Working in Ponds

[paccorti]

I've been digging out my pond lately and thought I'd share some of what I've learned.

1. Wet clay (and wet mud) is generally VERY heavy. Be careful and keep the bucket as low as possible.
2. Loader breakout is particularly challenging when the bucket is partially submerged (as you have to break the suction of the water). Roll forward and back slightly to help break the suction.
3. You need a real gentle slope into and out of the pond to carry anything of significant weight (as traction is a problem).
4. Driving backwards for half of each trip (as opposed to turning the tractor around twice per load) is MUCH faster.
5. Clay is positively EVIL with regards to getting stuck.
6. Even little branches hurt. While backing up after dumping a load in the woods I bent back a 3/4" branch with the rollbar. The branch then promptly let go and slapped me in the face. If I was to put an estimate on the force of this, I'd say it's like bending back a wood yard stick about 2' and then firing into your upper cheek. Ouch!
7. Many times I was able to drive to a spot where I wanted to remove material, BUT filling the loader bucket would then sink the front wheels in the muck... sometimes a smaller load is better.
7. Sometimes you have to get creative to get material out of a spot with limited traction. On trick seemed to work well. Many times I've had to back the tractor out of the muck by using bucket curl (when the bucket is pointed downwards) to push me out of a sticky situation. Usually though, if I was careful I could pull quite a bit of material with me. All the while keep the bucket pointed down then, push the bucket deep and roll to push yourself out then lift slightly and dump to pull material with you; repeat until you get onto solid ground. Worked well for me.
8. My tractor has R4s. I wonder if R1s would have been better. I know that R1s clear mud better but this is all based on the premise that there is something more solid below the mud (not necessarily the case in a pond, some places were over 2' of gooey clay). I expect the R1s might press down harder (higher psi) and tend to bury the tires quicker. No way of knowing for sure but just thinking out loud here...

Peter

 

[njrqs]

Wow that is a lot of info. Keeping us all informed. I take it your pond dried out by itself?

Not having a FEL, I got a 12T excavator in to play in mine. I don't think I'd like to be playing in mine with a tractor anyway. As you say, very easy to get stuck and hard to get back out of.

Send some pics of you in action !

Cheers

 

[MossRoad]

Sounds fun. Some pictures of your pond would be cool. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[paccorti]

I'll try to get some pictures. Unfortunately my scanner is down since my XP upgrade. I'll work on it again.

Peter

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Word of advice, next time you dig it out let the material set on the bank for about a month that way it has a chance to dry out and you won't be sinking on wet ground. R1's would have helped because they grab unlike R4's that mostly float. The R1's would have pulled you thru most of it with no problem but will leave more of a mess then a R4. When we dug our pond we used a Komatsu PC 150 to dig it and a JD 450G to clear the fill away from the banks. All the material was clay and shale and tracked machines have no trouble on them most of the time.

 

[gmason]

Peter, we went though the pond digging process a few years ago and here's what we ended-up with... <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.tractorbynet.com/forumfiles/33-37728-pond_finished_summer00.jpg>our pond</A>

I would also warn you about punching into some natural springs. This is not the best time of the year to be digging out a pond anyway. We have some neighbors that are starting to build and they pourded footings a few weeks ago and everytime it rains(about every 4 days) they have to dig the 4-5" of muck off the concrete footings and pump water out of the lower side. And they've totally trashed any topsoil around the house site.

gary

 

[paccorti]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I have no doubt that tracked machines would have made this easier but I'm stubborn and besides I wanted a lot of tractor time!

The pond had drained quite a bit on its own, I helped it along in a couple of sections with a trash pump. All in all I'm pleased with the performance of my TC35D; I think it did a great job on the excavation.

Peter

 

[duanet]

Peter,
I'm picking up on one comment you made in your original post - the slap in the face. I've been doing a lot of work clearing brush and have had similar experiences. Baileys Online has what they call a Sordin Helmet for $29.95. It's a hard hat with ear and eye protection. Actually, the face screen is like a full face shield but doesn't fog over because it is a screen. I got one a couple of weeks ago, and I think it's great. If you're interested, Baileys is at <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.baileys-online.com/store/USA.htm>http://www.baileys-online.com/store/USA.htm</A>.
Duane

 

[paccorti]

Duane,

Thanks for the thought. I have a full face motocross helmet that I could use (it is even appropriately blue). I probably should use it, might get more stares than I need from my neighbors. On the other hand that branch really did hurt. When I put a gloved hand on my face I was sure I would pull it away bloody.

