It's Hammer Time

Saturday's excavation was going well for the first three hours.  Chico was making progress on the house pad and started the terrace area above it.  The terrace is the area that started out as a mistake when he was cutting the road and he should have turned right about 20 feet earlier.

This will work out fine since we had planned for a terraced area, if the hill had to be cut steeper than we wanted.  It will also allow an 8 foot wide area to plant trees and most likely be my herb garden.  The East end of it will still be the generator house.  One of the main advantages to the terrace is the view of our property from down below.  When looking up to a big hill cut the rock really stands out.  The terrace will hide the area so all you should see is the house in the middle of trees.

The dozer is 8' wide and Chico was mainly in rotten rock for the first 30' and he could break it.  The hard rock vein was pushing the dozer towards the edge so he went back down to the house pad to finish up what he could before we brought the jackhammer out.  On the lower area he caught a hard rock with the edge and knocked the track off.  Digging was done by 10:30 am.  More on the repair and today's excavation below.

Sunday we went to the Honeyman's property and helped him construct hurricane proof beehive stands.  They are two rows of cut power poles set in the ground with 4x4's going across each of the pair, I believe there were 11 or 12 pairs.  Down each row we placed 2 rows of 3x8 wood for a total of 110' of area to place beehives.  He said he should be able to fit around 60 hives on the stand.  Both Denise and I forgot to get pictures but he'll send us some and I'll give an update.

This morning Chico arrived to fix his dozer.  Alvin dropped of the backhoe with the jackhammer and Smith stuck around to help fix it and then went to work on the rock.  Here's the dozer waiting to be fixed on the lower level that needs the hammer.

Here's the dozer on the lower level with the track off and being aligned under the dozer.

Once the dozer drove back on the track, the backhoe pulled it over the top as Chico drove forward.  When the end draped over the wheel he was able to pull tension with the backhoe and bolt it back together.  

The plan was to have Smith break the rock and Chico would move it but he also had a blown seal on a hydraulic connection.  Chico got the dozer up the hill to fix the leak while Smith got to work on the rock.  He did as far as the arm could reach but his backhoe doesn't have the pushing power so the broken rock will be removed in the morning once Chico finishes repairs.

Here's Smith chipping away at the rock.  He's a bit more per hour than Chico and it will probably take him another day or two to finish.

That's all the adventures for today.

Kevin & Denise