A few projects I have done recently

Nice! Sounds like a great time!

Well there is a first time for everything and yesterday I had a truck stolen.

2018 F350 that we hired an auto broker to advertise and sell. Friday morning received a call that we had an offer that I was willing to accept - awesome right?

So better 1/2 takes title along with extra key downtown to the broker since the buyer was coming in the early afternoon to look at the truck and seal the deal. She also went by a new project we will be starting a couple of blocks away so it was a 2 in 1 trip, something we try to do now a days with fuel prices.

I get a call around 4 PM Friday afternoon saying they brought the truck from the lot across the street to the showroom to let it cool down for the purchaser that was coming to pick it up. As the truck was sitting in front of their building somebody jumped in a took off.

So far nothing from the police. To be honest I hope the truck is in Mexico by now never to be seen again as it will be an easier insurance claim than a joy ride with damage.

Can't make this **** up.

Well the world keeps spinning regardless of thieves and this is our next larger sized project. Historic machine/fab shop downtown that is being turned into office and flex space.

Building part of the project. Our scope of the total project is tearing out the existing concrete paving in front of the project in addition to the curbing and grass. Second part is a parking lot across the alley.



One of the old original brick alleys that were built around the turn of the century. I am assuming these bricks were made by the Graves Company that made the same ones on the arena project we completed last year.

We'll try to salvage as many as we can.



The parking lot is the largest part of this project. The lot will be the tree'd area on the other side of the fence. We'll remove the brick alley as well to the building.



Section of alley we'll be removing. All the non-regulated material will go to our dump where we can separate the intact bricks.

That's awesome!

Sorry to hear about the truck. Most likely it will never be seen again.

That is a cool project you have coming up. I would think you could quite easily sell the salvaged brick. That’s a big deal around here. People love buying stuff like that.

Thanks LC. It's my old truck thankfully not the new one. Now it's just negotiation on value with the insurance companies. Like we need something else to deal with..

Wife and I have a more selfish reason to save the bricks as we are eventually going to build a new house and plan on using them in the build. We have other salvaged items collected over the years that we plan on incorporating as well.

I hear you on the insurance. What a pain. They like taking your money but not giving it back.

Cool deal on the bricks. We do the same thing. We save all kinds of stuff.

Mob'd out of the private school job last Friday and started a "side job" on Tuesday before we mob next week to the larger project downtown I posted pics of upthread.

This project involves creating an access road to the rear of the eating disorder clinic we started months ago. GC has to install an exterior metal fire escape, shore up the building corner and get kitchen equipment into the lower kitchen in the basement. This road will provide access for all those scopes.



The access road has to cross the end of the slue in their private lake. The only real option other than mucking everything out and going back with something the size of #4's was place and mash CL 2 rip-rap until the rocks didn't sink anymore. We have done this several times for low and soft road crossings. Works well.

You don't have to beat the rocks in with the bucket just place them then mash them down with the weight of the machine. When a section will lift the front of the hoe off the ground move over rinse and repeat.



Pitching and catching with 500-700 lb rocks.

We staged the rip-rap up top due to access and had to tote a bucket full at a time down.



This is our local class 2 rip-rap. Overall we used 4 loads or approx. 100 TNS.

Shot from the other side of the building.



24" HDPE pipe installed and fill being placed. We borrowed some fill from an area on the other side that didn't have any large trees as it was the quickest and easiest location. For the record that is poison oak on the tree in the left of the pic. Poison oak has been very bad this year.



Exercising the old girl. 2011 321DL with over 8K on the clock that still shows when you need her. Digging from the borrow pit and placing with the 279D.



R2 #2 compacting the fill.

Almost finished product as of this afternoon. Monday we'll spread a load of #4's on it and walk it in with the 321 then move on downtown. Going to miss this project in the woods close to home when we have to deal with the city and all the BS that comes along with that.



We had a nice stockpile of topsoil we stripped for the retainer wall that needed to go somewhere and this was the spot. Used it to fill in the borrow pit on the right after we put the brush and stumps from clearing. My role today was hoe operator and truck driver - I'm tired.



Inflow side. The rip-rap is dirty as it rained a 1/2" on Thursday.



