Land Prep/House Build

[wmonroe]

Hello everyone, my wife and i are getting ready to start building a house in the next few weeks so I thought I would start a thread that showed our steps through the process. I appreciate any comments you want to give.

Might as well start at the beginning.

About 14 months ago we went to look at this piece of property we had been watching for a while. After a little negotiating we were the proud owners of 16.7 acres. Here it is when we bought it.

And a couple in the spring when it is green, just prior to the driveway going in.

The first thing we did other than mowing the fields down was to install the driveway.
The top soil removed.

 

[gwjd]

looks great

 

[wmonroe]

My first lesson I learned is that shale although common in this area does not work at all for a driveway. I was out of town for work when my wife called me because the well driller could not make it up the driveway, his truck would just sink in the shale.
This is the pile of #4 stone to spread over the shale so the well driller could make it to the top of the driveway.

My dad helped me out and spread the stone, and the well driller was able to make it up the driveway.
Here he is drilling.

After the well was drilled we didn't do very much else before winter. It was very nice in the summer/fall though sitting around a campfire there and relaxing.

Now we are to the present time. This was my project for the last two weekends. I decided underground electric was the way to go, which means I need about 700' of trench from the last pole to the transformer. Thought I could dig this in about 8 hours, which led to lesson 2. Digging went way slower than I anticipated and by time it was down I logged about 28 hours of time on the mini excavator.
Conduit is a minimum of 36", deeper just about everywhere but there were a few rocks requiring a jack hammer and after hammering for quite a while I was happy with 36".

1400' of conduit (700' of both 3" and 2").

Me on the machine.

Pictures of the trench.

 

[wmonroe]

looks great

Thanks, we are going to begin the house in the middle of April so it is going to get exciting very quick.

 

[B7510HSD]

Looking good!!:thumbsup:

 

[hobie]

Beautiful property! I'll look forward to following this one!

 

[wmonroe]

Thanks for the replies. Dig date is April 18 so I will be following up with pictures.

 

[Kyle241]

Now that is trench! Nice views, can't wait to see the process. Any specs on the house? Are you going 'green'?

 

[wmonroe]

Yeah, the trench was definately more involved than I had expected. Really thought i could dig it all in 8-10 hours or less but missed that goal by a lot. Good lesson though. House will be a two story about 2200 sq ft. and about 720 sq ft of attached garage. Not really going 'green', going to use electric/heat pump and a gas fire place in the living room for the time being. Couldn't decide what i wanted to use for heat long term so that is my short term solution.

 

[TnWV]

Nice looking property. I am sure the trench and conduit is expensive but you won't regret it. Nothing worse than a bunch of telephone poles in the yard. I hope to build a similar size house in 2-3 years so I will be following closely and hopefully learn a few things!