Digging the Underground Utilities

After buying the underground materials (electrical cable for the 200 amp service from the pole to the building, cable for the 100 amp service from the new building to a future shop, 1” pex for all water lines (from well, to garden, to future shop, to future house), 3” dwv (drain, waste, vent) to the garden for the grey water line and from the future toilet stubbed out of the building for the future septic tank, conduit to sleeve all the electrical lines, 4” flex (black) tubing to sleeve all the water lines, and 1/2” copper tubing from the building to the future propane tank), we were finally ready to start digging.

On a very warm Friday (July 9th) the John Deere was delivered from the rental yard and we started digging the trenches. 

 

 

 

 

We dug a total of about 400 feet of trenches ranging from 2 to 4 feet deep. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s some video for the grandkids. As Brayten would say, “Dirt! Tractor! Grandpa! Truck!” 

The hardest part was digging the grey water line because it passed over a high spot and I didn’t do a good job of measuring elevations (my laser was not functioning for the moment). The result was a trench too shallow to provide 1/8” per foot drop for the 200 foot drain line from the house to the garden.

 

 

We had some much appreciated help from our dear friend Bryce. He cleaned out the trench and ran water line through the 4” flex tubing.

A note about why I spent so much money and effort sleeving everything from the water line to the electrical lines, to the copper tubing. In Missouri, rocks move under the soil. They, in fact, rise to the surface after repeated freeze thaw cycles year after year. If you just bury the electrical line, which is rated for direct burial, it will eventually meet the sharp edge of a rock and short out. It happened on my current house. For the same reason, I sleeve the pex and gas line because doing it now is relatively cheap and easy compared with digging up and replacing them in the future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s the old man (me) using the laser level (that miraculously started working, Thank you Lord) trying to figure out why I couldn’t get the needed fall in the drain line. I was trying to avoid having to re-dig.

Then it rained. I just happen to own a piece of land well suited for ponds and lakes. However, the same characteristic that makes for good ponds also makes for poor leach lines: Clay! As you can see from the pictures here, we had to get “down and dirty” to try and hand dig the trenches deeper in a few spots.

Before I went down to farmer’s ag and bought some Muck Master boots, I was using my old trusty Caterpillar steel-toed work boots, but the muck took a toll on my boots and lost my soul—both of them. The mud boots worked much better, but as you can see, it was still a struggle to extract my feet once planted.

The heat combined with the muck took its toll and got us extremely dirty. 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s my cute co-worker, Connie. She’s a trooper.

 

 

 

 

 

I made her stand by the results of our effort: one of four hydrants.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had hoped to get done with this project in one or two days. Silly me.  After keeping the tractor for a week, working several very long days and evenings, spending about $3,000 in materials and rental fees, we finally got everything in the ground and buried. 

The hardest part was, of course, trying to lay the drains with the right fall. If I had to do it over again (and I might if the drain doesn’t work well enough) I would bring in a couple loads of sand and use that to bury the pipe carefully before dumping the dirt and clay into the trench. That would have prevented some of the pipe being pushed up or down too much.   

Here it is complete. What a relief. We’re now ready for the post foundation.

Final Layout and Foundation Plan

Here’s our final take on the lot layout:

This is a bit messy, but it places the buildings as we think we’ll need them. This gives us the locations of all the utilities as well as the dog shed, driveway, etc. Keep in mind that the only thing set in stone is the placement and layout of the cottage, which we’re currently working on.

We’ve also made the final decisions on all the underground stuff. This is what we’ll do first. The following shows the placement of the posts for the foundation, as well as all of the water, electric, propane, and drain lines:

You’ll notice that the foundation is a bit unique. Call it a combination post and beam, platform, and pole barn constructions. This eliminates the cost of pouring either a monolithic slab or concrete footings and stem walls. This approach also allows me to run some of the posts all the way through the walls to improve seismic strength. I believe this is the most cost-effective (read cheapest) approach. I’ll talk more about how I’ll prepare the posts to make the last as long as possible, but we only need them to make 30 years or so. After that, I’ll be too old to care.