Need some reference points. What/where is a level spot on the BX23s

OrangePower

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A cute little rinky dinky 2021 BX23s
Sep 15, 2021
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VA
Suffice it to say it may be hard to belive, but, I have no idea where on my property there is level spot. Maintenance kept up by a hillbilly before me has led to absolutely nothing being level, whatsoever. I have the 3 point hitch coming in this week so I am gonna mount up the box blade this weekend. I need to get her leveled out with the tractor but have no idea when and where a level spot is. Guess I will have to place a level on the tractor and drive around till the bubble is true. What, and, or, where is the best place for a referance point to take level measurements from (left/right front/back)? Of course it has to be a place easily accessible.
 

eipo

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L4060
Dec 1, 2015
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MI
You dont need a "level" spot. You just need to level it in relation to the tractor. Park the tractor where ever and check level across the front of the frame somewhere. Then match the bubble reading to the box blade.
 
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Old_Paint

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You may find that you're being a bit too critical of what "Level" means. You're moving dirt, on varying packed and composition conditions, so the tractor itself is going to be doing some bobbing and weaving. Stand centered behind the tractor, eyeball the blade pitch to where the rear tires contact the ground, or across the rear axles, and bingo, level enough. If you need to tweak it, shouldn't be more than a turn or two. The beauty of a box blade is being able to tilt it to help correct sloping issues. That normally requires intentionally setting the blade off 'level' with the tractor so that one side digs more than the other.

Worst situation will be if your BB is narrower than your rear wheel/tire stance. Then, you'll have some fun trying to make a flat place. Before you get too critical of what the 'hillbilly' did, you might also want to look at WHY he might have done what he did. It could well have been done for shallow drainage and water diversion to help prevent erosion without putting in French drains.
 
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Russell King

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Jun 17, 2012
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You can find a level contour line with an A-frame level and start making a level area along that line. Look up permaculture swales for an example.

You can also use string levels to get an idea of what level looks like and attempt to get that area level.

Any concrete work on the property would be fairly level to start your project on.

Are you sure you want level or just flat?
 

GreensvilleJay

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BX23-S,57 A-C D-14,58 A-C D-14, 57 A-C D-14,tiller,cults,Millcreek 25G spreader,
Apr 2, 2019
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Greensville,Ontario,Canada
You need to do what surveyors do these days..
setup a laser level(green LED is better...) at a know good 'level/at grade' spot. record height of laser line.
grab a few clean stakes,hammer,tape measure,pencil,paper....
go out say 20 or 30', whack in a stack, measure the laser line off ground, record on paper.
do this for the entire area of interest, you end up with a 'grid of stakes and heights'.
use basic math to decide if a stake location is higher or lower(you'' get the hang of this real quick'.
say the laser base is 10", stake says 8", that means the stake is 2" HIGHER than the 'base', so remove material. if the stake says 14", you need to ADD 4" of material.
once you have all the stake locations same height as the laser 'base', grade inbetween the stakes,working away from the 'base'.
the 'fun' is that we have no idea if you're talking about a small area (carport) or a 1/2 acre....
also the 23s doesn't have automatic height control, so YOU have to do that job.
 

OrangePower

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Equipment
A cute little rinky dinky 2021 BX23s
Sep 15, 2021
100
42
28
VA
Before you get too critical of what the 'hillbilly' did.........
All I know is that the dirt on the side of the house slopes down for around 5 feet and then goes back up. All that water that was up (150ft out) drains toward the house 5 feet away and then goes from the front corner of the house outward to the driveway and runs across the "t" shaped driveway (Entrance is on the bottom/I park on the right of the "t"/rest of the driveway forward I leave empty for play room ). I have to step over a river to get onto the other side of the "play room" driveway (which I keep open for projects to do) and into the house. That alone is dragging silt and mud down when he could have angled it to keep running forward into the woods where the drainage field (and trees/woods) is are that goes off into the ditch by the street. Not only that, but, the front yard is sloped to drain half of it onto the driveway going to the garage, in which the driveway id shaped like a U. That drainage has eroded a huge spot on the other side of the driveway from the 2 driveway runoffs. Yea, got the water to drain, but, thats failure 1, 2 and 3 in my book, lol. I know why he did what he did, but, he traded one erosion area for another, he didnt "fix" the problem.


the 'fun' is that we have no idea if you're talking about a small area (carport) or a 1/2 acre....
Just did some measurements so I could start figuring the slope I want, and, the slopes allowed, dictated by the lands geometry. Looking out the front door, it is 59 feet to the woods (3540sq ft). On the side, it is about 77 feet (8,393 sq ft) roughly. I will be plowing through the woods catercorner to the back of the house to expand the back yard another 77x30 ft. According to ye ol calculator, adding all the sq ft up comes out to about 0.32697429 of an acre.
 

