Building a Gravel Driveway

[Rich Riddle]

I know a few basics about building a gravel drive and have read several articles on the topic but still have comments and questions.

1. Some folks want the drive to be three layers of varying rock with each layer 6" thick; that won't happen. I am not trying to build a road to Athens. Is 4" a reasonable depth for each layer?

2. Concerning layers, many say 3" - 4" rock for the bottom layer. Will 209 stone suffice? I am not quite sure what it is, but the quarry a couple miles from the farm has it.

3. I am likely going to cut into the hillside to bury the drive or only have it above the grass a few inches. Is there a reason to have it a foot above the area around it?

4. Is 12' wide sufficient?

5. Everyone seems to recommend an underlayment cloth in heavy clay soil, which this is, but do you also recommend having an "edge" on the driveway such as railroad ties? This drive will be about 300' long. That's a lot of ties.

6. Some dealers want to quote in cubic yards and others in tons.....how does one calculate apples to oranges?

Thanks.

[Brent Cutshall]

As far as cutting a divot in the ground to for the driveway, it'll keep the rocks in better but it might funnel water into the driveway when it comes a monsoon. With my driveway, I don't think we've ever had any more than 3" deep of rock and I could say the same thing for the rest of the local folk too. I'd like to ask if you'll be putting yours on a hill. Mine is on a hill that raises from about 1000 feet to about 2700 feet in just over 150 yards, it's a steep hill. On the flattish spots the rocks stay there pretty good, but on the hill they'll gradually wash down. The friends down the street don't have really any problems. Oh, and we've got clay under ours.

[Jerome Stanek]

When I was running heavy equipment this is what we did. remove the top soil is a must the we would put down 4 to 5 inches of number 2 stone pack it in with a piece of heavy equipment we had a 211 pay scraper that we would have the belly full on dirt then 4 or more inches of 67 or b211 stone. The most important is remove the top soil as it will just keep coming to the top and make a muddy mess

[Bradley Gray]

My experience with roads in clay is the clay will suck down just about anything you throw at it for a few years, especially in winter freeze/thaw cycles. I would stick with coarser rock for a while.

[Lee Schierer]

You definitely want to put down geotex fabric or the gravel will slowly merge into your clay. You also want to removed the top soil and put down a base layer. You need to consider drainage of the road way and the areas surrounding it. Any low spots will collect water and cause future problems. Likewise any areas where the driveway is higher than the surrounding land will act as a dam and stop storm run off. Your local government may have codes that apply and you may need a permit to cross any ditches to the main road.

[Nicholas Lawrence]

Like so many things, there is the "right" way, and the way that you can afford. They do not always overlap for me. To do it right, you need a good base (compacted), and the advice you are getting about multiple sizes of rocks in multiple layers is probably good, but it sounds a lot fancier then any gravel road I have ever been involved in. In other words it is probably good advice, but if you can't make that work it is not the end of the world.

Growing up, a lot of folks just put down gravel, and drove on it. After a while, you would have spots that needed more gravel, and then they would add more gravel as needed. For the first couple of years that might be quite a lot of new gravel. Over the years of driving on it, the gravel would sink into the ground, and everything would get compacted, and eventually things seemed to reach an equilibrium where you did not need to add much to it except an occasional pothole every so often.

In terms of cutting in, or having it protrude, take a look at a decent dirt road sometime. You will likely notice that they tend to have a crown, and are elevated a bit. Mostly so they shed water as far as I can tell. You do not want a lot of water moving across a dirt or gravel road, because it will wash out regardless of how much landscaping fabric, railroad ties, or whatever you use to try to prevent it. You want to lay it out in a way that lets it shed water to the sides to runoff someplace away from the road.

[Brian W Smith]

Drainage ends up being the metric...more so than materials and methods.Having been seriously involved in historic preservation work,I spent quite a few brain cells studying "drives".Have seen properly crowned,graded,drained drives that never saw a single "gravel",that not only survived 200+ years....but are still serving.Drop dead gorgeous as well,all things considered.

