Demolition, clearing and grading

[Landclearer]

Had a busy week. Did a lot of work around the pool house job we are doing. We laid the RCP, underdrain and a lot of conduit. We also subgraded the parking lot and started rocking it. Moved in the 160 to clear a temporary fire lane and future house driveway on the other side of the building as well.

 

[Landclearer]

 

[CM1995]

Looks like your workload is strong LC, same here. There are so many projects coming across the table and I can't look at it all and definitively can't perform them all..

I have a RL-H4C too and it's a damn good laser.

 

[Landclearer]

I am glad to hear you are as busy as we are. Like you said more work than you can handle for sure. We have gotten lucky with a couple jobs getting held up so we could work on other stuff.

We have 3 Topcons and have had great luck with them. We tried a lasermark a long time ago and it was not good at all so we have used Topcon ever since.

 

[CM1995]

The popularity and quality of that laser has driven the price up. I bought one in 2013 for a little less than $600 delivered. Now they are pushing $750-800. Worth every penny IMO.

On the work forefront, it's like a triage center.

We had several projects that trudged along during the rainy winter months, then the weather broke and everyone is ready to finish. I triage my jobs by relationship with the GC or owner and their quickness in paying.:cool2

The slow payers get pushed to the back of the line as it should be.

 

[Landclearer]

I like the triage analogy! It is true, same thing we do. We are pretty fortunate, most of our customers are repeats and we have weeded out the bad ones but we do have one that doesn't pay good. We add money onto any bid we do for them

 

[Landclearer]

Worked on a few different jobs this week as always. Had to mulch about 4 acres and got a start on that. Got everyone out of our way on the pool house job so we rocked the parking lot and got it ready for paving. 75% of the parking lot gets shellsand and not asphalt. I give them a year and we will be back to scrape up whatever shellsand has not washed down the storm sewer and grading for asphalt.

Got a new toy to play with on Friday. Renting a crusher to crush our concrete stockpile.

 

[Landclearer]

 

[JNB]

Looks real good there LC. How's the SVL90 been working out for you? Hours on it?

 

[Landclearer]

Looks real good there LC. How's the SVL90 been working out for you? Hours on it?

Thanks! It's been doing great. Only thing we did was replace a bottom roller, the sand is hard on the seals. We have almost 700 hours in it.

 

[CM1995]

How much concrete do you have to crush? I looked into renting a crusher and it was $25K a month bare rental. I didn't have enough concrete to crush and compared to our delivered stone prices it just didn't pencil out.

What's shell sand? Obviously it's sea shells but is it processed or a naturally occurring product?

 

[Landclearer]

CM, I am hoping we have about 5000 but if I want to be realistic, 3000 tons but at what it cost to buy and truck it, 850 tons would pay for the crusher for a month for us. We don't have the close supply like you

As for shellsand, it is natural. It is very course angular sand that is full of shells. It is usually either above or below or sandwhiched between gumbo(gray slimy clay that never gets hard). It is $19 or $20 per yard at the pit. When we put it down, I will get a bunch of pics for you.

 

[CM1995]

Thanks for the explanation of the shell sand. I find it interesting to see the different materials used in different areas of the country.

Knowing somewhat of your area, I figured the cost to crush plus rental would be a profit maker if you had enough stockpiled. A 25 ton load of #57's runs $500 or so depending on location. At those prices it's cheaper to dump the concrete in a clean fill. I've got three clean fill spots, one on the north end of the city and two on the south end, so disposal is free other than the cost to push it off.

 

[Landclearer]

Hey CM, you are right crushing is feasible if you have enough material stockpiled. Renting is really the only option if you get a small outfit they charge you so much per ton to do it and the big boys won't move in unless you have 10,000 tons.

In the pics you can see the new crushed concrete as I am working it with the skidsteer. I am also putting some pics of the shellsand on here.

As you can see the gumbo balls mixed in. Some good size shells also. Makes it hard to put down 2 inches thick.

 

[CM1995]

That's very interesting, thanks for taking the time to snap some pics.

So there's pretty good sized shells in the shell sand and I can see where that would be a PIA to spread thinly. Are those large shells basically fossilized and solid or do they break up easily? Is there enough gumbo in the mix to cause a problem or does it act as a binder?

How's the concrete crushing going?

 

[Landclearer]

CM, the shells are just like you would find on the beach. To make good shellsand you need a little gumbo but guys that get greedy at the pit get to much and can ruin it. If there is just enough, it makes the sand compact and will stay compacted.

Crushing is going OK. We only ran for a little while, the mechanic came down and showed us how to close it up to make finer material so we should get some production this week. I will say this, an impactor sure makes a lot more noise and dust than a jaw does.

 

[JNB]

Interesting on the shell sand. We have a local sand that gets sold for everything from arena sand to select fill. It's silty and always has a few clay ball surprises in each load. They're not much fun to work with, but at least we don't have to deal with shells.

 

[Landclearer]

JNB, that sounds kinda like sand clay. They used it for road base around here in the 70s. The shells are a pain and will cut a tire in a minute. I will get more pics once I get it down and raked out.

 

[Ronald Sonnen]

Been clearing sites for new builds out in Hewitt. That's me driving the tree cutter. Not nearly as impressive.

 

[Landclearer]

Been clearing sites for new builds out in Hewitt. That's me driving the tree cutter. Not nearly as impressive.

Been there done that Not all clearing jobs are feller bunchers and trackloaders.