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Need Advice on Accessing an Inaccessible area

3K views 20 replies 13 participants last post by  Georgiehopper 
#1 ·
I visited a potential client today who wants a 600 square foot paver patio with about $1500 worth of planting. It would be a great job for us except for one problem:

The access is horrible. The house is surrounded on three sides by steep hills...at least 45 degree and thats no exaggeration. The 4th side, which is the area for the patio backs to a lake. There are no access roads or paths.

I'm ready to not bid the job because of this factor but was hoping someone here might have a suggestion about how we could get materials down to the job site...which is behind the house.

I thought about bringing the stuff in on a boat or something, but I'm sure we'd have to get special permission and I don't know what type of boat or raft or whatever we'd need to haul the stuff.

It seems too steep to use wheelbarrows too...and I highly doubt that my Dingo could traverse the incline safely. I have a four wheel drive truck, but I still think its awfully steep.


Any ideas on this one? Or should I just walk away?
 
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#4 ·
We had one last year that we built a ramp so the MT50 could go up and down.... we actually picked the side of the house that didn't have steps but existing timber planters....built the ramp to go over them. You could build one so that it was 15% instead of 45.
 
#6 ·
Bobcat Toolcat. Hauls 2000 pounds, has 1500 pound (rated) lift capacity. Here, they rent for ~$175/day.

Your other option is a crane. Crane the stuff over the house.

Check into the boat option too. It wouldn't be the first time someone had used one in a site like this.


Dan
 
#7 ·
I would try a pontoon to bring the materials in, then hire a couple of the strongest guys you can get to do everything by hand. The toolcat doesnt seem much more stable than the dingo. I wouldn't worry about the total capacity of the boat with a loader or dingo on it, but I would worry about the small size bending the boat. Another option might be to try driving the dingo across the hill, with a couple guys holding straps attached to it to stop it from rolling, since it probably wouldn't roll just from driving on the slope, but would from an impact or bump that made the slope in that area steeper.
 
#10 ·
You would be surprised at what a Dingo can handle as far as side-slope, even straight up and down slope...

I've had a TX 420 on a slope that was around 70% or so, and it handled it just fine. Sideways and up and down. I would imagine that a 425 or even an MT 50/52 would do the same, maybe even better with the slightly wider tracks.

The Toolcat will handle the hills, up and down, but I'm nut sure about the sideways part....


Dan
 
#13 ·
Is it possible to move the materials THROUGH the house, like through a basement or garage? You could use a wheelbarrow or hand truck, put down clean tarps to keep floors from getting dirty. If this wouldn't work, get one of those little 1,000 lb. capacity pneumatic tired wagons. Tie a rope to it, wrap the rope around the hitch of your truck for a frictioning device. Load up the wagon, lower it down the hill, pull it back up. Sorry if these ideas sound goofy, I'm trying to think "outside the box".
 
#14 ·
Can't move the materials through the house.... the house is 6 stories tall and you have to use a tiny elevator to go to each floor. If we could do it this way, we'd have to go in through the top floor which is where the entranceway is...then we'd have to take the elevator down 6 flights to access the back yard. Its ridiculous actually. There is no garage.
 
#15 ·
Find someone with an amphibious ATV.Not to use on water,but because they have such a low center of gravity.When I had mine,I went across,up,and down some of the steepest inclines around.It's darn near impossible to flip one.
Then attach a trailer to the back and haul your materials that way.
Man I miss my AATV.
 
#16 ·
Can't move the materials through the house.... the house is 6 stories tall and you have to use a tiny elevator to go to each floor. If we could do it this way, we'd have to go in through the top floor which is where the entranceway is...then we'd have to take the elevator down 6 flights to access the back yard. Its ridiculous actually. There is no garage.
WOW, that is ridiculous!:eek: Well, I suppose if they own a six story house they can probably afford whatever method you come up with to get the materials in the back yard.
 
#17 ·
We actually have a job rather like this right now. The angle is steeper though. We pretty much took the shovels and made some temp steps coming down the side of the hill. Then we got 5 gallon buckets and started hauling gravel and Legacy blocks down. One at a time. SIGH! I am glad this isnt that big of a job ill tell ya.
 
#18 ·
Originally posted by Georgiehopper


The access is horrible. The house is surrounded on three sides by steep hills...at least 45 degree and thats no exaggeration. The 4th side, which is the area for the patio backs to a lake. There are no access roads or paths.
If it has 4 sides, 3 of them being 45 degree and the 4th being a lake, how does the home owner access the house? Do they arrive by boat? Sounds too weird:rolleyes:

That said, can you make a sled type of apparatus and let it slide down one of the hills with a winch on your truck to control the movement. If you don't have a winch you might be able to get someone with a medium size wrecker to cable the materials down. If you are all set up to go when the wrecker gets there you shouldn't have to pay for very much time. How many pavers are you talking about and do you know the total weight of materials?
 
#19 ·
Alright, alright, I'll tell you the proper way to winch down a hill.:D

Make a skid to put your materials on. When I did it, we were winching full pallets of stone down into a ravine. The skid was two 6x6 timbers with 2x12 decking. The total size was 4' wide by 8' long. We attached a cable to what was the "uphill" end of the skid, that cable was then attached to the winch hook. The pallets of stone were placed on the skid with a skidsteer, then rachet-strapped down with two straps forming an "X" over the top of the pallet. We put in 4 eye bolts in the 6x6's for that purpose.

How did the skid move down the hill, you ask????

Simple. Get some 4" schedule 40 PVC pipe. At least 6 lenths of it. SDR 30 will work too, but you need more. Use the pipe as "rollers". As the skid moves down the hill, bring the roller from uphill down to the bottom and put it under the skid.

When we did it, we had a SuperWinch 9000 with a 12' remote switch. Got a cradle for a reciever hitch and mounted it on the back of a crew cab F450. Left the truck running, and had heavy (I think 4 gauge) jumper cables running from the battery of the truck to the power cables for the winch. Duct taped the clamps to prevent arc'ing.

Steering the skid was accomplished with long handled "King of Spades" spades, as well as changing the direction of the rollers.

It's a fairly labor intensive way to do it, but we winched many, many pallets this way, in addition to 4 LARGE stone slabs, each wieghing around 4k.

Word of warning: DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT hook the winch hook back onto it's own cable! I did this and the cable broke! Fortunately, we were using the winch as a brake for a SkyTrak at the time, and no one was hurt. I was lucky that I had just moved to the full reach of the remote, though, 'cause the winch cable came zinging right back up the hill!

If you can winch down the hill, that may be the best option.

Hope this helps, any questions about what I just wrote, ask!


Dan
 
#21 ·
These people decided to send me the design from another company who was bidding on the job. They wanted me to price this design with the hopes of me being cheaper. I refused the job and told them I respect the time and effort of the other designer and I was not going to bid on the job.
 
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