Property line trail/ track

[PAGUY]

Boy, that excavator operator is pretty and young to be so good at clearing the site. Do they pay her cash or in candy?

My guess is that the company doesn't believe in child labor laws.

 

[GGB]

I'm enjoying watching your progress-thanks for the pictures. You'll get a lot of enjoyment from the trail, and as well built as you are making it, you shouldn't have to spend a lot of time maintaining it. Keep up the good work, and keep the pictures coming!

 

[sfloggie]

Wow..quite impressive and looks great. I am really proud of your hard work. Jim

So this all started when I bought my house lot. We have a fraction over 4 acres. One of the four property lines was cleared relatively well... the others not so much.

I decided that being a responsible homeowner, I should clear these lines.

Then being the offroad enthousiast that I am, I thougth; "why not clear it wide enougth to get the Jeep through?"

Then I thought; "I'll get bored with this... I should make a nice walking/ bikeing/ go-kart/ mini bike trail.

So I took two and a half years and built a dump trailer in order to fill in low spots and gravel the trail. In the mean time I've logged 27 hours on a gas powered jackhammer busting out rock outcrops. My theory is simply that knocking down high spots and using that material to fill in low spots is an efficient use of time and energy vrs raising low spots above the high spots. I've also had three tandem loads of clay brought in and spread at the ends of the trail. I've also ripped out over a dozen stumps. So far I've only spread two loads with my little trailer... but plan to kick it into high gear once summer vacations are over.

Anyway, enough rambling... here are some vids and pics.

The trail (I hope to get a non-snow one soon)
Trail/ track March 2013 - YouTube

The trailer
V8 TJ dumping trailer - YouTube

Moving roots to break rock
Felling a tree with Jeep's winch - YouTube

Breaking rock
1b - YouTube

before

after


before
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after


before

after


before

after


That's it for now. I have to build a bridge over the brook... but the budget didn't allow for it this year. Hopefully next year, and I'll be able to take the jeep all the way around and start spreading gravel!

Oh, and this is an extremely long term project. This is year three, and I hope to have it done by year 5 or 6. However, my three year old daughter loves walking the "twail" and has a pet squirel names Nemo that we regularly take walks to go feed him peanuts. Makes the effort worth is. : )

 

[NS Gearhead]

So I've been to the quary about 6 times. Unfortunately after the first trip, none of the loader operators have come over to load me. So I've found that 200 shovel fulls get me right around a ton. (one ton's the min charge of $10) It takes me a good hour to get there, load, and get home. (20min each) One time I went to a closer, smaller place that loads with a tractor... they charged me $47.50 for one load... so that's out. LOL

After some quick figguring it apears that my trail's going to take about 12 tandem loads to get a 4" top of class A. That's 168 yards... or 33,600 shovel fulls. : (

I've got a couple of options;
-keep going the way I am
-get gravel trucked in, dumped, and shovel from there saving me fuel, time, and wear and tear on the Jeep
-get gravel trucked in, dumped, and rent a machine to load the trailer, saving lots of time, but costing me the most
-modify the trailer to self load

By the time I pay the fuel for the Jeep I figgure it's about the same cost as haveing it dumped in my yard, so to keep going the way I am makes no sence. I may as well shovel at home at my leisure... I suppose doing it that way's not so bad. I'm trying to fight off the dreaded middle age spread. LOL and if I come across some extra cash or get impatient I can rent the machine.

Stay tuned, I've decided to pull that big tree down by the retaining wall, and the loaner fourwheer's back, so I'll be making an updated ride around video! : )

 

[NS Gearhead]

For self loading ; a log loader with dual scoops
Bailey's Road & Log Grapple Trailer Systems from baileysonline.com - YouTube
with this at the end
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4c45b09GLY

or something like this off the back
Minidumper Cormidi 800 Self Loader 2 - YouTube

...but of course that would be $$$, and even though I don't have much time... I do have more of it then money. LOL

 

[Larro Darro]

Those are some handy machines. The problem with having the money to buy stuff like that, is you could hire the work down. It would be fun to play with though.

 

[NS Gearhead]

Very true. Another option would be to buy an old tractor with a loader and bucket, build the trail, then sell it when done recouping most, if not all of what it cost. But you still need $$$ up front. Come to think of it; we do have a family friend down the road with an old tractor... I wonder if he has a bucket... hmmm. He's the type of guy who'd lend it to me for months no prob.

 

[pat32rf]

The summer that I got my new JD 4300 I was hired as grounds keeper for a local 400 acre retreat. Supposed to work 2 days/week. The retreat had a new owner, a "well to do" fella from Palm Beach, Florida (the retreat was in Central Ontario). The first time he flew up he and his wife decided to have a perimeter trail constructed. My boss started out by giving me a helper, chain saw, axe and shovel.
After the first two weeks produced 200' of trail, he let me bring in my tractor and FEL. I put in over 1000hrs before the snow got too deep, pretty well paying for the new tractor....The owner was happy, built a 5 bay garage, sleeping rooms overhead, with a $80,000 pricetag. After two years he got bored and sold the place but I sure got in a lot of seat time in the bush that first summer....and never did have to cut any grass.

