Gravel Driveway using Grid products to reduce washout

[jhendric]

 

[jhendric]

Sorry for having pic in on post and text in the next, I've never posted pics before. In the first pic to the far left of the dog (left side of gravel) is where the worst of the washout begins. water flows down the driveway from there creating ruts. The second and third pics show where I have no ditch, washout is not as bad there as it is farther down, The last pic is downhill looking up. The worst of the washout would be on the right in pic4 as the water is flowing down the driveway. I feel like the problem is mostly water that comes straight down the driveway, but it is fed by the lack of ditch uphill.

Please note these pics do not show the actual washout as I box bladed it after the last heavy rain...

 

[EddieWalker]

Looking at your rock, it doesn't look like you have fines mixed in with the larger rocks. How thick is the rock? The fines will lock the rock together and make it look almost solid. Your road looks like loose rock. If it's not thick enough, it will never lock together.

Were I live in East Texas, 4 inches is the minimum for road base rock to lock together when compacted. When the County builds roads, they put down at least a foot of rock and roll it with vibratory compactors.

If the rock does not lock together, it will wash away. Once it's compacted, the worse thing you can do to a gravel road is to disturb the rock. Dragging it, grading it, or doing anything to it will weaken it. Potholes should be dug up, filled and compacted with a little damage to the surrounding rock as possible.

If you do not have enough rock in place, it will never stop eroding.

 

[jhendric]

Interesting, it was professionally laid and compacted and was plenty thick to start. That being said I've box bladed it 100 times since then. It did erode first before my first box blading.

I wonder if it makes sense to put down some gravel fines to help lock the loose gravel at this point.

 

[paulsharvey]

It looks like atleast the top layer is loose gravel. That can be caused by the box blading to fill the erosion though.

Some of that loose could be caused by a couple things. It looks kinda narrow, using the dog for scale, it looks 3.5 dogs wide, and it probably should have been a full 4 dogs wide. I'm kinda joking, it looks 9-10 ft wide, and it is possible that the vehicle traffic is pushing everything outward.

 

[D&D]

Interesting, it was professionally laid and compacted and was plenty thick to start. That being said I've box bladed it 100 times since then. It did erode first before my first box blading.

I wonder if it makes sense to put down some gravel fines to help lock the loose gravel at this point.

IMO, that would be a waste of money at this time. Fixing the water/drainage issues should be your first priority. in the first picture, there appears to be little to no drainage away from the graveled area.

 

[thclimer]

In your last picture is your fiber buried on the left side? Is it from this left side that water is not being shed from the driveway and running down its length? My initial impression is you need a more aggressive crown to shed the water off the driveway as soon as you can and then you need a ditch or a swale to divert it away.

 

[jhendric]

In the last picture the fiber is on the right. There is a decent ditch at that point but the water from uphill is moving down the driveway bypassing the ditch. That picture is where the worst of the erosion happens.

 

[BnRidge]

Near here we have the Kettle Moraine recreational area. It's basically highly erodable glacial till sand and gravel with forest roads and trails in and around all the hills. 30yrs ago they experimented with all sorts of erosion control. Dozens of kinds of buried plastic wood and metal mesh, timbers, buried canvas diverters, crushed stone, spray on hardeners etc. Not a one worked. When it was finally realized that velocity and volume overruled all of it did they finally come up with a plan. All the contraptions were removed. Water was kept from gaining momentum. Roads were crowned, trails were tilted to shed water sideways and dispersed. Curves had a reverse camber to keep the inside corner from pooling. Those going straight up hills were rerouted or rebuilt.

 

[2manyrocks]

Beautiful property. Like others, I'd suggest more crown to your road and doing what you can all along the slope to divert it off the road. You don't want it to run a long way downhill on your road because it will washout.