GreensvilleJay

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BX23-S,57 A-C D-14,58 A-C D-14, 57 A-C D-14,tiller,cults,Millcreek 25G spreader,
Apr 2, 2019
9,672
3,924
113
Greensville,Ontario,Canada
You can probably use Google maps, or something, to get areial views of your property, zoom in then print a few copies.
On one, map out 'how it is now'..
on another, 'the way it should be'.
Should be able to rescan into PC, add an 'overlay' of 'grids', say every 15' (BX23S overall length), to give you an idea of the project.
It's a whole lot easier to push paper than dirt..maybe spend a day or two doing that BEFORE you move a mountain, in the wrong direction......
There may be a better 'channel' for the water to flow...

and be grateful you don't live in southern BC !!!
 

OrangePower

Active member

Equipment
A cute little rinky dinky 2021 BX23s
Sep 15, 2021
100
42
28
VA
You can probably use Google maps, or something, to get areial views of your property, zoom in then print a few copies.
On one, map out 'how it is now'..
on another, 'the way it should be'.
Should be able to rescan into PC, add an 'overlay' of 'grids', say every 15' (BX23S overall length), to give you an idea of the project.
It's a whole lot easier to push paper than dirt..maybe spend a day or two doing that BEFORE you move a mountain, in the wrong direction......
There may be a better 'channel' for the water to flow...

and be grateful you don't live in southern BC !!!

I was actually going to take grid paper and map it out ft by ft with waypoints every so many feet (10-15) with elevation heights, all the way into the front woods. with the angle of the road in front of the property, I may only be able to angle 20-30 feet from the side before I start cutting into the opposite slope. I know the way everything is angled now (in the front) it is about 5 feet higher than the (what I am calling drainfield) woods area. If I can slope off from the front of the house 50ft out to the drain field/woods and still have 2 feet, then thats perfect, as the drain feild then drops 3 feet into the ditch by the road. Again, how far on the side of the house I can continue the up hill battle is unknown till I get some specs down on paper. Worst case is I can angle it all to the back of the woods behind the house, where it should have gone in the fist place, but, ye ol redneck decided a pond next to the house was better, so, he built up the ground MORE, rather than build the pond deeper. Good lord!!

Your idea does sound interesting, will have to check that out. Need to buy me a laser level also. Almost bought a Topcon RL-H4C but it has a red led. It would work, but, still looking at options.

Thanks for all the opinions guys, and gals, appreciate it.
 

bird dogger

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To help make things a lot easier when you start laying out your grid with stakes....get a bunch of surveyor "stake chasers", such as these They'll let you know when you're getting close to your final grade without hitting your grid stakes. When you're pulling material from the high spots, your grade stakes can be to final grade below ground (dig a hole to set them in). You'll know your getting close when pulling material away because you'll see the colored stake chasers before hooking your grade stakes.

You should also set a "benchmark" stake somewhere out of the way so that if something is accidentally damaged or removed you can reestablish it off of that benchmark and your paperwork.
 
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bird dogger

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Just bought some of those stake whiskers (in smaller quantities) at: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07D5MXVJ3/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Using for a small leveling and step project. I use the large spikes instead of wood stakes for easy driving in gravelly dirt
Nice! A search on Ebay for "Stake Chasers" will turn up all kinds of quantities, lengths, colors, etc., also.
They sure help to make the project go easier and take some of the worry out of snagging a stake unexpectedly. They let you know when you're getting "close" to grade.
 

