Should I do it myself?

[LBrown59]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( dragging the dirt out of a "borrow" ditch next to the road.
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Here is how I would go about this:
Use the hoe of my BX23 and or the tiller on my 1967 Bolens to break up the dirt then scoop it up in the FEL and dump it over the culvert.

The advantage of the tiller is the dirt is finer and covers the pipe better without leaving large air pockets in the back fill around the pipe.
The finer dirt will also compact better and easier around the pipe.
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This post is not about me however it does involve sharing experence/information.

 

[Buck]

I've built three culverts. On the first one, I used a box blade. On the other two, I did not.

You are not really going that deep. I would be suprised if you could not get the job done with a rear end implement used for ballast and a good FEL with a tootbar in a few hours.

The only time my box blade really proved its worth for me was a 150 foot drainage ditch that I built that started at about six inches deep and ended at about 24 inches deep.

 

[flusher]

If I were doing this job, my inclination would be to use my $150 middle buster and plow the area on the road where the culvert has to go. Use the FEL for scooping out the loose dirt. Plow again if you need to go deeper.

You'll have a 4 ot 5 ft wide trench across the road (depending on the width of your FEL bucket that's admittedly oversize. But so what. It's a dirt road so you won't be digging up expensive pavement. Lay the culvert and use the FEL to move the dirt back in the trench and smooth it out with the backside of the bucket. Don't need no stinkin' box blade for this job.

If you want to do it all with the FEL and not use any 3PH implements, then follow the suggestion of someone in this thread and consider getting a tooth bar for your FEL so you can dig efficiently. The cost is under $200 for 4-ft wide units (but check the shipping cost carefully before whipping out the plastic).

 

[OkeeDon]

I have FEL and box blade. I'm not about to hold myself out as an expert on the box blade, but I've gotten compliments from a professional grading contractor.

I put in my own culvert, 15" diameter by 40' with mitered ends. There was an exisitng swale, but I prepped and graded it with my FEL, working from the side as was suggested above. It's a little bit of a pucker factor working with your front wheels down in the slope, but not really a problem -- you only feel like you're going to slide out of the seat and over the hood. /forums/images/graemlins/ooo.gif

When the culvert was delivered, we rolled it off the side of the truck down into the Vee; it actually ended up with the miters facing up the correct way! I then backfilled it carefully, again using the FEL, making sure that the first few inches of backfill got under the curves of the culvert and didn't leave any voids. There is no other way to backfill the Vee other than an FEL that I can imagine.

I use my FEL to rough grade. I find the opposite factor than you mentioned. Because the box blade is so close to the tractor, I find it reponds more quickly to the upsys and downsys of the tractor and needs a much more delicate touch on the control lever to keep it anywhere near level. The FEL is way out there in front of me where I can see it. I use a combination of back dragging with the back edge of the bucket (not recommended, because it supoosedly wears the pins, but it does such a nice job I'll willingly replace the pins if necessary); front pushing with the blade in a dozer angle, and finally back-smoothing with the nearly flat bottom of the blade and lots of down pressure. I deliberately raise the front wheels off the ground; I'm going straight back and don't need to steer.

The attached is not my culvert but is a section I've graded with the above technique; I haven't gone in there yet with the box blade. (I'm cheating a little; the picture was taken after a rainfall smoothed it a bit more). But, to me, the box blade is best for going from this state to a finished state. It's a finishing tool, not a gross dirt-moving tool. I used my box blade on my culvert job only to grade my shell rock cover over the culvert into the final road grade.

If I didn't have the FEL, I'd use any of the implements mentioned above (plow, middle buster, pond scoop, rear blade, etc.) to do most of the culvert work rather than a box blade. Of course, if I didn't have a box blade and wanted to justify it to my CFO, I might alter my opinion slightly. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

As for your dimensions, since your pipe will be 12" in diameter, I assume that when you say "bury it 8" you mean that the top of the pipe will be 8" underground and the bottom will be 20" underground; then when you build up the road by 6" you will have over a foot of material on top of the pipe. If this is what you mean, you'll be fine. But, if what you meant that the bottom of the pipe will be 8" down, and stick up 4" above the road until you build up the road to 6" higher over it, then I'm afraid you might have problems if you try to take anything very heavy over it. You'd only end up with 2" of fill over the culvert, and that's not really enough to spread the load over the width of the culvert. My county is pretty lax about such things, but they require 12" of shell rock (like crushed limestone) or gravel over the pipe. The bottom of my 15" pipe is only about 20" deep (because that's where the bottom of the drainage swale is), so I needed to build it up in a hump more than 8" high over the pipe, and slope up to it on either side.

 

[LBrown59]

I have to have a dip over the pipe I'm installing because A hump over the pipe will flood the front yard.

 

[Holzster]

Sendro

I am down by Anna south of you - I have a Subsoiler/Middle buster . If you want to come by & barrow it. that might help start the cutting off.

tracy