Input on Clearing for a Forest Road

[drivadesl]

hey gang! I am putting ideas together for a road/drive that I would like to build on some recently acquired property. The road starts at a field, but runs into wooded area where I eventually will build a cabin. The road through the wooded area will run about 1/8 of a mile and will skirt along the base of a hill on one side, and has a wet swampy area on the other. It then turn towards the building site,where it will cross an underground spring/stream. The spring is mostly dry in summer, and gets wetter with the seasons, and runs into a swampy area.


My plan is to first lay stone then excavate about 4-6' into the hill and use the refuse to build up the road. When I get to the wetter area, will clear some room and laying culverts to ensure water can still travel downstream, and build up the road base over the top.

I plan on doing this with a 4T Kubota U-35 mini-ex to dig and a 70HP TN-70 utility tractor to help spread rock and to grade. I will have to remove some 8-10" dia trees along the way, though its not to thick luckily.

My quesion is do you think the equipment I have is up to the task? I expect I may rent a larger Ex to remove stumps or for heavy digging, or a dozer if necessary. I am even considering buying a larger Ex in the 15T size to use for this and other projects, though prefer not to if what I have will work. I have no deadline so will work mostly weekends over the next few months to get this done.

Does this sound like a workable plan?

 

[nybirdman]

As long as you are not in a great hurry;I see no reason why you couldn't do it with the equipment that you have.It is more than most of us have,I would think.Renting a larger Ex should save some wear and tear on your smaller unit.You may want to invest in a good heavy duty box blade.

 

[Woody65]

Last year I did the same type of project on my property. I used the same type equipment that you have. I rented a larger ex to clear 4 acres of wooded area where I had to clear 500+ stumps. But overall, if you have the time, the equipment you mentioned should do fine. Here are some pics of the project.

These are of a road at the base of a hillside with a swampy area just below. Same as you describe.

































These are of the road through the wooded area.

































Make sure you get the water under the road and not over it and you will be good to go. I have had to tweak the ditches a little over the year to accommodate the water but overall it's looking good. Good luck with your project

 

[TnAndy]

Don't clear stumps, dig around trees cutting roots, then push the tree over, cutting the stump off after you used the leverage of the tree to take it down. MUCH easier, and you can get by with far smaller equipment.

 

[drivadesl]

As long as you are not in a great hurry;I see no reason why you couldn't do it with the equipment that you have.It is more than most of us have,I would think.Renting a larger Ex should save some wear and tear on your smaller unit.You may want to invest in a good heavy duty box blade.

I was looking at a heavy duty 8' landpride box blade before I started considering buying an Ex or Dozer. Most likely will get the box blade, since it will work well with the tractor. I may decide to sell the U35, and add the funds to get a JD 120C sized Ex. That should work will for cutting into the hill and stump removal.

Thanks!

 

[drivadesl]

Last year I did the same type of project on my property. I used the same type equipment that you have. I rented a larger ex to clear 4 acres of wooded area where I had to clear 500+ stumps. But overall, if you have the time, the equipment you mentioned should do fine. Here are some pics of the project.

These are of a road at the base of a hillside with a swampy area just below. Same as you describe.


Woody, we're practically neighbors. I grew up in East Meadow, and dated this hot chick from Northport back in the day. The property I'm going to put the road is in Windham.

Nice job on the road!! Really nice and smooth. What did you use for a base, and did you add any geotex to keep it from sinking into the wet areas? How long did all that work take?

 

[drivadesl]

Don't clear stumps, dig around trees cutting roots, then push the tree over, cutting the stump off after you used the leverage of the tree to take it down. MUCH easier, and you can get by with far smaller equipment.

Great advice Andy. I've been looking at Youtube and have learned a lot about stumps. Till now, mostly used my Ex for trenching and landscape work. Stumps are a whole nother animal, which is why I may move up in size. I'll know better when I get started on all this when the ground unfreezes.

Thanks!

 

[Gordon Gould]

Nice road Woody !!

I think you will be fine wirh your equipment. Use the good advise you have gotten here. Pushing over 8" to 10" trees to save digging stumps is great advise from TnAndy.

 

[Woody65]

Drivadesl,

In the area where it's on a hillside, I dug a trench on the high side of the road with a gentle slope into the culvert. In this area I used smooth large road base stones instead of the typical base. It was recommended to me so that any excess water can pass through the stones since they have small cavities within the base to allow the water to pass. I needed about 24" of base in this area. Didn't use any geo textile fabric. Topped it off with 3/4 minus. It has held up very well. No issues with water, erosion or sinking. The rest of the road was built using your common road base and 3/4 minus on top. It's not totally finished as this road will be used by all the larger trucks to get materials to my building site. Once I get my pole barn built ( this spring), and the home built, I will finish it off with fines and a final grading.

