Tractors, Mowers, Chippers, Trailers, Chainsaws, Generators, Driveway Erosion Control, ETC.

Here's a few videos showing a bit of the difference.
This happened several times the first year I lived here.
https://youtu.be/L-PmLhC1lBA

https://youtube.com/shorts/lKik6daRjbU?feature=share
The fix
https://youtu.be/qyODFUSljTY

Bigger is better!

 

That's some serious water moving under your driveway!
More like a hard running creek when its up. Do you have water there all the time or just on heavy run off?

Edit: Played video... Didn't have sound on. My fault.

 

that has some hydro electricity potential for sure!

 

Turned out nice! Doing something like that is in the next year or two plan for us. We had a big "flash flood" type event that did some damage to our culvert. Not enough to need to fix it right away but enough that we will need to eventually. But we will widen it too which will be nice (its currently only like 14' wide....minus a foot now due to washout). This was just at the house...didnt get deep but the amount of water is always crazy. lucky we are mostly flat/have bit of slope towards the ditch.


We didnt get it as bad as further down the irrigation ditch though. This back cut pretty good and caused a decent amount of damage. Thankfully it doesnt effect much though since its an irrigation ditch and the roads are just permitter roads along farm fields. But had some of the same washout effects at out culvert

 

It's only wet when it rains. It stays wet for quite a while, but eventually it will dry out when the rain stops.

That field is in a little valley, most all the water from the surrounding hills flows down to that creek and one on the other side of the field. When the ground is already saturated like it is now from the snow last week, it quickly fills the creek to capacity. The previous owners never bothered to fix the problem, they just kept buying gravel and filling it back in. Nor did either previous owners tell us about that issue when we bought our homes. The neighbor bought his house 3 months before I bought mine. We both bought in the summer when everything was very dry.

The power of water is no joke. Fixing washouts can get to be pretty damned expensive. If you can figure out how to fix the issue sooner than later, it'd likely be to your benefit.

 

i bought my house in the summer too. come winter i had 8" of water under my house. dug some half hearted drainage ditches and drilled holes in my foundation to drain.

 

Here's a short vid on the smaller creek on the other side of the field. My end of the driveway turns and crosses this creek. It's just a smaller version of the larger creek. I still need to do some work to the upstream side of the pipe, even with the 36" pipe it still overflows the road on occasion.

https://youtube.com/shorts/NHPboFfN9vI?feature=share

 

Its amazing how people can forget to disclose important things like that when selling a house. I was tempted to sue, but it's not in my nature to be confrontational. I think I've told the story elsewhere in this forum, but when I bought my first house the seller failed to disclose that the basement flooded every winter. The door frame to the basement was rotted out at the bottom. It should have been a warning, the water heater and furnace located in the basement were on pedestals which should have been a clue. But neither my home inspector, realtor, or me ever considered the water table to be an issue. That was until a month after moving in and the rainy season started up. I was giving the dime tour to one of my friends, when we got to the basement part of the tour the bottom two steps were under water. I won't lie it freaked me out. It was a 50 year old house when I bought it, and the basement had been dug 34 years earlier. The original basement installation had added the pedestals as a fix, but never truly fixed the issue, until I bought the house and installed a proper sump pump and drain. That is where I earned my welcome to homeownership merit badge.

 

Luckily our section isnt at risk of washing out completely. Just the edges are decaying. And if they do go its a simple fix for temporary fixes. Its geta bit more complicated though since thats a irrigation ditch for farming. So cant just go changing things on it. Plus limits the times you can work on it a bit unnless you want to work on it with water flowing. Also luckily we dont get that much rain....that was just a freak thing

 

My driveway when I came home. Where the water is running down the hill, it’s several inches below the ditch. It was like this when we moved in. On my list of things to fix.

 

Our driveway still has some issues like this. Last year the neighbor brought is work crew (he's the a foreman at a excavating co.) out for a week and regraded the little hill you can see in the earlier videos to prevent that from happening. I don't know what that cost to do, he didn't ask my opinion about doing it. Nor did he ask me to pitch in to pay for it as I'm sure I couldn't have afforded it if he had, but it did need to be done. The big hill on the other side of that one still needs the same treatment, but it's only bad in a couple small sections. In the six years I have lived here we've put over $20K into the upgrades and new gravel, plus whatever the regrade cost. I'm certainly tired of putting money into it, I also know we're not done putting money into it which really sucks!

 

Started taking sheet metal off.




The shuttle is stuck. It’s behind this cover. From what I’ve read you have to split it to get the shaft out it all rides on.

 

That pretty much looks like my driveway but mine is way worse now! Get it fixed before the water does more damage.

 

Well that’s not good… found a hole. It’s almost 4ft deep and undercuts the driveway a little over a foot.

 

I talked to a guy with a dump truck today, he said he’d haul 10 tons of crush and run for $350. Not sure why not 16 but whatever.

I know a guy who has a pile of crush and run and I know a guy who has a dump trailer I can haul 5-6 tons on. He said he’d load me 5-6 tons for $80. It’ll cost me between $35 & $50 diesel to haul it myself.

If I can borrow the trailer it’ll be worth it to haul it myself.

 

Check around a bit, times change and you're in a different area than I am. Lots of thing can affect the price. But last time I ordered rock I got a 20T load of 3/4" pug delivered for $265 per load.

 

Nice! I have a connection to borrow a dump trailer whenever I want for free. But only shovels to spread it

 

If you can't swing buying tractor right now, you could always rent a skid steer or a tractor for a short period to spread some rock and move some trees. They aren't cheap to rent, but rental is a fraction of the cost of buying. The main reasons I bought the tractor instead of renting one, was the knowledge that I would need to use it several times a year, every year. Renting that much wouldn't be worth it in the long run, particularly with 0% financing on the table. But if you don't have a long term need for one, renting might be a viable option for you.

 

I'd stuff that hole with as many large fist sized rocks as you can to fit ASAP.

 

All this talk of rain, it was raining yesterday at the house and more on the way. I turned to an old country station yesterday and they were playing this song. I'd never heard it before.


https://youtu.be/BK7P4Sgomtw?si=2Lk98dk2vGiPrufc