[Yonak Hawkins]

If you have access to limestone gravel you may want to check into it. It seems to have a way of locking in place and not washing away as readily.

[Mel Fulks]

Rich,since you have that new machine ,dig to hard pan... I don't imagine that requires much. For the size of stone I would use big stuff on bottom to cheaply take up space ,then cover with gravel. I have an area by garage door about 20 by 20 that I bought gravel for twice and previous owner had bought more than once. It needed a REAL fix. Dug to hard pan with 1/4 inch per foot slope ,put down landscape cloth ,covered with the old gravel SCREENED out and moved the dirt to a place needing some for a better look.

[Jerry Bruette]

I know a few basics about building a gravel drive and have read several articles on the topic but still have comments and questions.

1. Some folks want the drive to be three layers of varying rock with each layer 6" thick; that won't happen. I am not trying to build a road to Athens. Is 4" a reasonable depth for each layer?
​Around here the first layer would be what we call breaker run, probably 6' thick. It's limestone that's crushed to that size. Being crushed stone it locks together tightly.

2. Concerning layers, many say 3" - 4" rock for the bottom layer. Will 209 stone suffice? I am not quite sure what it is, but the quarry a couple miles from the farm has it.
Don't know what 209 stone is but see answer to #1.

3. I am likely going to cut into the hillside to bury the drive or only have it above the grass a few inches. Is there a reason to have it a foot above the area around it?
If you're going to plow snow off of it I'd build it up above the adjacent grade. Gives you somewhere to plow the snow.

4. Is 12' wide sufficient?
Depends on the width of the underlayment cloth. Cloth might be 12' and I'd go a little wider than that.

5. Everyone seems to recommend an underlayment cloth in heavy clay soil, which this is, but do you also recommend having an "edge" on the driveway such as railroad ties? This drive will be about 300' long. That's a lot of ties.
​Here again are you going to plow the drive? Nowhere to push the snow if you have an 8" tie sticking up above the drive. If you crown the drive some I don't see a need for the ties, just taper the edges. The ties could become a big maintenance issue in the future when the start to rot, and they will rot.

6. Some dealers want to quote in cubic yards and others in tons.....how does one calculate apples to oranges?
Good question, I've asked the local dealer for the ton/yard conversion only to be more confused. What if it rained yesterday and the material is wet?

Thanks.

[Stew Hagerty]

Make your first layer using #304, which is a mix of #4 & #10 stone. It's very good as a base, even in muddy areas. This should be 6" deep.
Then use #57 as your middle layer. 4" thick is just fine for this layer.
Top it all off with a 4" layer of Crusher Run. It's a mix of stone & stone dust. This material compacts extremely well and will provide an excellent driving surface.

[Steve Peterson]

I am out on the left coast where we don't get much snow, just rain. Also, the topsoil is typically about 6-12" thick before hitting slate. You are on semi-solid rock by the time you grade it flat. Most people just throw down about 4" of crushed rock and spread it around. Add a bit more in the spots that need it after a year or two.

Steve

[Rick Moyer]

Already some good advice. A cubic yard of average limestone is about a ton. Base and drainage are key for a good sustainable roadbed. Will you be needing deliveries in large heavy trucks? Cars don't do too much damage but a big truck is ten times heavier (or more).

[Rich Riddle]

About the biggest equipment that will likely travel the road will be 8000 pounds.