GreensvilleJay

Well-known member

Equipment
BX23-S,57 A-C D-14,58 A-C D-14, 57 A-C D-14,tiller,cults,Millcreek 25G spreader,
Apr 2, 2019
9,672
3,924
113
Greensville,Ontario,Canada
if you want cheap hitech and have a smartphone....1st decide on a finished grade height, then add the difference to where your smartphone sits in the tractor. Either download or cut code to access the 'GPS' data of the smartphone. It'll tell you whether you're higher or lower than your reference point. 'tractor' as required to get the land level.
 

bird dogger

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Kubota B2650 and lots of other equipment
Feb 24, 2019
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Those are kind of cool!
Yes, money well spent when you're moving dirt around! :) there's a couple of different attachment methods that I'm familiar with.
On one kind....you just hammer the metal clip on the end right into the top of your stake. On the other kind, you actually use a nail to attach it. there may be other methods, also. They all work great!!
 

Old_Paint

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LX2610SU, LA535 FEL w/54" bucket, LandPride BB1248, Woodland Mills WC-68
Dec 5, 2020
1,540
1,425
113
AL
I was actually going to take grid paper and map it out ft by ft with waypoints every so many feet (10-15) with elevation heights, all the way into the front woods. with the angle of the road in front of the property, I may only be able to angle 20-30 feet from the side before I start cutting into the opposite slope. I know the way everything is angled now (in the front) it is about 5 feet higher than the (what I am calling drainfield) woods area. If I can slope off from the front of the house 50ft out to the drain field/woods and still have 2 feet, then thats perfect, as the drain feild then drops 3 feet into the ditch by the road. Again, how far on the side of the house I can continue the up hill battle is unknown till I get some specs down on paper. Worst case is I can angle it all to the back of the woods behind the house, where it should have gone in the fist place, but, ye ol redneck decided a pond next to the house was better, so, he built up the ground MORE, rather than build the pond deeper. Good lord!!

Your idea does sound interesting, will have to check that out. Need to buy me a laser level also. Almost bought a Topcon RL-H4C but it has a red led. It would work, but, still looking at options.

Thanks for all the opinions guys, and gals, appreciate it.
As for the laser level, if you want one you can see in daylight, get ready to spend some bucks. I got one that was supposed to be visible for 100' in daylight. Well, it is visible in daylight, if you can find the reflective target with it, within about 30 feet. Unfortunately, my slab is nearly 60 feet diagonally. I was sorely disappointed in it because found it to be pretty much useless until I got the walls sheathed on my shop. But, it's still handier and more convenient than a pocket on a shirt for inside use.

I had hoped to use it for levelling the slab forms, but unless I worked at night, that laser was useless. Too many things go wrong trying to do accurate work in the dark, so I just reverted to the oldest level ever made so I could get things right when i could see them. Gravity and water. I use a 5-gallon bucket with a hose thread bulkhead fitting near the bottom, 75 feet of water hose, and then 10 feet of clear vinyl tubing attached to a rigid stick. Total investment was less than 10 bucks, considering the hose was one that had ruptured a couple times under pressure and the bucket was an old used drywall paste bucket (free). I put a small cap on the vinyl hose with a tiny hole in it to help dampen the 'bounce' of the water between the stick and the bucket. Put a reference stake in near the bucket, and make sure the bucket will ALWAYS be at the same position and height, then mark that grade on the stick the clear tube is on based on a reference stake as close to the bucket as possible. From there, it's just a matter of measuring how much drop/rise there is by how far the water meniscus is from its original level in a position near the bucket. This makes shooting an elevation grid REAL easy. All you need is marks, no stakes. This is the same way the Romans put in the aqueducts in Rome and built Hadrian's Wall in England/Scotland. The aqueducts had to go over rough terrain, and maintain a drop that would make the water go in the direction they wanted it to. That's pretty tricky stuff.

Funny, but sometimes, the old ways are better and simpler and cheaper. All ya gotta do is remember up is down and down is up. Makes it really easy to set a grade with a simple mark on the stick for the amount of drop or rise you want. Put multiple marks on for longer distances and checkpoints in between. Some simple triangle geometry will figure out the elevations over the distance you need. Setting multiple bench marks makes it useful over very long distances. The only difficult part of using it accurately is getting all the air bubbles out of the hose. Air will go up hill, water goes down hill. So, just put one end higher than the other in a straight line and wait. Doesn't really matter which end, but I typically take the 'smart' end downhill and let the bubbles go back to the bucket since the air tends to go through larger hose better.

Almost forgot, very few people will 'borrow' an old 5-gallon bucket and patched water hose if you leave it sitting outside. Can't say the same for a fancy laser level on a decent tri-pod.