Levelling a Driveway

[picframer]

Well mother nature was on my side this morning so I decided to take the backhoe off (first time) and try this box blade with the top cylinder, I had never used one before. Do these things ever work slick, the first order was to remove the ice with the tooth bars, simple from the seat just tilt the teeth down and go, worked perfect, then I scraped the ice down to the gravel and went at leveling. Once again I forgot before pics but the driveway was getting in tough shape, pot holes at ruts, it's been a tough winter on gravel, freezing and thawing over and over. Also the area I put a culvert in had sunken about 4". The driveway was in pretty sad shape to start. These box blades are simply amazing and super simple to use, can't say how impressed I am with the results. My driveway is just over 600 feet long, total time from start to finish was 45 min, I had two people walking by with their dogs ask if I could come over and look at their's this afternoon and give a quote.

Attached Images

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	finished.jpg (137.6 KB, 22 views)
	teeth.jpg (125.0 KB, 16 views)
	tilt-back.jpg (133.6 KB, 16 views)
	Tiltforks.jpg (133.4 KB, 15 views)
	Top-Cylinder.jpg (134.6 KB, 17 views)

[Steve]

Lawn care business tips

This is fascinating! I don't know anything about this. Can you tell me about the tool? How does it work? Are there two parts to it? The box part and the teeth? How do you use it?

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[picframer]

Originally Posted by Steve

This is fascinating! I don't know anything about this. Can you tell me about the tool? How does it work? Are there two parts to it? The box part and the teeth? How do you use it?

If you remember as a kid, Tonka made a toy called a scraper, basically as you built roads the centre would start to fill with dirt depending on how low you had the scraper blade, it released dirt into low areas, the result was that the road you built was perfectly flat. This box scraper works on the same theory.

The teeth are adjustable, from the seat I can make them dig into the ground up to 6" or not at all. What you do is go up and down the driveway taking about 1/2 the depth of your deepest pot hole or rutt, what will happen is the box blade will release dirt into the rutts or holes and as it pass's over the rear of the blade puts about 600 pounds of pressure on the dirt compacting it. Once you have gone over the entire driveway going forwards, you go backwards generally one pass and it will really compact the gravel and you end up with a driveway that is super smooth.

Now the reason the teeth can dig so deep is for digging up really uneven soil, removing top soil to put in a new lawn, removing surface stuff to level for a garage for example. In short anything you want to level, this is the ideal tool.

Now when it dries out, I will attach the rake and crown the driveway. I did four today and made an easy $360.00, it sure was great to be able to work outside, hard to believe this past Friday it was -21 with the wind chill, today it was around +10.

[Steve]

Do you have to add more gravel when you do this on the driveways or no? Are you digging up a lot of top soil during this process and does that cause problems with the gravel? Does it mix it up? Is that good or bad?

[picframer]

Originally Posted by Steve

Do you have to add more gravel when you do this on the driveways or no? Are you digging up a lot of top soil during this process and does that cause problems with the gravel? Does it mix it up? Is that good or bad?

It would depend on the driveway, all the ones I did today the answer is no, it will dig up any rocks but it has so much force it drives them right back into the ground and covers them with finer gravel. You are basically recycling what is there and making everything smooth again.

If I were removing top soil, you change the angle, it will collect the soil in the box then you simply dump it, grade what was under the top soil to the desired flatness or slope and then sod.

[justin_time]

Makes me want to get a John Deere

[picframer]

Originally Posted by justin_time

Makes me want to get a John Deere

As I mentioned before, color is not as important as a good dealer, JD, Kubota, Massey etc. they are all about the same, some have little features over the other but in my readings they are all excellent. I chose JD as the dealership uses me like gold and they have the best team of employees in a business I have seen, bar none. If you do get a tractor there are many manufactures of attachments and you can save thousands to get you going by shopping around, granted they will not last as long as the commercial grade stuff but your upfront cost will be thousands less and you can at least get going, it is shocking how fast this equipment can pay for itself.

I just throw this stuff out for those looking to diversify with their lawn care, the more areas we can offer a service, when one area of the business struggles it doesn't hurt as much and one never gets bored, it really is a lot of fun.

[lawn-guy]

nice job man have you ever tried using a power rake if u adjust it right it makes a grvel driveway look smooth as silk it will do the same as you mentioned (fill in low spots holes ruts ext)

[picframer]

Originally Posted by lawn-guy

nice job man have you ever tried using a power rake if u adjust it right it makes a grvel driveway look smooth as silk it will do the same as you mentioned (fill in low spots holes ruts ext)

I have on bigger tractors, In order to clear the wheel base I would need a 72" power rake, that would need around 36 H.P. ++ which would be the 3000 series of tractors. I did look at them however the cost and weight concerned me, I would have been looking in the $45,000+ range for the same set up which was more than I wanted to spend and they are desperate heavy, almost 1,000 pounds more than this one and I am coming in at close to 3,000 pounds which is really pushing it for doing anything on a customer lawn, I did buy the turfs for it however I think I will limit anything on a lawn to the 2305 tractor or the X500. I would have had to buy a bigger truck (F250 range) in order to pull it.....perhaps down the road.

The power rake is an amazing attachment and would do well in my area, they really brake the clay soil up.

[Steve]

What's the difference between a power rake and a box blade?