?? About gravel driveway and potholes

[AlbertC]

We have a gravel drive that is in bad condition. It has several low spots where we have potholes. I talked with a man about putting some new crusher run on top. Current drive doesn't have much gravel on it. I questions him about the potholes. He said he will put the crusher run on drive and slope it so that the water runs off and that this should take care of the pothole.

Will this work or will the pothole come right back. Does the existing drive have to be graded to get rid of the pothole before the crusher run is put on or will what he is talking about work. It seems to me that even if he slopes the crusher run so that the water runs off, some water will still seep through the crusher run into the pothole and I will have the pothole reappear.

Any help appreciated,

 

[whistlepig]

Potholes are going to be forever potholes on a gravel drive unless you want to burrow to the center of the earth to fix them. Or dig the whole gravel drive up and put new base in. I keep a pile of gravel on hand to fill in the potholes. Then have crush and run poured every three years. Our gravel driveway is constantly sinking,

 

[joshuabardwell]

Will this work or will the pothole come right back. Does the existing drive have to be graded to get rid of the pothole before the crusher run is put on or will what he is talking about work. It seems to me that even if he slopes the crusher run so that the water runs off, some water will still seep through the crusher run into the pothole and I will have the pothole reappear.

Gravel driveways require period maintenance. By doing things right, you can extend the maintenance interval, but you can't get rid of it.

 

[oldpilgrim]

You can't just fill pot holes. A roadcrew in Vt told me you need to scrape off the road to the level of the deepest pothole and then replace the gravel evenly.

Considering that Vt hasmiles and miles of the best dirt roads anywhere, I'll take his word for it.

 

[amazincaucasian]

One key element in building a road is applying good base on dry ground. By good base, I mean rock that will pack tightly, therefore not allow water to soak in. As long as the driveway has crown for drainage, and ditches if needed, and provided the rock is compacted, you have most of the battle won.

To deal with potholes: wait till they're dry or dig till they're dry. Then apply 1" minus and have the driver compact with dump truck. If the rock compacts to below grade, add more and compact again

 

[Tractor Seabee]

Whistle started out right. New gravel in old pot hole just beats out in short time. One solution; scarfy it all down to the lowest PH bottom grade and re-compact. A new PH will start at the points you start and stop. The county in AZ where I grew up they came in every few years dug it all up anf re-compacted as their maintenance program. PHs hardly ever had a chance to start.

Ron

 

[roadhunter]

Not sure if you have options but asphalt millings and if you can get crushed asphalt does a really good job on driveways. It packs much better than the gravel, finds, crushed gravel, crushed concrete, etc.. that I have used in the past. Around here we sell the millings for 10/ton and crushed asphalt for 14/ton, plus delivery.

 

[whistlepig]

We have tried different gravels. We use chips and dust. Other areas call this crush and run. Regardless this is by far the best driveway gravel. Don't let anyone talk you into B19. Goodness we tried that once.

 

[Michelle K linnane]

I have a very long driveway and was built ten years and every year I used to york rake to get pot holes out I did not last year or this year and the pot holes were bad. Also in front of my house were I park my truck I started to have almost a small sink hole under one of the front tires. So I order crusher run yesterday and poured alot of it in front of the house as I am sick of the mud and then bucketed the crusher run and back bladed it with bucket.
Everything requires maintenance and 20 ton of stone a year on 1800 feet of driveway and a big parking area is not that much stone. But I am sick to death of the hole and the mud. When we built driveway 10 years ago it had a good deal of crusher run on it. But thru time it seems to disappear with plowing the driveway. For the past few years we have hardly had any frost in the ground so when ever my plow guy plowed it was a mess.
This year we had frost, but this was the first time in maybe 3 years. Need to cover some wires by the barn and will use the rest of the crusher run for the outside of my pheasant pen. Animals have made holes and crusher good to fill in with.

 

[Ken45101]

IMO, you guys are starting with way too small of crushed limestone. Start with 2's (3-4 inch) or maybe 4's(1-2"). Get that good and compacted so the rock locks together, then put your 304 (1" and smaller with crusher run) on top and compact it.

Of course, it all varies with location, soil condition. traffic use, thickness of road base, etc.

Another good add on top of the big rock is concrete washout. That can eventually set up as solid as concrete I'm told. But not as top dressing but to help the bigger rock solidify.

Of course, traffic use does a lot. If you are running dozens of loaded 30t trucks over it all the time, that's different than a couple of cars per day.