[AT] Continuing "What to do"

Dennis Johnson moscowengnr at outlook.com
Tue Jan 12 11:21:54 PST 2016


Charlie, Cecil,

My main loader project is trying to prepare a site to build a 36 x 44 or 48 pole building. Got a few trees down that were too close or in the build site, and now need to work Building poles will be set in dirt, and the floor will be "floating" without stem walls. Plan to do hydronic heating in the slab.
My entire property is a small hill. The soil is sandy, and the location I have for the building was where there used to be a small shed. Gophers dug tunnels all though the site.  Loose sandy soil runs though the gopher holes and comes out further down.
The soil where I am has a lot of sandstone. So water may go down between 6" and 30" and hit a sandstone layer and then try to move more horizontal than vertically down. It is not the nasty gumbo  (grew up in Kansas - remember gumbo very well) type soil Cecil was talking about, but it is still soft and nasty especially when you end up on top of one of the gopher tunnels. As. I recall the definition of quicksand is sandy soil where water is flowing though it......
I need to move some dirt to level out the site, and also do some drainage to make sure water drains around it. I have a few places where there is build ups like a ditch edge are too steep and I need to move dirt from there to the building site. There is also some fill at site of an old house that burn down in wildfires where I need to remove some dirt.

Thanks
Dennis


Sent from my iPad

> On Jan 12, 2016, at 12:38 PM, charlie hill <charliehill at embarqmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Cecil,  I'm going to pick on you a bit because I think you will agree with 
> me.
> After a 40 year career in construction and then real estate appraisal it 
> still
> amazes me that people pay so little attention to foundation design and 
> finish
> landscaping prior to construction compared to what you see with commercial
> and industrial buildings. It's become a pet peeve of mine so please indulge 
> me.
> 
> It seems like folks build a house in a hole and then
> try to figure out how to drain the hole after the house is finished.  Given 
> your
> background I'm surprised you made the mistake of not considering soils but
> anyone can make a mistake.
> 
> I bet if you had been designing a foundation for a commercial building on 
> your
> site you would have not only put piles under it but you probably would have
> preloaded the site with good compactable soil that you later graded down
> leaving a solid, compacted base to "float" the slab on and at the same time
> gaining enough elevation to allow for settling.  Or you might have even
> mucked it out to a solid base and filled the hole with compactable fill.
> Of course when you have to write the check yourself for all of that site 
> prep
> it is easy to see the temporary merit of doing it the other way.
> 
> Near where I live is a piece of property that is not low but it's wet and it 
> does
> not have good drainage to anywhere.  It's about 25 acres and the folks that 
> own
> it moved up to Chicago and made a bunch of money.  They retired back home to
> build their dream retirement home.  They cleared off a corner of the 
> property and
> built the house with a conventional floor system and after the fact realized 
> they were
> in a hole.  In the past 3 or 4 years they have completely graded and 
> re-graded the
> entire 25 acres and dug two large ponds to try and dry the yard up and get 
> the water
> out from under the house.   I think they finally have it fixed as long as it 
> doesn't rain
> enough to flood the ponds and at normal water table they only have about 2 
> to 3 feet of
> bank before they flood.  Now I notice that their outfall ditch seems to be 
> flooding some
> of their neighbors slightly.  Had they simply shot grade on the site they 
> would have seen
> that all they needed to do was build on the other corner of the site.
> 
> I'm writing all of this not to pick on you exactly but so that others that 
> might read it and
> not know better can be warned.  Think of the final elevation, grading and 
> landscaping FIRST
> not last.  I guess this sounds like I'm trying to be a smart A$$ but as I 
> said it's a pet peeve.
> 
> Charlie
> 
> -----Original Message----- 
> From: Cecil R Bearden
> Sent: Tuesday, January 12, 2016 11:04 AM
> To: Antique tractor email discussion group
> Subject: Re: [AT] Continuing "What to do"
> 
> In Dennis'  defense, this Oklahoma mud is really something else.    It
> is about as sticky as super glue and as slick as greased owl S**T !   (
> My Dad's favorite expression ).  You can get stuck in a truck with mud
> grip tires in as little as 2 inches of this stuff.    It is a very
> sticky and slick clay.  To drive in our mud, you have to have aggressive
> tire tread and enough power to spin the mud out to take another bite
> when the tire comes around again.   A friend has a pickup with a high
> speed rear end but with only a 350 engine, and it cannot spin the mud
> out of the tires.
> 
> On a tractor, the mud will build up in front of the front tires and then
> stick you.  If you put any load in the bucket, the tires will sink.  You
> have to keep moving fast enough over the ground to stay on top of the
> mud.  When it dries, you need a pick and hammer to get it loose.  When
> you wash the last of it you need a detergent to loosen the last film
> that is left.
> If I park a truck on a dry place and it sits without moving for a year,
> it is down to the axle.  If I park it on boards to hold it up,  it lasts
> another year.  We have to design foundations with piers down as much as
> 6 to 8 ft to hit a shale layer.   My house was built in 1985 when I was
> not really familiar with this soil, and has a conventional 12 x 18
> footing with no piers.  It was also poured monolithic.  It has sunk
> nearly 4 inches in the 30 years since it was built.  That is an entire
> structure 34 x 66ft and functions as a solid slab!
> 
> Just FYI about the mud in most of OKla.
> 
> Cecil in oKla
> 
> 
> 
>> On 1/12/2016 8:19 AM, Ralph Goff wrote:
>>> On 1/12/2016 1:01 AM, Dennis Johnson wrote:
>>> Ralph, Larry,
>>> 
>>> Maybe I need to practice being stuck more to develop that. Tried it
>>> earlier without a lot of success.
>>> 
>>> Thanks
>>> Dennis
>> Hope this picture is not too big for the list. I took it last June
>> while filling in a muddy crossing with sand. Loose sand on
>> top of mud and water so the Massey sunk almost to the front axle as I
>> pushed into it with the bucket. I thought it was
>> worth a picture before getting backed out of there using the bucket.
>> 
>> Ralph in Sask.
>> 
>> 
>> 
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