Kyle and Karen's House Addition Project

Driveway Grading Begins 05/30/04 (Day 156)

Sweeping corner

Sweeping corner

Begining the guide trench

Well, we're completely out of money (and accepting donations!). That means no more workers. Now we're doing everything ourselves. To pour the driveway, we have to do some very complex grading, or the water will not flow right and either flood out our foundation, or wash into the new garage. Here, we broke up the old driveway parts. Then we broke out the shovels and started digging the first, very deep, "guide trench" for the tractor to follow.

Guide Trench Progresses 06/02/04 (Day 159)

Guide Trench

Digging the guide trench takes a long time. The tractor follows it best if it is hard compacted soil. This means that you cannot dig the trench too deep and then fill it back in, so you have to slowly, methodically work your way down to the correct depth.

Guide Trench Nearly Complete 06/05/04 (Day 162)

Guide trench

Guide trench

From old garage

The Guide trench is nearly complete across the whole new driveway section.

Rough Grading Begins, Sunday Morning, 06/06/04 (Day 163)

In front of garage	Tractor follows guide trench	Wench in trench	Wall illustrates change in grade
Slight grade difference	Squatters (wrens) move in	New driveway goes here	New driveway path mark

Once the tractor is involved, work moves quickly. In the morning, once the very first grade cut is made, the driveway path can be marked and the top side can begin to be sculpted.

Rough Grading, Sunday Evening, 06/06/04 (Day 163)

New driveway area (rough)

Rough transition

Slope towards garage

Front of garage

Hand Grading, 06/13/04 (Day 170)

Transition

Driveway curve

Big grade difference!

Front of garage

By this point we were almost done with what we could do with the tractor. Although we still used it, most of this work was done by hand.

The Drought, 06/14/04 (Day 171)

The drought

The experts tell us we are having a drought, but we can't remember a previous July with so much rain. There are many days when we would get grading done only to have the rain wash it all out later. This was one of those days.

Hand Grading, 06/17/04 (Day 174)

Still not dry

More guide trenches

Clear between trenches

New rough grade

Although not completely dry, we kept at it. The angle had to change in the middle to match to the old garage height. To accomplish the correct angle and grade, we measured, used string and other tools to create more guide trenches. We then used shovels to excavate the dirt between the guides by hand.

Smooooth, 06/20/04 (Day 177)

Finished

Done

Finé

The grade is perfect! Smooth as a baby's bottom. All set for a 4" pour. All the angles are exactly what we need for perfect drainage without getting any water into the new garage. Let's put in the forms and pour some concrete!

To Trench or not to Trench, 06/26/04 (Day 183)

Trench from driveway

Trench from garage

Trench from ramp

Trench from garage corner

The concrete sub contractor insisted that we install a surface drain trench. We did not and still do not believe it is necessary. So we spent money we didn't have for a crew of mexicans come out, dig a ditch in our perfect grade, install an NDS surface drain trench, and put up the forms for us. Once again, we're ready for concrete.

Concrete, 07/07/04 (Day 194)

First truck arrives	Pour begins	Concrete takes shape	Begin the smoothing
First truck nearly empty	Second truck (finally) arrives	Second truck begins dumping	General smoothing
Smoothing the edges	Pad at the new back door	View from garage hallway	Looking towards old oaks
	From old oaks	From corner of new garage

The concrete pour went very smoothly (no pun intended). Finally we can see the light at the end of a very the tunnel.