Peter

 

[patrickg]

Bucket suction: I wonder if you could put a piece of pipe or two, say at the ends of the bucket to break the suction under the bucket. One end of each pipe would be near the top of the open bucket and the other end near where the suction is. This should let air, or water if the bucket is in deep enough, get into the area that is pulling the vacuum and relieve it. Hopefully the pipe being at the sides of the bucket wouldn't let it get trashed tooooo fast. I suppose if you want high tech you could use a compressor and a small accumulator tank to supply compressed air under the bucket but I think plain ole pipes would do it..
I have eight ponds in need of de-silting, two of which need dam restoration to allow them to fill to the design height (depth?). The other six are brim full and overflowing as underground water comes in on the uphill sides. I nearly got stuck twice with the front wheels just barely in the water and the bucket curl save me readily once. the other time I had to hunt up downed wood to put under the front tires while holding the wheels in the air with the bucket. I had sunk so deep that the front axle was burried so the curl couldn't save me until I raised the front with debris (sticks). Of course unpredicted rain started to fall about 10 min into this 40 min evolution.
I'm thinking maybe a long cable with two turning blocks anchored to good deadmen so I can shuttle back and forth (without turning around, just like you recommend) keeping the tractor high and dry while pulling a scoop through a pond. I've heard of it being done with two tractors. A big one to pull the muck out and a little one in opposition to pull the empty bucket/scoop back across the pond. Two tractors would be great and easier to manuever to dig anywhere in the pond B U T I'm one guy with one tractor soooo...
I have been considering using a pump to make a suction dredge to suck out the finer silt. Need to research the horse power vs gallons/unit time, length of run, head (height desired above pond to deposit removed material) and on and on. I know it can be done (we put men on the moon) but is it cost effective? At least it is something one guy could do.

Best of luck to you with your pond work,

Patrick

 

[bgott]

I really, really tried to keep this thought to myself.


Looks like those boys in Georgia need to read up on this thread...looks like they're going to be doing some work in a pond themselves.

 

[ewoss3]

patrickg, just use a pickup in place of the second tractor, we used to use this method for pulling a supply barge to and from a friends island cabin.

 

[patrickg]

ewoss3,
The pickup/second vehicle idea hadn't escaped me. I have a 4wd Dodge Dakota which is a candidate for such a light duty task. Don't want to use the Dodge 4x4 or is that 6x6 3500 dually diesel... too heavy, churns up the ground too much and its 12000 lb winch is too slow if I thought of trying that. My problem is just a single driver, me. I need a way to do it with one driver that isn't such an inefficient method that Rube Goldberg would think it excessive. That is one of the reasons that I am attracted to the suction dredge idea, only one operator required. My needs have grown since the rural water district layed their main line in the right of way I granted them. They churned up a lot of dirt and the rains have washed much of it into one of my largest ponds. I have 8 ponds, most of which need some de-silting. If it were just one pond, I'd ask a neighbor for help and do something for them in return but this is going to be like burying an elephant(a large undertaking) and I don't think it as appropriate as it would be if it were a smaller task.
I'm open for other suggestions if you or any of the other members of the brain trust want to give it a whirl.

Patrick

 

[ewoss3]

big pulley on the far end with a light duty dragline to return the bucket. this will work but be slower becasue you will have to swap the lines. the other options, brothers, fathers, wives, nieces, nephews, I find my nieces are ideal for this type of work. The 11yrold drives the lawn tractor or truck and the 8 yrold hooks up and fetches the barley pop when I get parched

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Patrickg

The suction dredge idea should work okay. I remember seeing a small gold dredge that was basically what you describe. It was mounted on a small inflatable raft and they had models that could be worked by one or two men. You float it down a river (you need scuba) and suck the material off the bottom through the dredge. It is then screened and the solids are deposited elsewhere for later panning. That's basically the operation you are describing, except you wouldn't want to save the solids. So, you would need some way/place to dump the water where the solids would separate and mainly water would filter back into the pond.

If anybody sets up the bucket and line system, post some pictures or plans or something.

