Hand Clearing House Pad (storage, club, move)

[bensempress]

Has anyone cleared their drive and house pad by hand? I know it's a lot of hard work, but I also know it can be done. I am curious however if ther eis a reason other than because of teh ease to use a dozer to clear a house pad.

[Dreaming of Hawaii]

What location? There's no way we could have cleared our lot with anything other than a bulldozer. Even after they ran over it a lot of times, it's still really, really hard to dig a hole to plant anything. I can't imagine trying to dig out enough area for driveway and house pad. And then how will you get it level?

[bensempress]

We've already hand cleared the drive and parking area, and we're about 1/3 done with the house pad. At this point we'll probably have to get a small excavator in there to break up a little rock in the high places and move it to the lower places to level it- using base rock to finish the job.

We have had some luck using a pick axe by hand, and leveling the drive pretty nicely so far!

BTW- We're in HPP

[mdand3boys]

The advantage with a D9 bulldozer is that its' nearly 50 ton weight will "find" any pukas, before your house ever would. If the dozer doesn't fall in a lava tube, your lighter weight house probably won't either.

There are times when going cheap isn't the best route.

[bensempress]

This wasn't about going cheap at all...

[mdand3boys]

Originally Posted by bensempress

This wasn't about going cheap at all...

Then use a dozer to clear the house pad and the house won't collapse into a puka, later on! There really is a good reason why people use the dozers!

[Balad1]

Another advantage is the dozer can crush the a`a lava so that it can be walked on by you and pets.

[hotzcatz]

If you are building on post and pier, then hand clearing is something that can be done. It saves on you having to join an exercise club to get in shape, that's for sure!

Another way to level a lot is to have cinders brought in to fill in the low spots. However, don't put the cinders where your house will be if you are building a house on a slab since you'd then have to remove the cinders before pouring the slab.

Hand clearing is nice if you want to save some of the ohia trees. They are real sensitive to having dozers crush their roots. However, if you are putting in a septic tank or cesspool, you will probably need either an excavator, dozer or dynamite to get the hole dug.

[bensempress]

Mahalo Nui Loa Hotzcatz... we will definately be building a storage shed on post and pier (hand cleared) but hadn't decided about the house pad which we plan to do within the next year- this is good information to sit on!

We will have to put in a septic (would prefer over cesspool) and realize it would require a machine- but I was hoping to use a small excavator to get that done, to get around the Ohias. I am extremely sensitive to what we're doing here, I value every part of the aina which includes a lot of the "junk trees" some people tend to have no regard for.

I can understand it, but I figure to each their own. If I can do my part to keep some of the land pure and unchanged then I feel I'm doing something good! My stomach turns every time I see a lot dozed from pin to pin and all the poor trees are pushed up against the edge of the lot- it's such a shame. And dozer operators don't make it easy to only clear a little land when they have a full day minimum...

[mdand3boys]

Originally Posted by bensempress

... And dozer operators don't make it easy to only clear a little land when they have a full day minimum...

And earlier you said it wasn't about being cheap?