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Gravel road?

2K views 12 replies 10 participants last post by  muleskinner2 
#1 ·
I have about a quarter mile worth of farm roads that I need to maintain. It looks like the original owners just scattered a very thin layer of crushed gravel to make a hardpacked surface and I'd imagine this is the cheapest solution to fix this driveway. I've seen it just dumped/spread in thin layers over county roads but I have no idea what this gravel is called. I haven't seen anything like it available at landscaping depot's. It's a mix of various sized (I think quartz/sandstone) gravel up to 1.5-2" and it gets packed down after being driven over. Any help would be appreciated.
 
#3 ·
A quarry will have this in several grades. Coarse grade is used for a base and then a finer grade over the top. The finer grade makes a very affordable landscaping mix - once the rain washes the surface stones, it has a nice clean look. I use this over black plastic along my house.
 
#4 ·
If you can find crushed asphalt from a drive or parking lot that's being repaved, try to get it. Sounds weird, but that was the best I've ever had laid on a drive.

While shopping one day, I saw guys tearing up part of the parking lot. Drove over and asked what they do with the crushed asphalt as they were putting it in dump trucks. Ended up getting 8 loads for $100 a load. Probably the best deal I've ever made.
 
#6 ·
If you can find crushed asphalt from a drive or parking lot that's being repaved, try to get it. Sounds weird, but that was the best I've ever had laid on a drive.

While shopping one day, I saw guys tearing up part of the parking lot. Drove over and asked what they do with the crushed asphalt as they were putting it in dump trucks. Ended up getting 8 loads for $100 a load. Probably the best deal I've ever made.
While crushed asphalt can sometimes be had pretty cheaply, that stuff is totally butt ugly. I wouldn't use it anywhere you wanted to look nice.
Two neighbors down the road from me did this when they were tearing up the nearby highway. Both of them told me they regret using the stuff and have topped it off with clean crushed limestone.
 
#9 ·
Yea I've been thinking about drainage. This past week has been the first significant rainfall that I've seen here and everything got washed out. I got about a foot worth of silt piled up on the porch and the road visibly got eroded. I think I'm going to have to plan out some drainage ditches before I spend money on the road.
 
#11 ·
This question cannot be answered correctly without knowing what kind of soil you have.The soil in the Rogue Valley in Oregon is red clay. I had pit run rock which is large pieces of hard rock put down on as a base. It was in the spring and load after load of the rock kept disappearing. Luckily I had a contract and wasn't paying by the load. Eventually the road was topped with 3/4 minus and held. Here in eastern Oregon the soil is volcanic loam. It is very solid until it gets saturated and turns to mush. Once again we put down pit run rock about a foot or more deep. We were advised to drive over it for a year before putting a topping layer on the road. The pit run rock was compacted by a dozer when it was dumped..A year later we put washed two inch minus on the top. Our neighbor has 3 driving age kids and the road got heavy use until the kids moved out. It held up for 14 years without needing any attention. Over time the 2 inch gets ground down to 3/4 and fines and make a great smooth surface to drive on. Last year we rerocked it with 2 inch minus again ( 12 twelve yard loads.) It has been a fantastic road even with water running over it. In our area we also have some kind of white material they call chalk. It sets up lke cement but it's not widely available.
 
#13 ·
I live at the end of ten miles of bad dirt road, not gravel road, dirt road. There isn't a wheelbarrow worth of gravel in the entire ten miles. We only gave two seasons here, dust and mud. The snow doesn't stay long enough to count. I like it just fine, it keeps the looky loos out. I don't care a twit how it looks, it's a road. I drive on it, I don't look at it.
 
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