SHF

 

[patrickg]

SHF, I once had an electronics tech working for me to get a grub stake to go back to the gold fields of Northern California. He told me about dredging. He had a Keene brand dredge on pontoons and used a hookah (sp?) rig (SCUBA type regulator but the air supply is from the surface not tanks on your back. I designed a heat exchanger for him that used engine heat to warm up water and pump it down to him. A surgical ruber manifold and distribution system inside his wet suit dumped the hot water where he wanted it and the excess just escapes without inflating the suit.
There is a warm comfortable feeling experienced by many SCUBA divers that has to be experienced after a good long time below the thermocline or in cold water to be appreciated. I won't describe it here but use your imagination or if you are a diver YOU KNOW what I mean. Anyway, I digresssssssssss...

My first thoughts on this pond dredging (mentioned in a previous post) was to box blade some contour saw tooth shaped berm-ditches, fill them with straw for filter material, and pump the water-sediment mix above the highest "ditch". It should fill with water and sediment and over flow mostly water with some sediment to the next lower ditch, and so on through all the contoured ditches eventually returning discolored water with little suspended sediment to the pond. Note: all 8 of my ponds have fairly extensive sloped grass covered slopes above them on at least one or more sides. I might try this without the "filter medium" and depend on a low flow rate for the volume of the ditches to let most of the sediment settle out.

What I haven't researched yet is the required horse power, pump volume-pressure requirements for the head of pressure to be overcome due to the height above the surface of the pond to up the hill where I want to discharge the water-sediment mix.

Having just pumped 7 1/2 yds of concrete through a 2 in ID hose last tuesday I feel some better about trying to pump sediment although it is with different pump technology. I hope to figure out a cost effective approach unlike putting footprints on the moon.

Anyone out there in the brain trust have experience with pumps that can pump soupy mud with some sand but no hard chunks larger than say a pea, a lima bean, a peach pit or whatever? I have no experience on what it takes to pump what as all my previous pumping experience was with uncontaminated liquids (with the exception of the rented concrete pump.)

Patrick

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Patrickg

I know what you mean. When I still had time for diving, we used to "preheat" our wetsuits with gallon jugs of water before going in. Lake Michigan in March and April can be a bit nippy. Worst part is getting all warm and snuggy swimming around and then reaching for something and opening that wonderful void under your armpit. /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif

The multiple filter idea sounds like a winner, you might want to keep some extra filter medium on hand since I would expect the straw to plug up pretty fast.

Keene is a popular brand for dredges. I believe the company name is Keene Engineering?

SHF

 

[micromike]

I've been exploring ways to dredge silt out of a small lake on which I live. I talked to the guy who pumps my holding tank, (can't have a septic field next to the lake) and he uses a trash pump which is a centrifical pump driven by a gas engine. My research shows they come in 2" 3" and 4" suction hose sizes. The 4" is reported to be able to pump a slurry of mud, roots, rocks etc. up to tennis ball size.

Below are a couple of links to Turbo Turf Hydroseeding systems, which pump a slurry of grass seed and mulch to seed lawns. They use a centrifical pump set up to do this which is the closest I have been able to come for some technical info. thus far.

http://www.turboturf.com/
http://www.turboturf.com/How_They_Work.htm

Northern Tools sells trash pumps or you might be able to rent one I would think. And I saw a used 2" trashpump and motor for sale a few weeks ago in our local penny saver for $200. I


I'm going to try this when the weather warms up. I'll let you know how it works.

Anyone else had any experience using a trash pump?

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Patrick


There are two types of divers - those who know exactly what you mean...

and those who won't admit it !!!

 

[patrickg]

Absolutely, Stan!
You might be amused to know that this was the inspiration for the prototype "heated suit" that I put together to stay warm in winter while cleaning the bottom of my sailboat. I put an aerator to hose barb adaptor on the galley sink pressurized faucet and ran a garden hose down the neck of my wet suit. Worked real good so for my tech I went to the surgical rubber manifold distribution scheme and incorporated a heat exchanger with his Keene dredge's engine exhaust and made him a happy dredger as previously his season was restricted by how cold of water he could tollerate.
I eventually went to a semi-dry (comfort) suit for winter and below the thermocline use. Southern California's costal upwelling keeps the coastal waters pretty cool year round except for the immediate surface to a few feet. Haven't dived any of my ponds yet, should be pretty warm in mid to late summer. So far I have only been waist deep in one while clearing a six inch overflow pipe. It had willow roots down in it that were 14 feet long virtualy plugging it such that overflow bypassed the dam and washed out a dozen T posts.

Patrick