A few projects I have done recently

[hvy 1ton]

As for lottery plans, I know where there is a 10,000 acre pasture with 1 fence around outside. Could spend a long time building road through that.

 

[CM1995]

Nice to get an update. I'll be interested in seeing some of your utility work, specifically water lines.

I'm always curious about how things are done in other places. What sort of watermain commissioning process do you have to go through?. Grab some pics of the processes when you can.

Cheers.

Thanks WaterDoc and I apologize for not responding sooner.

One of the services we perform is being a subcontractor for a large fire protection company installing the underground portions from tap to in building riser.

On a normal fire line and lead in once installation is complete we will test the line and lead in. Depending on the local municipality the building inspector and/or fire marshal will witness the test once the line is pumped up and under the required pressure. On certain University jobs there will be a university inspector, city inspector and fire marshal come out at inspect once under pressure.

The fire services are separate from the domestic service so no chlorination or water samples are needed.

 

[CM1995]

I love diesels and have one for my weekend toy, but unless I start towing heavy and a lot I'll never buy another for work. There is just to much BS on them now and they ain't a as dependable. Being a GM guy we has several 2500s with over 200k on them and they cost 10or 15k less to buy

I haven't used a hoepac in 15 years now. Trench rollers are the way to go. I'll even widen a trench out while backfilling so we don't need a jumping jack for the small trenches.

I love field engineering a job too. I have thought the same thing if I won the lottery.

DB the "newsd" (new to us used truck) gas burner has been good so far, it does what it's intended to do and fit the budget for the time.

However I prefer diesel as we do tow a lot pulling the smaller equipment around. So far my '13 with just shy of 90K miles has been great - knocks on wood several times.

My philosophy is buy new and run to 200K miles if it's a good truck, anyone can get a lemon in any brand. When I bought my '13 the price difference between gas and diesel was around $6K, well worth the extra money when divided over 6 or more years of service at just $1K or less per year premium. At 200K miles a used diesel truck will still carry a $2K-3K premium over the same age and milage gas burner, if not more - as long as it's not a 6.0...

Our 2001 F250 7.3 is still used every day with over 200K on the clock. In need of a new trans so we don't pull with it much. The '01 will become semi-retired when I purchase a new truck for me and hand my '13 down.

On another note with the flooding in Houston I've read articles of how many vehicles were totaled to the tune of 250K or more. This will affect the new and used truck market in the Southeast as insurance claims are processed and Houston gets back on it's feet.

Due to this I am considering going ahead and buying a '17 instead of waiting on the '18 Fords. Rumors from Ford is they will not start Job 1 production of the 2018 Superduty's until Nov. which means getting them on the dealers lot will be January at the earliest. This coupled with the demand for vehicles from the flood will drive prices up for new and used trucks.

I hate buying the current year model new when the next year model is coming out soon but we need to upgrade pickups. At a cross roads.

 

[CM1995]

It's been a while since I've updated, since adding another crew my PM and office duties also doubled.

Finishing up the private school project. Topsoiling a slope and spread 1.5" crusher run for the modular classroom pad. Our 533E compactor is a nice machine, took the shell kit off to roll all the stone in.



Clearing a slope for a mini-warehouse expansion.



Interior demo job of CMU wall for a large GC we work for. This is their fab shop where they make all sorts of steel imbeds and piping for their large industrial and aviation projects.

CMU wall was not poured, it came down easily once separated from the bar joists and other conduits/piping running through the wall.



A little R&R. Saturday's game at my Alma Mater Auburn University agains Mississippi State. It was Military Appreciation day, the US Army Herald Trumpets made an appearance. It was fantastic.

 

[mitch504]

How much work is it put that shell kit on and off?

 

[CM1995]

How much work is it put that shell kit on and off?

Not too bad Mitch. 1/2 impact on the service truck and either the hoe or old Blue to lift them off and put them back on. Usually the bolts that attach the shell to the drum and each other are shot, depending on how on how long it's been since it was swapped.

 

[Landclearer]

Hey CM,

Thanks for the update, what did you use to take the wall down?

 

[CM1995]

Hey CM,

Thanks for the update, what did you use to take the wall down?

Good ole manual labor using chipping hammers to break the wall down well below the bar joists. Then sawing sections on both sides of the wall and using the GC's Cat tele handler to push the wall over. The shorter portions were pushed over by the T250.

The walls weren't filled so it wasn't tough to break the blocks out.

 

[Landclearer]

Well unfortunately for us manual labor is the only way to do some things. I would like to see god do that

 

[CM1995]

Utility crew had a fire line tap for a new warehouse building for an automotive supplier. Existing 12" C900 line was in the asphalt in front of the truck scales.

Had to hammer rock in the ditch line all the way across the road.



Rented a 310J with hammer from United to break the rock. The T250 is still in service..


The dirt crew is working on an expansion of an existing mini-storage facility. This project involves clearing and re-grading an existing slope to 2:1, building pad and concrete flume.

The concrete flume is in our scope of work. Usually I don't take concrete work but I've got a good sub to do it and it's a new client with future work.