[Ronald Blue]

Sounds like you have lot's of opinions and some good advice but some impractical suggestions as well. What type of aggregate is available to you? Dig the turf off and lay down a base of larger rock. 6" deep is plenty for the weight you are anticipating. I don't know the number but it's going to average about 3" approxamately. If you have limestone available it is a good choice. I could see you only having granite or river gravel available too. If you do have limestone available a good topcoat around here is called CA-6. It's a mix of finer and courser up to maybe an inch. It grades easily and packs well. The drawback to limestone is it breaks down to dust and basically dissolves away over time. So you might have to add a load or two every 2-3 years depending on traffic. I know snow isn't a common issue for you but it can be easy to plow rock off pushing snow as well. I also don't see you dealing with a lot of frost in the ground to cause issues in the spring. Twelve feet in width should be fine unless your going to be bringing semi's in and out. Curves might need a little extra width. It should go smoothly. Keep us posted.

[Lon Crosby]

About the biggest equipment that will likely travel the road will be 8000 pounds. What about the semi delivering the new saw, or the concrete truck delivering for the new shop footing/floor, the truck servicing the electric line, or the??? Even the UPS delivery truck will most likely be over 8000 pounds. A simple pickup will come in at over 5k pounds - unloaded. Lots of ways to make a good lane and 10x more to make a bad one. Give me a drum of wood glue (acrylic), a rototiller and a compactor and you can have a mil-spec road under the right conditions. Fabric can turn a bad design or implementation into an acceptable lane. Building a lane /road is all about drainage. You can't have enough. Cut into a hillside, drainage on the uphill side is critical. That is why there are ditches along roads, both sides.

[Larry Frank]

No matter what I did, the gravel driveway needed a load or two of new gravel every year or two. My ground was clay and with significant ground heave every year. After about 10 years or so it got pretty good.

[Matt Mattingley]

It really comes down to what you're laying it on top of. I have a drive that's been maintained for maybe 30 years. One of the best materials was crushed limestone mix. The one that lasted the longest and cost the most was recycled asphalt. The quick daily fix on the cheap is recycled cement Gravel (if you have a recycler nearby) . The washouts are the killer. Callverts and the Muskoka culvert help prevent wash outs. I have used everything from P gravel those nice on the feet to 3/4 clear stone but for the main drive or three-quarter gravel mix does well.

[Jerome Stanek]

My drive to y shop I used railroad ballast as a base

[John K Jordan]

I know a few basics about building a gravel drive and have read several articles on the topic but still have comments and questions.
1. Some folks want the drive to be three layers of varying rock with each layer 6" thick; that won't happen. I am not trying to build a road to Athens. Is 4" a reasonable depth for each layer?
2. Concerning layers, many say 3" - 4" rock for the bottom layer. Will 209 stone suffice? I am not quite sure what it is, but the quarry a couple miles from the farm has it.
3. I am likely going to cut into the hillside to bury the drive or only have it above the grass a few inches. Is there a reason to have it a foot above the area around it?
4. Is 12' wide sufficient?
5. Everyone seems to recommend an underlayment cloth in heavy clay soil, which this is, but do you also recommend having an "edge" on the driveway such as railroad ties? This drive will be about 300' long. That's a lot of ties.
6. Some dealers want to quote in cubic yards and others in tons.....how does one calculate apples to oranges?


Rich, I am not a civil engineer but I have built thousands of feet of driveway for the farm here. I think there are many "Right" ways, but right depends on your soil, drainage, runoff, whether the drive is under trees or in the open, what materials are available, and what equipment you have. Also, what is the traffic, do you expect constant loaded semi trucks and other heavy equipment or is it mostly light weight farm and home vehicles? Our past work at the Lab with highway research taught us why they use multiple thick layers of rock for commercial roads but that is WAY overkill for most farm/personal driveways.

Remember that one person's advice may be useless even if it worked for him - your conditions my be quite different. For example, iif the drive is mostly under trees through the woods, the trees may stop much of the driving rain and the forest soil will absorb much of the water as it hits the ground and before it can make a gully-washing stream. If the ground is sloped uphill on one side of the drive where it can funnel runoff to the drive, you will need to play close attention to drainage. I my case, I have one field that feeds water to a low spot on one point on one road and I really need to shape the ground and a culvert at the low point.

