Installing New Driveway

[RSKY]

My daughter has bought a new, to her, house and she wants a circular drive in front. I intend to put it in for her. A few years ago I had a guy with a backhoe put one in to my shop behind my house. He dug out either six or nine inches of soil before putting gravel down. Does anyone here do this kind of work for a living and if so how deep should I go before starting to fill in, what kind of fill should I use, and any other advice you can give. Thanks in advance for your help.

 

[crash325]

My daughter has bought a new, to her, house and she wants a circular drive in front. I intend to put it in for her. A few years ago I had a guy with a backhoe put one in to my shop behind my house. He dug out either six or nine inches of soil before putting gravel down. Does anyone here do this kind of work for a living and if so how deep should I go before starting to fill in, what kind of fill should I use, and any other advice you can give. Thanks in advance for your help.

Before anyone can give you good advice, more information is needed. Such as soil type, rain amount, freeze depth, How you want the finished drive too look, type of edge, level with current grade, any type of outline or curb.

Generally around here, first to go down is ABC, it packs down like a rock almost as hard as concrete, that gets topped by 3/4" down gravel. Most of the time that is all that's all that is needed. Now and then that gets topped by Pea Gravel (some of that can be had with a cement coating.) For a lot of my drive way I topped it with coarse White Sand.

I do a fair amount of road and drive way work in this area. But am sure it is very different here.

"Don't
worry about the world coming to an end today.
It's already tomorrow in Australia !"

 

[jmanatee2]

Let me preface this with I don't do this for a living, and I did not do this in a way that everyone else says a driveway has to be put in, however, I regularly drive very heavy objects over it without and deformation or sinking or problems with mud season. Some of the heavy objects include Chevy 2500 HD towing different Trailers 11K lbs, 10Klbs, 5K lbs and a 33k lb Motor home, and of course UPS and FedEx and other large delivery vehicles. Also I have had a couple of delivery's from tri-axles dump trucks with top soil and other loads

Not only was I topping the surface of a pre compressed area, I was altering the slope of an area, raising it by 2- 3 feet and also putting in a new parking area for the motor home and trailers.

I had over 300 tons of dirt brought in, and moved over another 300 tons of dirt and rock to build this level parking area and driveway. Once this area was leveled, back bladed and compressed with the wheels of my Case 680 (18k lbs)

I topped the parking area and driveway with 3 to 4 inches of 3/4" trap rock. Spread evenly in two layers of 1.5 to 2". I rolled over the the area again and again with my loader and back bladed until the area was compressed. Once it was compressed I added the second layer. Rolled over it again and again.

Many people told me it wouldn't hold up, that I had to have cloth and six inches of larger rock and then 4 inches of 3/4" rock.

But I must say years later is still looks great. This year I added 2.5 yards of gravel to replace some that was plowed off when I had to plow before the frost set in. I also bought a box blade this year to clean up turn over some of the gravel. This really refreshed the appearance of the driveway.

This was my experience.

 

[dmccarty]

In my area you are lucky to have an inch of topsoil. Under that is clay. Lots of brick and potters in the area.

So for us, there is no need to remove the topsoil. I built our driveway which is about 500-600 feet from the road to the turning circle. From the turning circle there is another 200ish feet back to the barn, a large turnaround/parking area, and where we actually park.

I put down ABC which is fines(dust) up to rocks about 1.5 inches in size. The stuff packs down like concrete. I have used geotextile fabric under the rock and I would not build a driveway without the fabric. The fabric keeps the rock from merging with the clay. We only have 2-3 inches of gravel in places. No way we could do that without fabric.

The fabric I used was 12.5 feet wide and 360 feet long and was a mesh. There is a woven type out there as well. I paid not quite $1 a linear foot.

For gravel you really need rock with the fines. If you put down just rock, or even worse round river rock, the gravel goes all over the place. We park behind our house in a spot that is gong to be a patio or maybe an extension of the house. As a result we have 67 stone in that area not ABC. The 67 stone has no fines and will rut up pretty easily. 67 stone is what our concrete pad is built on and what we will use for the patio or extension so that is what I put down. Not at all optimal for traffic but long term it is the best answer for us in that spot.

ABC is about 3,000 pounds per yard when wetted to the NC DOT standard.

Later,
Dan

 

[atgreene]

I build driveways as part of my business.

Every region is different, but around here we box cut the area down to hardpan or gravel removing all the loamy topsoil. I then use 3" minus crushed gravel (usually 6-12" in depth) then cover with 3/4" crushed gravel.

See what others have done in your area. Around here if you try to cut corners you will know it come spring. Here's a pic of my neighbor, the edges of his driveway turn to soup when the frost comes out.

 

[RSKY]

Thanks to all of you for your information. I have also searched and found several older posts on this subject. I know feel confident that I can put them in a good long lasting driveway (that Pop will end up paying for of course).

Isn't it handy to have a forum where you can ask a simple or complex question and have concerned, knowledgeable people answer you!

 

[Gordon Gould]

I build driveways as part of my business.

Every region is different, but around here we box cut the area down to hardpan or gravel removing all the loamy topsoil. I then use 3" minus crushed gravel (usually 6-12" in depth) then cover with 3/4" crushed gravel.

See what others have done in your area. Around here if you try to cut corners you will know it come spring. Here's a pic of my neighbor, the edges of his driveway turn to soup when the frost comes out.

Ahhh - Mud Season at it's best