 

[NS Gearhead]

NICE! I don't know any "well to do" people like that. Well, their is the one cousin of my dad's that won $15.8M I just dream of the day they offer to pay off my house... but I refuse to ask for anything. It's acutally made things a little awkwad seeing them. I feel I have to be mindful not to talk about lacking money so that I don't seem like I'm asking indirectly.

 

[csr0831]

I havent been on this site for a while and just happened to stumble across this thread. Like everyone else I admire the work you've done and envy you the place to do it. I do have a question...you put a vedio on U-Tube of you driving your jeep through the trail (nice sounding machine BTW) and you vedio taped it from inside the cab with the recorder attached to your CB radio...right? I have not been able to figure out why the camara seems to stay perfectly "level" relative to the hood of the vechial and did not duplicate the roll of the jeep back and forth. Do you have the CB mounted with some sort of self leveling gimble? Probably a very simple explnation but it escapes me at the moment.

I wanna race a cart on it when its done!!! : )

Chris

 

[NS Gearhead]

Thanks for the kind words. Yeah, I was freaked out when I saw that too... the only thing I can think of is that I selected an option on youtube video editor to stabilize it, and so it probably wouldn't let it follow the Jeep's movements exactly.

I actually have a race cart that I'm in the process of modifying for this trail. I'll put up a build thread when I have all the parts garthered.

 

[NS Gearhead]

So, the fourwheeler's back. I figgure I'd take an updated video... but my previous method of mounting the camcorder proved to be flawed. I tried a couple times but the vibrations were just too much. I thought a go-pro sure would be awesome, so I rigged this up;



It also took several takes to get the camera angle as best it could be... here you go. Hope you like it.
Trail/ track Aug. 2013 - YouTube

****! I thought I'd trimmed my uggly mug out of the start and finish... that'll have to wait for another day.

 

[Iowachild]

Good video of a great project.:thumbsup: I am guessing the two planks bridge is a temporary thing?

 

[csr0831]

Did ya drive the jeep across those two planks?? This type of vedio is more of what one would expect to see when driving down a trail like that......STILL haven't figured how you stabilized the camera on the previous one. I don't know of any software that is going to be able to discriminate and level the picture, but not the hood of the truck. Very curious, but very cool. BTW....your mug ain't that ugly, you should see some of the rest of us!! : )

 

[NS Gearhead]

Oh yes the planks are just for walking and the bike. If the funds allow in the spring I plan on building a bridge capable of handling the jeep & trailer. Four 2X8s per beam on the outsides, two 2X8s in the center, planked with 2x someting. Outter beams line up with jeep's tires set on 2X2' cement pads. Decked 8' wide, and it'll probably be 12-14' long. I priced it out at around $500 My engineer buddy assured me it would be capable of the weight.

 

[NS Gearhead]

There, mugless version;
Trail/ track Aug. 2013 - YouTube

 

[NS Gearhead]

Well I had been procrastinating taking this tree down... when I built the trail I tried my best to leave the big ones, but after seeing the trailer video it became apparent that the retaining wall kept being destroid when this tree kicked the back of the jeep over. So today she came down. I tried pulling on it the other day, but it became apparent I didn't have the angles right. I was hooked on about 15' up, so I planned for my neighbor to come over with his much taller lader then mine. In the mean time I dug up and cut 1/2 the roots I could get to. So this morning I went and set up before he showed up... tensioned it and saw it would go, so we left it where it was. Of course it was 10X harder then I anticipated. Took about 1.5hrs.

Enjoy!
Jeep tree removal - YouTube

 

[NS Gearhead]

I fully intended to use that tree as a retaining wall farther down the trail. Measured, and needed 60' with 3 trees to lean up against. The tree I took down was 50', 33' by the time the top was off and still a useable diam. 12" base, 8" at the 33' mark) So I figgure, good enough, I'll just use two trees and notch them to fit...

I'm sitting watching TV that night when it hits me like a ton of bricks; used tires!!! They're free, easy to handle, can go as long, as tall as I want and can curve... best of all they'll outlast me. I may bank every corner! LOL So, my buddy bings me a car trailer full the next day and I send him home with it full of firewood. Everyone's happy.

The tree along with it's stump needed to go, so it wasn't a waste either.

 

[fordmantpw]

Great work, and you are one of the most resourceful people I have seen in a long time!

That's a pretty potent winch you have there.

Oh, and that Jeep sounds awesome!

 

[aginn]

Well, after reading this thread and watching the videos, it has become apparent that you will never become a couch potato. Great exercise and doing something that you enjoy. Life gets no better than that. Specially when you and the daughter get to walk that trail and create some great memories. Someday she will bring HER daughter there and help you build even more memories. Keep up the good work. You are doing a fine job.