Box Blade Dredges up Rocks

[Katahdin]

Hi All, newbie tractor and box blade operator here. I've been working on my 400' gravel driveway which has not seen any major maintenance in the last 10 years.

I have no problem ripping up the driveway with the scarifers, but find it brings a lot of undesirable 4-6" rocks to the surface. After I spread new gravel and angle the box blade to smooth things down, I find these rocks get caught in the blade edge and get dragged along the box blade path, leaving tracks and thus an unsmooth finish.

For my driveway I've been hand-raking out the large rocks and am happy with the results, but I'm about to do this all over again for my mother's 150' gravel driveway. I anticipate I'll have the same rock problems over there. Short of purchasing a landscape rake, I was wondering if there are any suggestions for dealing with these 4-6" rocks. Thanks!

 

[bcp]

Are these rocks the subgrade for the driveway or are they naturally there?

Bruce

 

[Katahdin]

Not naturally there. That picture was of a driveway extension that got put in 10 years ago and went in over an old barn yard. I remember the excavator bulldozed a few inches of top soil away and uncovered the cement posts of a barn that burned in 1950. He then put down new gravel, I think he said it was #4. When the contractor was done with all the work on the property, he smoothed down the entire length of the driveway. The originally driveway itself is 100 years or more old, and has seen new gravel and a culvert replaced over the years, just not regular maintenance.

My Mom's driveway was put in 33 years ago, but probably no new gravel in 20 years. Some of the top gravel has been scraped away by snow plow and the driveway can get muddy in spots. Her driveway is 150' long, after I rip it up with the scarifiers I plan to spread at least 18 tons of a one-inch reclaim gravel aggregate.

 

[Piston]

Why do you need to rip it up if you are going to put more gravel down? Try angling the box blade so you are just cutting the top inch or two of soil off, and keep the scarifiers up, this way you will just scrape the soil and leave the rocks. Then when the box blade fills with dirt you can spread a thin even layer to grade. You don't want to disturb the base if you don't need to.

This will only work if you have a good heavy box blade, otherwise it will just skim over the hard surface.

 

[Katahdin]

I had been putting the scarifiers all they way down to rip up and bury the grass and weeds growing in the gravel. I've tried different scarifier lengths, but all the way down does a better job against the weeds. My box blade is about 500lbs, its the 72" TSC King Kutter model.

 

[Combustix]

Make yourself happy get the rake though hand raking is good exercise

 

[CurlyDave]

You would be amazed at what 2-3" of new gravel will do to solve this problem.

Before you touch your mother's driveway, have new gravel spread. Then touch it up with the scarifiers only going about 1" into the old driveway.

 

[JoeBuyer]

Sometimes we haul large rocks in to make a "roadbed" in softer soil that gets driven on a lot by the tractors. Then smaller size rock on that and crushed rock on top. No science to it but it seems to work. I agree with others that you should not set your scarifiers so deep. Leave the larger rock down there and treat the weeds.

 

[s219]

You said you want the rippers down to tear up the grass, but don't like that it pulls up rocks. Well, pick one or the other -- you can't expect to put the rippers down and not pull up the road base. For my driveway, I use the top link to adjust the angle of attack so that the rear cutter is not very agressive, and I keep the rippers up. Works great.

 

[jenkinsph]

I wouldn't drop the scarifiers down just because of grass and weeds, as Piston said first, blade it then add gravel and smooth it out evenly. The large rocks are understandable when building a drive over a lot or barnyard, ground was likely soft and needed some large rocks to build the base. There is no reason to disturb the large rocks.



WOW, the picture didn't come up when I posted the above last night Looks like you pulled up the lower road base which should have been left alone. That is alot of rocks to deal with now.

 

[Mechanos]

With 25 years in heavy construction, I can tell you that you are doing more damage than good. Don't drop the scarifiers so deep so you don't distrurb the road base. Just dress the top of the road. If grass and weeds are a problem, then spray with glyphosphate.

 

[Katahdin]

Update, I decided to rip up my Mom's existing driveway with the scarifiers and do a little hand raking. Yeah it was more hassle, but her driveway turned out not to be as rocky as mine. I did disturb several melon sized boulders, but too few I think to do any harm. By ripping up the old driveway, before spreading new gravel, it feels to me I'm doing a more complete job. I don't have any experience in this line of work to substantiate that perception, its just my personal opinion and it was bugging me.

Here are some before and after pics. I hope to start spreading new crushed gravel on it in the next day or so. Also included is in the pics is a "harrow" I made from an old clothesline post and some old tire chains I found in the barn.

Now that I have the tractor and equipment, I plan to do annual maintenance on the driveways and not be as aggressive with the scarifiers.