One erosion control trick we use - the dirt berm behind the silt fence is to divert water away from the existing building and into brush check dams and silt fence behind the 321. The cheap silt fence is for looks and to make the city happy..

The new building pad elevation is behind the berm. The mound of dirt between the new pad and slope is to be hauled out. We'll cut the bottom portion of the slope and finish the building pad while that dirt is hauled out.

 

[Landclearer]

Looks like you had some near perfect soil conditions. I don't see any rock. The slope looks a lot bigger now all the clearing debris is gone.

 

[CM1995]

Looks like you had some near perfect soil conditions. I don't see any rock. The slope looks a lot bigger now all the clearing debris is gone.

The slope wasn't too bad to grade but looks can be deceiving - there are chert rock bands that run through the slope. We had to change teeth on the hoe to cut through it, the D5 just skips over them.

A video of how hard chert can be to excavate -

The slope is not perfect but considering the ground conditions it's good enough to be behind a mini-storage building.

 

[Landclearer]

You're not kidding. That is some hard digging. Poor teeth☹️ From the pics I would have never, turned pretty darned good for sure.

Hardest thing we deal with on teeth is concrete demo. Little over $700 for a set on the 160.

 

[LowBoy]

Thought I would post some pics and commentary on some jobs I have done recently.

This project was an interesting one. A frozen food processing facility was installing a new cooler. Problem was the building had a high water table underneath the slab where the new cooler was going. Our job was to excavate 22" of very sticky, very wet clay and replace with woven geotextile fabric and #57 stone to separate the water from the -10 F degree cooler that would sitting on top of it. The Engineer was worried the cooler would freeze the ground and buckle the $100K cooler. This project was done in July, a rather dry time in this part of the country and as you can see from the pictures, there was a substantial amount of ground water.

The staging area in the loading zone. T250, S300 and PC78
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The bay we were working in. Friday afternoon we mobilized in and ditched the area to a sump pump.
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Saturday morning we started hauling out the muck. It was a challenge with several large fans to keep the exhaust vented to the outside. The temp inside the plastic offed area was over 100 F.
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Every bucket had to go out a loading dock door and into the truck. I don't know how many trips I made that very long Saturday.
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One of "those" jobs eh CM? Those are the normal conditions that we fight up here at this time of year in New England. The rains never seem to quit, you're rushing to beat the deep freeze, working in glop/peanut butter, your boots are 2 feet in diameter with muck all day...it ain't pretty by any means. Good for you, you're getting her done.

 

[The Peej]

CM I hope your doing well I miss seeing your updates.

 

[CM1995]

CM I hope your doing well I miss seeing your updates.

I'm still around. It's been hectic, the good type of hectic, for the last two months with 2 gas station projects going on at the same time. I've got pics and will post up some updates.

 

[Jakebreak]

Enjoy the pictures do you hot tap your water and fire main tie ins. How are you liking the 321 we have two of them their nice the door is a little tight getting in their really stable on slopes with good power would tiger teeth work for that chert or wear out to quick for you

 

[CM1995]

Jakebreak it depends on the tie in, who's it for and whether it's a private fire line or tapping a city main. Sometimes we can isolate and cut a T in or it's a hot tap.

Love the 321 it's been a great hoe and it's paid for. We've tried tiger teeth before but they break off. We use penetrator plus and they seem to work the best for digging and average wear.

 

[Jakebreak]

Jakebreak it depends on the tie in, who's it for and whether it's a private fire line or tapping a city main. Sometimes we can isolate and cut a T in or it's a hot tap.

Love the 321 it's been a great hoe and it's paid for. We've tried tiger teeth before but they break off. We use penetrator plus and they seem to work the best for digging and average wear.

Cool same goes for us on doing tie ins it just depends I wish I had pictures of a job we did on the coast running storm and water up slopes that were pushing 2:1 for a flat lander it was a different but not bad just couldn’t get crazy with swinging

 

[DGODGR]

Love the 321 it's been a great hoe and it's paid for. We've tried tiger teeth before but they break off. We use penetrator plus and they seem to work the best for digging and average wear.

I use mostly the Penetration Plus teeth as well but have also used the twin and single points. In my opinion they seem to work best in fractured rock because the small points can get in the crevasses and lift out the chunks. That being said they do wear quicker than the others. As far as breaking goes I have only ever broken one tiger tooth. Since you used the term Penetration Plus I assume that you are using Cat teeth on your Cat hoe. Maybe you already know this but Cat teeth are guaranteed against breaking. My dealer gave me a brand new tooth when I showed him the broken one. Since I've not had a lot of teeth breaking, and I'm digging in severe applications (bed rock, shot rock, etc., and clays too), I think that Cat makes some great GET. Is it possible that your teeth and shanks are slightly undersized for use on a 321? Maybe bought your buckets used and/or held over from your previous machine/s?
As it relates to "zero tails" I bought a Deere 245G this year and I have been very pleasantly surprised at how well it performs in my application. It's been remarkably stable on slopes (and I have a thumb and coupler mounted as well), can work better in areas that we normally have been using a 15tn machine, and the tool control system has been great for all the different attachments that we are using (crusher, hammer, and plate compactor).