Outfall into the pond. They have spent $15K with a local pond specialist to stock the lake with shad, bream and bass. If you focus in on the pic you can see the shad in the safety from the bass in the newly place rip-rap. GC told us they have to fish 250 LBs of bass out of the pond in order to get the balance right. A country boys dream right there - being told to fish.

Loading some topsoil into the ol' L9000 on a beautiful Alabama August afternoon. It was hot as hell as normal but a nice blue sky none the less.



Topsoil stockpile from the retainer wall and future parking area from a couple of months ago. Replaced the logs the novice clearing guy left as erosion control in addition to the straw wattles we initially installed.



Entrance off the private drive for the access road. Routed the road around the old dogwood tree in order to save it. I think it turned out nice.

Mob'd into our downtown project this week. Should be an interesting project.

D3 behind the fence. Unfortunately the temp fencing just keeps the honest people out, the other's well that's what insurance is for I guess.



It's been raining off and on all week, typical August in AL but we were able to get some clearing and demo work done. Moved the 325FL and 321DL in as there are long concrete stem walls that run the entire length of the future parking lot probably from a foundry or rolling mill from the turn of the last century. So far the walls have broken out easily but when they don't the 325 will hammer and 321 will clear debris.



Processed brush, trees, stumps and other debris staged for haul out. The trees here had massive sprawling root bases, you could snatch one out and pull roots from 20' away.



East end of the new parking lot. Stripping the "topsoil" for re-spread later and piling it up outside the proposed curb line. With the cost of diesel we will not have a fuel tank on the job although it warrants one. We'll carry fuel from the yard as needed, fueling up the 321 out of my tank.

On another note -

They found my truck.. Thieves must've been spooked as they left it on a RR track after attempting to remove the DPF filter. Apparently the bastards knew what they were doing as they only cut the soft hoses and were in the process of removing the rest.



As life has it the only damage other than the DPF filter was a broken tailgate camera and an alignment due to the tow trucks recovery from the tracks. Auto broker ended up sealing the deal with the original purchaser.

I hate thieves - they should be shot.

Salvage rough sawn beams from the downtown project. I bet those are worth a pretty penny as the building was built in the early 1900's.



The old and the new. $1M condos across the street from the project.

Glad you got your truck back. So do you have to lock your fuel tanks on the equipment also?

Thanks CraneOp. We feared the worse when they said they found it. Last thing I wanted was a damaged truck to deal with however this time it worked out.

Yeah we have locks on all our fuel and hydro caps. It's mostly Cat locks but keeps the honest out.

On the flip side of locked fuel caps we leave all the doors and panels unlocked. Reason is the crack heads and tweakers will break the glass to see if there's anything of value inside. If you leave the door open they'll rummage through and move on. If they want the battery they are going to get it so no reason to have a broken door as well. The word we live in right?

Fortunately they have no idea of the cost of the GPS equipment on the dozer. Even if the GPS hardware is stolen each part has a serial number and basically useless on the Trimble system stolen from what I'm told.

Getting the trees and brush cleared for the parking lot removed any cover they would have had at the rear of the building.

I had somebody break the window in my p'up and steal my bag phone. I drove 5 hrs home from Charlotte, NC in a freezing rain with no drivers window, paid $110 for a used window and spent a frustrating 4 hrs installing it. The deductible to replace the phone was $20.
My father walked in the shop and listened to me cuss a few minutes, then said: "If you had just left the doors unlocked like I do, you'd just be out $20."

My spreader trucks have Trimble GPS units in them, we pull the main units out and take them home frequently, leaving the antennas and peripherals in the trucks. Not knowing what they are worth won't keep a crackhead from selling them to a pawn shop for $20, then the pawn shop will put them on ebay.

Mitch you father is a smart man.

Had the receivers on our D3 bolted down to the roof brackets. If they get stolen we'll report it to Topcon and they'll be useless when they try to use them.

I asked Mike specifically about GPS antennas being stolen and he said a common thing that happens is contractors set their base pole on the entrance to a site (he said it's more of a problem on larger sites) so they can set the antenna up when they arrive and break it down when they leave.

Crackheads ride by and see the battery hooked to the GPS and steal it; figure while they're there might as well take the antenna too as it looks expensive.

He says it happens more than you think.

Of course not as much of a problem on smaller sites.

Fingers crossed it doesn't happen to me, but I guess that's what I pay insurance for.

put the control point deep in the site to solve that.