 

[DKCDKC]

I've used a box blade on my mile long drive for 10 years. I have never put the scarifiers down so that I didn't disturb the larger rocks put in as the driveway base. I only move around the smaller rock to fill in holes and ruts. It has worked beautifully. I now touch up the drive with a regular blade and a rock rake I bought for junk value at an auction... To help pull rock into the center of the drive. Your drive now shows a lot of dirt. I'd lay some 1.5 inch rock thinly on it before laying your crusher run or smaller rock. On a flat drive you can also lay a thin layer of rock dust on top of that and it should last years. Don't go cheap with no larger rock because the smaller rock will sink into the mud over time and you'll have to lay much more in annual maintenance.

 

[Wyobuckaroo]

Update, I decided to rip up my Mom's existing driveway with the scarifiers and do a little hand raking. Yeah it was more hassle, but her driveway turned out not to be as rocky as mine. I did disturb several melon sized boulders, but too few I think to do any harm. By ripping up the old driveway, before spreading new gravel, it feels to me I'm doing a more complete job. I don't have any experience in this line of work to substantiate that perception, its just my personal opinion and it was bugging me.

Here are some before and after pics. I hope to start spreading new crushed gravel on it in the next day or so. Also included is in the pics is a "harrow" I made from an old clothesline post and some old tire chains I found in the barn.

Now that I have the tractor and equipment, I plan to do annual maintenance on the driveways and not be as aggressive with the scarifiers.

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With what I see in the pictures you posted I also would have dug it up at least a little. Around this area I have used "compaction" gravel (about 3/4" gravel) to great success in major repairs to old driveways. Then it takes minimal grading to maintain it I have found.

Good luck

 

[Katahdin]

Thanks for the suggestions but I'm kind of going a different route with the new gravel. On my driveway I used a one-inch recycled material made from construction debris, crushed concrete, brick, asphalt, shingles, etc. Its "made" locally and delivered for $13/ton. Its seems to be holding up to its claims of compacting well and becoming a solid road base. One of my vehicles is a 16,000lb deuce-and-a-half so the driveway is getting a good workout. Time will tell if buying this recycled material was a good decision.

Edit,I forgot to mention the driveway was wet in the "after" pictures. We had a lot of rain just days before, I agree there's some soil in it, but its darker than it normally looks due to the moisture.

 

[jenkinsph]

Katahdin,
I like your dog, he appears smart enough to stay out of the mud.

If it were me reworking your mother's driveway I would have put down a 1 to 1 1/2" layer of 3/4" crushed stone, that is about it. No rippers because there was no need to. From all appearances there weren't any notable ruts or pot holes, just an old hardpacked driveway that needed some gravel on the top.

I think that now the weeds will be more plentiful than before as the amount of dirt on top has been increased. You will need more material now about 50% increase over what you could have gotten by with. For me having to spend an extra 50% on materials would cut my profit considerably.

About the recycled material, some of this stuff works okay but I doubt it is better than rock. I use crushed rock with about 5 faces on a typical individual stone, these seem to pack down very tight. Where I have a choice I try to pick a color that works well with the site.

Here's some pics of a driveway I reworked early this year, this driveway and parking area had not been graded in atleast 10 years that I know of. I was able to get some tan colored crushed rock. I used the tlb to distribute the gravel and the tractor with landplane to smooth.

 

[hizoot]

From what I see in the pic of the tractor with box blade attached,the top link needs to be shortened. It looks like the BB is riding on the back edge and not the front edge. If so, then I can see why you were needing to use the scarifiers since the blade wasnt cutting in.

edit..after looking at the pics closer, I can see where you drug the BB into the edge of the grass and it wasnt cutting at all....just gliding over the surface. Adjust /shorten the top link for a more aggressive cut when needed. Lengthen the top link for a more smoothing action. You will find a sweet spot in the middle,where it will only cut in lightly and you can then skim the surface easier .

 

[troutsqueezer]

You can't help but kick up rocks on many gravel roads with the BB. Do what I do, get a teenager (or neighbor) to walk behind and chuck them off the side of the road for you so you don't have to keep getting on and off the tractor. No two roads are the same and sometimes you have to dig in a little to get some dirt to move to the rougher spots. Can't always do it "by the book" when time and money are in short supply and you just want to smooth things out a little.

 

[jdonovan]

Really it looks like you are using the blade because you have it, but not because its needed. I find it a lot easier to control grass/weeds on the drive with herbicide rather than iron.

If the drive is properly crowned, and doesn't have pot holes/ruts that you are trying to remove, you are probably going to do more harm than good by reworking it with the box blade.

mom's drive looks like it still has a lot of soil in your 'base'. As long as you've got soil in there, weeds are going to grow vigorously. You would probably be better served by removing a few inches of that material and putting in 3-6" of new gravel, with fines. That kind of gravel packs very tightly and helps exclude weeds.

 

[sdkubota]

Bringing soil up into your gravel only contaminates it and will make it useless. As others have said if you have new gravel place it over the top of the existing. Use Roundup on weeds and grass not scarifier teeth. All the weeds you think you ripped up where actually re-planted and will come right back.