soon to be newbie!!

tcv49 · Mar 28, 2004

Good afternoon everyone....I think I have convinced myself that I need a tractor!!! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif I'm jacking up my house, excavating underneath it, putting in a full foundation, and then backfilling. I've gotten estimates of 8-10K for the excavation part, and so I figure I might as well buy a tractor, do the work myself, and have a new 'tool' after all is said and done!! I've looked at the BX2300 with the loader and backhoe. Someone suggested I look at Massey Fergusons version....I'd appreciate any and all advice. I think the BX2300 will be big enough but does anyone think otherwise? With the hinged ROPS I'll easily be able to get under the house, but if you guys think its too small, then maybe I should consider the B21....????? I expect to buy new because I can get some pretty cheap financing.....Thanks in advance for letting me pick your brains.....

Junkman · Mar 28, 2004

considering that you live in NH and the rocks there aren't much smaller than the ones we have in CT, I suggest that you start thinking more in the lines of a bulldozer than a wheel machine. I will tell you that a BX is definitely out of the question without a doubt. I own one and know it won't do what you need to do. Without more details of how large the house is an other details of the surrounding environment, it isn't possible to give much advise beyond what I have already said. One thing that I will recommend though is, a 10' basement. I did this in my home and it is great. There is plenty of room above your head for all the utilities and you can install a drop ceiling and still have it look like a room is supposed to when you are done. Here is a link to a discussion about a barn. Read that discussion because it talks a lot about similar things that you will run into in your foundation...... link to barn thread

tcv49 · Mar 28, 2004

Thanks for the reply Junkman....the house is right on a lake and the ground under seems to be pretty much rock free,,, I've done some test digging, and don't expect to find anything very big, based upon my own testing, and neighbors input...

Bird · Mar 28, 2004

I'll sorta agree and disagree with Junkman. I think you can do it with a BX, but I don't think you will do it because it would take so long you'd get disgusted and tired of it before you finished. And of course, since I don't know you, I'm guessing, but figure there's a very good chance I'm right. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Junkman · Mar 28, 2004

Bird.... Once he said that he has good digging soil, I feel that the BX will do it. I used to live in NH and I know that they have rocks that are better described as boulders the size of Volkswagens and those are the rule, not the exception. When they dug the foundation for my home, the contractor used a D-11 and pushed some boulders out that were larger than the blade. When he got down 6', that was as far down he could go because the hard pan was so compacted, the blade just scratched across the surface and barely removed an inch of material. When it came to putting in the septic tank, they said that there was no way that they could get it below the level of the cellar floor. I asked that they try since it was located 25 feet behind the house and in that location, the digging was fine gravel as far down as they went. That is why my septic tank is so far down. The land around the foundation is raised to cover the foundation and the tank is buried deep so the waste line can go out under the cellar floor. If I had known how easy the digging would have been 25' away, I would have moved the house and saved a bundle of money on fill and other expenses. You never know what is under the ground until you dig. You can only guess based on what the surrounding area looks like. This is what my land looks like all around no matter where you look, except that this area has been landscaped and the rest is wooded.

Bird · Mar 28, 2004

Junkman, I never had to contend with rocks where we lived, either in Texas or when I was a kid in Oklahoma. Now to me, your place in that picture is very pretty, but it reminds me of a time when someone mentioned a picture of a mountain as being "pretty" to my old grandaddy and he said, "Well, what's pretty about that, you couldn't grow a crop there." To him, "pretty" meant flat plowed and fertile ground. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

frank_f15 · Mar 28, 2004

I THINK u are going to need something a little bigger than the BX, sure it will probably do it but don't imagine u want to sepen a whole lot of time digging1 also how much water do u expect to leach in when u start to dig?

GerardC · Mar 28, 2004

Have you looked at KIOTI?

Junkman · Mar 28, 2004

That is the reason that we have stone walls as boundary lines between properties. Farmers would pile the rocks that they plowed up from the fields along the edges of the fields along side of their neighbors fields. This is also how roads were defined. Two rods wide between the stone walls. A rod is a old English measurement of 16 1/2 feet. Some of the old deeds go from the old oak tree to the snow pile to the pile of rocks etc.... and people wonder why there are property line disputes. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

gone · Mar 28, 2004

junkman is your leaving the reason the old man of the mountan got sad and fell! /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

Bird · Mar 28, 2004

( Some of the old deeds go from the old oak tree to the snow pile to the pile of rocks etc)

Yeah, I knew about the stone walls and the measurement of a rod (but I'd forgotten how long a rod was), and lots of old records are hilarious reading. I have an original copy of The Bexar County Highway League's Official Logbook for Texas, 1914-1915 (A Touring Hand Book of the Principal Automobile Routes in the State of Texas). All directions from one town to another all over the State are written like your old deeds. They give a mileage number and then what will be found or what you do at that mileage. Just as an example, in the directions for Fort Worth to Waco, at 55.5 miles "Turn left at large barn. Residence on right, cedar trees in yard" and at 56.5 miles "Turn right at white house with three white gables". Windmills, trees, houses, barns, railroads, creeks, and power lines are the "landmarks" used in the directions throughout the book. In the directions from Galveston to Dallas, several places say "road ends, turn right (or left) through pasture".

tcv49 · Mar 28, 2004

Hey Frank.....thanks for the reply.....no concerns about the water.....the house is 50 feet from the water, but the walk out basement will about 12 feet above water level......Please look at my post about the Ingersoll 7020TLB that have found...let me know any input....thanks and happy tractoring!! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Junkman · Mar 28, 2004

If you don't mind my asking, where in NH is your home? I used to live in Antrim back in the 1960's and spent a lot of time on Franklin Pierce Lake. Also learned to water ski on Lake Sunapee, but that is a story that the moderators wouldn't allow me to tell here! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

tcv49 · Mar 28, 2004

we're in Newton, NH junkman....next to Kingston, Haverhill, MA

PineRidge · Mar 29, 2004

Also learned to water ski on Lake Sunapee, but that is a story that the moderators wouldn't allow me to tell here!


Come on Junkman, we would all like to hear the water skiing story. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
please, please, please!

Junkman · Mar 29, 2004

Her name is Suzy and she is the daughter of my collage professor of history. His family owns a lodge on the lake and they rent boats and cabins. She invited me there for the weekend. We arrived late Friday evening and took one of the boats out on the lake and went around the cove to this cozy little retaurant for dinner and a few beers and then returned to the cottage to get a good nights rest so in the morning she could teach me to water ski. We lit a fire in the fireplace, and then censored....... censored...........censored......... censored........if you keep this up Junkman, we are going to kick your butt out of here! censored.......... censored... and that is the rest of the story....

SteveH_CT · Mar 29, 2004

Wow - that's a familiar sight - We could probably start a thread just on the rocks here in eastern CT. I've got stone walls running all over the place on both our properties. One other thing I've found on our East Haddam lot is that large rocks (unmoveable) often had smaller rocks stacked on them. It appears that whoever was working the land in the 19th century would simply move the rocks onto the ones he couldn't move. It makes sense to me. I can't imagine how the old time farmers got the land so well cleared without the machinery we enjoy today.