown is on one side, but I don't have a rear blade with an angle that it would take to recrown the road. As far as the bucking like a horse statement, consider a couple of different avenues.
1) Another implement, double edged grader such as a duragrader
2) Build and install training wheels on your blade, basically making a "land Plane" out of it.
The training wheels will offset the tractor tires going down into a rut and the blade following it, giving you a more even surface. The work great (and aren't called training wheels, just similar)

David from jax

Hey David,

I did a search for the "training wheels" and I like the idea.. I'll add that to my list of mod's..

I was thinking while coming in the house tonight, that a little "tang" with a hole on the back of my rear blade would be nice so I could mount a 2" ball and move the empty utility trailer around the yard etc.... How much stuff can one hang off the back of their rear blade before it's just tacky? hehehe.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Carry on,
Phill

 

[KennyV]

Road looks OK.. the P/U looks GREAT... KennyV

 

[Iowachild]

Road looks OK.. the P/U looks GREAT... KennyV

I really like your flag!

 

[dex3361]

Great job it always is more work than you think.

 

[Paul004]

I think it would be a good idea to create a slope on that road. Otherwise the soil will wash out in the first rain. Even some simple rolling will help reduce washout. Other than that a pretty good job.

The sherwood grader i posted a picture of before can be moved to the side past the width of the tractor.

What exactly were you doing when you scratched the fenders?

 

[Redbug]

Hey Phill,

Looks good and you broke the ice with the neighbor. That's good! And thanks for the pics. We all like to see pics and share what we are doing. And nothing else gets us involved in a thread like showing pics!

Your road looks like it has a combination of gravel and clay. That is a pretty good combination for a good road bed and easy to keep maintained.

 

[sandman2234]

If training wheels doen't come up in a search, try guage wheels.
David from jax

 

[mdn0123]

I know you are done with your grading, but here is the way I have been doing it on my 1/4 mile gravel/dirt driveway.

1) start with the grader blade at a sharp angle, maybe 30-45 degrees, and only a small amount of tilt. Go along the sides and either do a small ditch or just pull in the material from the sides on the first pass or two.
2) next adjust the blad so that it has less angle, and probably less tilt and make a pass to form the crown using the material you pulled in on the first pass, plus new stuff you scrape up. How much angle and tilt depends on the material and what you are trying to do.
3) after you have a crown from making one or more passes in both directions, I've found a york rake to be very helpful for smoothing out the surface and putting a final finished shape on the road. Me and two other neighbors went in together to purchase a used rake and we just share it when needed.

Mostly, you figure all this out by trial and error. The first time I tried it, it took a long time and the result wasn't so great. Now I can usually just touch it up with the york rake and save the grader blade work for maybe once or twice per year.

 

[sandman2234]

A wise (and rich) lady once told my mother "I set the style where I go", so who cases if your rear blade gets a little tacky looking. Most of us look past the color of your paint, past the size of your tires, past the horsepower of your engine and what flavor fuel it is running. What we want to see is pictures!!!
Before you cut that single hole for a "Reese hitch" receiver, or mount that tang, consider doing it twice, to allow the training wheels to be added or removed. Just a thought...
David from jax

Hey David,

I did a search for the "training wheels" and I like the idea.. I'll add that to my list of mod's..

I was thinking while coming in the house tonight, that a little "tang" with a hole on the back of my rear blade would be nice so I could mount a 2" ball and move the empty utility trailer around the yard etc.... How much stuff can one hang off the back of their rear blade before it's just tacky? hehehe.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Carry on,
Phill