The area that was on the hillside took about 2 days to do. It's about 100' long. I removed a lot of topsoil to get down to the clay where the road would have a decent base to build on. It was all slop as you can see in the photos. The rest of the road was pretty straight forward and took about 10 days to complete.

This is where it leads to. It was all wooded. Cleared, graded, seeded and covered in hay. Came out pretty good for an amateur.





















Good luck!

 

[Woody65]

Drivadesl,

Small world. I grew up in Queens, moved out to Suffolk, and have a place in Oneonta. Very similar to your situation. I pass through Windham on my way to Oneonta. Very nice town. Tough year with no snow for the skiing crowd.

 

[drivadesl]

Drivadesl,

In the area where it's on a hillside, I dug a trench on the high side of the road with a gentle slope into the culvert. In this area I used smooth large road base stones instead of the typical base. It was recommended to me so that any excess water can pass through the stones since they have small cavities within the base to allow the water to pass. I needed about 24" of base in this area. Didn't use any geo textile fabric. Topped it off with 3/4 minus. It has held up very well. No issues with water, erosion or sinking. The rest of the road was built using your common road base and 3/4 minus on top. It's not totally finished as this road will be used by all the larger trucks to get materials to my building site. Once I get my pole barn built ( this spring), and the home built, I will finish it off with fines and a final grading.

The area that was on the hillside took about 2 days to do. It's about 100' long. I removed a lot of topsoil to get down to the clay where the road would have a decent base to build on. It was all slop as you can see in the photos. The rest of the road was pretty straight forward and took about 10 days to complete.

This is where it leads to. It was all wooded. Cleared, graded, seeded and covered in hay. Came out pretty good for an amateur.



Good luck!

Woody, that road looks mint, and a nice finish to it. Curious where you got your stone from, I assume it was delivered. Do you know how much you ended up needing? Also, never heard the term 3/4" minus,, is this just the typical 3/4" grey stone that is used everywhere?

Sorry for the questions, but looking forward to getting started on this, and with today being near zero here, not doing much else but puttering in the basement.

 

[Woody65]

Woody, that road looks mint, and a nice finish to it. Curious where you got your stone from, I assume it was delivered. Do you know how much you ended up needing? Also, never heard the term 3/4" minus,, is this just the typical 3/4" grey stone that is used everywhere? Sorry for the questions, but looking forward to getting started on this, and with today being near zero here, not doing much else but puttering in the basement.

Thanks. It's also called crusher run. I am lucky with the stone. The quarry is less than a mile from my place. It's called Sewards stone and gravel. They have two locations, one in Oneonta and one in Davenport. I would have to look up in my records how many truck loads I had delivered. If I can locate them I will post it.

 

[GLyford]

The "minus" means "this size, and all the sizes below it." So 1/2" minus is 1/2" stone with everything smaller down to sand and dust. 3/4" minus has 3/4, 1/2, etc. If you ordered straight 3/4" stone, you'd get just that without all the smaller sizes. For some uses, the fines are used to help lock in the larger stone, like in concrete and driveways. For other uses you don't want them so you can keep the water channels open (rip-rap, drain layers in roads or septic, etc.) or if you are tightly controlling your proportions of a mix.

Other terms we see in our area are "pit run" (nothing run through the crusher/grader, so it can include both broken and rounded stone, often softball size and larger); "crusher run" where you get all the sizes straight out of the crusher without grading, starting at whatever the largest size through the crusher is, even up to 5 or 6" sometimes; and "crusher fines", which are coarse sand-size bits of broken rock out of the crusher, not rounded like beach or glacial sand.

Different pits will give you different products, where I grew up the pit was glacial till, so have a lot of rounded rocks and boulders, all mixed of various types of granite, sandstone, and others. Where I live now the pit is a granite hill where they blast off a "face" and run it through the crusher, so it is all granite unless you specifically ask for river stone which they truck in. Other places in the country your local pit may be limestone or sandstone or something else. In NY I would expect a lot of granite like here...?

Odd tidbit of information: Don't count on crusher fines keeping the weeds down unless it is in a heavy vehicle traffic area to stay tightly packed. Breaking up the stone exposes a lot of nutrients that plants and weeds seem to crave, as well as holding water between the jagged surfaces.