I built my primary driveway with just the yard box on my tractor. It's about 900 ft long, down and up a hill, part in the open part in the woods, built over the red clay and chert common here. I put 4" of crusher run on it maybe 8 years ago. I have to grade it a couple of times a year but until this year I didn't need to add any more rock.

I have several other access roads through the woods on the property for occasional use with tractor, truck, and my big trailers. These I cut with the bobcat and tractor and spread a thin layer of 1/2 gravel. I sloped the drive slightly sideways and made sure there was no cut on the lower edge to catch the water and make a stream. Friends looked at these and said that will never work. These have needed no maintenance in years, even after torrential rainstorms. I think the trees slow down the water and the 1/2" gravel lets the water move gently sideways instead of cutting a channel. Any place I used compacted crusher run on a slope washed out eventually.

One thing I always do which works for MY soil and conditions - I cut and shape the ground (cut and fill, cut and fill) and then drive over it a bunch of times to compact. Before I got the skid steer I would put a load of gravel in the bucket of the tractor to put a lot of weight on the smaller front tires. This makes a poor man's sheep's foot compactor (sort of). Then I spread gravel and run again. (One tip: offer to pay the gravel delivery guy a bit extra to run his truck up and down the drive a bit to compact the gravel he just spread. Another tip - some drivers are horrible at spreading, ask for the best guy. Also, if I can make it work, I prefer to have the rock dumped in a pile and spread it myself - that's what I did with two loads this week and a couple coming tomorrow.

I like the surface a few inches about the surrounding soil, but again, this depends on conditions - if there is a lot of runoff from the side you may need to allow for drainage or the water may cut a big ditch. If there is a long area with gentle runoff from one side, it may be better to let that run onto and straight across the gently sloped drive instead of channeling the water down the side.

My gravel supplier recently told me about what he uses on his drive (long drive, up a hill, several switchbacks) - slag from a local steel mill, a byproduct of making rebar. He said every customer he as spread this for loves it and for some reason won't wash out like crusher run. I got one load to try on maybe 400'. It is black, almost looks like asphalt when it goes down, but is supposed to gradually turn grey. (And it is a lot cheaper than gravel.) We'll see how it works - check back in a year or two! Note that I put this down over an existing compacted driveway - I don't know how it would work over dirt.

I would recommend driving around your area and scoping out the best looking gravel driveways and try to find how they were made, how well they have worked out, and what the owner might recommend to do differently. Also, consult with your favorite geologist friend if you have one.

If you haven't priced gravel lately, be prepared for a sticker shock. I paid just over $300 for a 20-ton load when I built my drive - yesterday it was over $450 delivered from the same people. They said it is going up again in a couple of weeks.

JKJ

[Ole Anderson]

As far as cutting a divot in the ground to for the driveway, it'll keep the rocks in better but it might funnel water into the driveway when it comes a monsoon. With my driveway, I don't think we've ever had any more than 3" deep of rock and I could say the same thing for the rest of the local folk too. I'd like to ask if you'll be putting yours on a hill. Mine is on a hill that raises from about 1000 feet to about 2700 feet in just over 150 yards, it's a steep hill. On the flattish spots the rocks stay there pretty good, but on the hill they'll gradually wash down. The friends down the street don't have really any problems. Oh, and we've got clay under ours. 1700 feet of elevation in 450 feet? Even 170 feet in 450 (38% grade) would be 4x4 hillclimb territory.

[John K Jordan]

1700 feet of elevation in 450 feet? Even 170 feet in 450 (38% grade) would be 4x4 hillclimb territory.

I have a friend with a very steep driveway. I always had to use 4WD on the gravel. He ended up concreting the steepest part, made with a very rough surface. Very nice!

We've thought about concrete for our main driveway but the last time I checked it would be $26,000 even if I did the forms and supplied the rebar. Ack.

