screw anchors on frozen ground

[sparc]

anyone have a good tip for getting anchors in the frozen ground , beside waiting for spring .

Tried using a pick to get through the first 6 inches, tough going. It's 20 deg here and ground is nice and hard.

 

[Welshman]

How big of a hole and how deep?

 

[sparc]

we got them in. they are 4 foot screw anchors with two ~5" diameter screws. had to dig with the pick another foot, so about 18 inches down ground was soft enough to get them going. i had 8 of them to do. it hasn't been cold here for long. last week it was in the upper 50s and only dropping into the mid 30s at night, so I didn't expect the ground to be frozen this deep so fast. it just turned cold monday with that cold front that blew in from Michigan/Ohio area, since then it has struggled to get above freezing at mid-day.

Anyway, jobs done so that's that.

 

[PILOON]

A bit off topic but I needed to access my pump in my septic system as it had failed.
That light bulb (idea) lit up.
I took firewood and built a fire over the concrete lid and had my wife feed the fire while I went to buy a replacement pump.
By the time I returned the ground over and around the lid was nicely thawed and the lid came off just like in summer. Even with a pick I had been unable to make any progress.
Good news was that the float switch had simply got itself tangled in the off position due to a 3 day power failure and was easily rectified.

 

[Gale Hawkins]

A bit off topic but I needed to access my pump in my septic system as it had failed.
That light bulb (idea) lit up.
I took firewood and built a fire over the concrete lid and had my wife feed the fire while I went to buy a replacement pump.
By the time I returned the ground over and around the lid was nicely thawed and the lid came off just like in summer. Even with a pick I had been unable to make any progress.
Good news was that the float switch had simply got itself tangled in the off position due to a 3 day power failure and was easily rectified.

Sounds like you got lucky and did not have to do a switch out in the cold.