I'm gettin a load of gravel on Wednesday for extending the drive at my mom's house back to the shop in her backyard. It's asphalt from the street to the gate at the back of the house and from there it is mostly grass. My son parks his landscaping trailer there frequently and I will be storing a car back there as well. The grass works fine when the weather is dry / hot & dry but she has a gentle sloping lot and rain makes it a little soggy/sloppy. I think there was some type of base layer about 20 years ago but the sediment and grass have overtaken it. I've shot it with roundup and plan to bring in some gravel with a dump trailer a friend has let me borrow. What is the best type of gravel for my application. I've heard about ABC but thought you guys might could weigh in with your thoughts. Thanks.

 

If you aren't driving on it regularly, and there is already a base, then just 1" road rock should be fine. That is how they call it around here anyway. When I established our base, I went with oversize first, then the road rock. We drive on it daily though.

 

ive heard to use crushed and compact it.

 

I don't know a lot about this stuff, but I used class 5 gravel to build up my driveway and then used some of the smaller stuff.

Class 5 is pretty much dirt, but it packs down nicely and makes a firm base.

Might be more than you need, but it's relatively cheap.

hj

 

Thanks for the feedback. I think I have a pretty good base already but it probably wouldn't hurt to improve it some. You are correct, it won't get heavy/daily use. Trying to spend as little as possible and still take care of the need. No plans to top coat it with asphalt or sealer. It's probably 35 feet long and 10 ft wide. The guy has a dump trailer so that should make unloading easier.

 

i use recycled concrete. it is about the cheapest there is. compact it real good and it gets very firm.

 

Around here we use whats called "crush and run", mixture of fine and coarser gravel that sets up well.

 

Pit run, or 1/2 minus is what I've heard to use. It's all called different things in different places so hard to give long distance advice on it.

 

If appearance isn't critical, 1/2 or 3/4 minus is fine. If yo want it to look nicer, order the 3/4" clean.

 

what do they do just hose it off and charge more? heck the rain should wash it later anyhow.

 

Well, we made progress but are a long ways from finished. The stuff we got was mixture of different sizes and should make a good base but I might have been better served with a little bit larger rock. It rained hard last night and the fine stuff probably absorbed a good bit of moisture. So the 3 tons I got could have been a little less on the volume side but it was probably neglible. Anyway, I probably need 6 more tons to finish the job and might opt for a little bit larger rock. I think we might rent a bobcat to spread it. The stuff I got today would make a very good thin base and then put a thin layer of larger stuff on top and I should be good to go.

 

pics so we know what it looks like.

 

they hire a whole gaggle if "undocumented immigrants", and give them toothbrushes to scrub the rocks clean.
that is why 3/4 clean costs so much more than regular stone.

 

I had my first chance to work with the stuff yesterday afternoon. I think it will work okay as a base but it almost had more of the appearance of a bag of Quickrete mix with medium size rocks in it as opposed to just a load of gravel. Since it rained on it once it even looked like the Quickrete after having shot it with the water hose. Makes me think that it was definitely full of water when we got it Wed morning after that hard rain. I plan to spread what I have over as wide an area as possible and get some medium size gravel to go over the top. That should get me the result I was looking for. It will take at least 6 if not almost 10 tons to finish so I will probably get a bobcat or dingo to help spread it. I'll try to get a few pics posted.

 

A minus size is everything that goes through the screen up to the size of the holes in the screen. This will include everything down to the size of dust.

"Clean" means it's only pieces that are smaller than indicated the size but has everything smaller than the next smaller size screened out. It's usually also washed with a water spray to remove any dust.

For example, 3/4 "clean"' will only be pieces of rock that are less than 3/4 inch but are larger than 1/2" (the next smaller screen at the local quarry).

No illegal immigrants involved, just screens and machines.