JKJ

[Jim Becker]

When our "new" driveway went in, they cut it down to subsoil, laid in geo-textile and then put in several layers of modified stone, compacting each. The only area that got some heavier rock was the last 8' to the road which was a bit more "regulated" relative to construction requirements including requiring 4" of asphalt paving for that 8' as what I'll term a "landing pad". (I'm actually very appreciative of that paving when a rare snowstorm dumps on us as it makes clearing that area at the road much easier) If your driveway is cut in clean enough, you don't really need a boarder for a rural driveway...the un-touched soil should hold it fairly well. Borders are more of an aesthetic in most cases, although in certain areas with certain kinds of soils, they may be more practical. IMHO...which may not match reality.

Personally, if I happen to win the PowerBall, the driveway will get paved quickly to cut down on dirt and make snow removal much easier.

[Jim Laumann]

Personally, if I happen to win the PowerBall, the driveway will get paved quickly to cut down on dirt and make snow removal much easier.

As the owner of a 1700' gravel drive - I can only say: Absolutely YES!!!!

[Jim Becker]

Ours is only about 350' on one side and another 100'+ on the other side (shared with neighbor but I maintain it) with a large parking area...but I truly do want at least the parking area paved at some point, if not the whole thing. I did a whole house generator this past year as "the project", so maybe the next time I have the ability, the driveway will get the nod.

[Ed Aumiller]

Here is a handy calculator to find out how many tons of gravel is needed for roads, etc

http://www.rockydalequarries.com/Help/Calculator/tabid/128/Default.aspx

There is other info on stone sizes, etc on their website..

Good luck on your project..

[Rich Riddle]

We cut the top soil down about six inches and finally had weather that would allow for starting the drive. The protective cloth is under the 6" layer of #2 rock which is the first course.

356157 356160

[Mel Fulks]

Looks good ,and there is always a place that needs some more top soil.

[Rich Riddle]

Mel,

Thanks for the encouragement. To me it looks like an old abandoned or neglected farmhouse and land, but it's improving. Slowly but surely. The scraped off topsoil is filling the dips in the contour of the lot. The mower didn't like the low spots.

[John K Jordan]

...scraped off topsoil is filling the dips in the contour of the lot. The mower didn't like the low spots.

I did that in a long depression running across my horse pasture. With the yard box, landscape rake, and a little grass seed, a year later you couldn't see any difference.

I bought a used 6' wide landscape rake which simplifies smoothing and cleanup in the fields and especially under trees (rocks, limbs, sticks, roots) where I ripped out all the privet and bush honeysuckle with the skid steer. Great for occasionally smoothing a gravel drive too although the yard box is needed on slopes after a downpour.

BTW, the absolute best thing I ever did to add utility to my tractor was to add top and tilt cylinders and controls to adjust the angles of things on the 3 point hitch. Not only lets me do a better job but saves SO much time making adjustments when shaping drives, drainage, etc., and incredibly useful even when drilling holes or pounding wooden fence posts into the ground.

JKJ

[Jerry Bruette]

Rich,

Looks good, pretty soon you'll have a regular highway.

How big is that #2 rock and was it crushed?

Found out yesterday I have to do some improvements to the driveway approach at my cabin so the logging trucks can get in and out easier. How much did the cloth add to the job?

[Rich Riddle]

Jerry,

I don't know if the rock was crushed but will ask tomorrow when back at the quarry. The cloth costs about $72 for a 12.5' x 54' piece. not really all that expensive considering many people say the cloth saves loads of gravel, literally.

[Lee DeRaud]

I'd like to ask if you'll be putting yours on a hill. Mine is on a hill that raises from about 1000 feet to about 2700 feet in just over 150 yards, it's a steep hill.


1700 feet of elevation in 450 feet? Even 170 feet in 450 (38% grade) would be 4x4 hillclimb territory.Yeah, my first reaction was, Does. Not. Compute. :eek::eek: