Sugar soil is a term my friend likes to use,meaning dirt that doesn't stick together. Should of just said sand.

No rocks or trees showing put the road anyplace you want by the pictures.


Glum came through with some very good pictures. A very good example of the berm. As well as the long look to help decide how steep you need to be to get from A to B. An then Neil's tip about switch backs working much better when flat as you can get them.


The only other thing I can think of is you could wait several years.:wink:Turn livestock in water at bottom feed treats at the top,there trail will be as good a grade as any engineer could give you.

Yeah, it is nice to actually get a view of a road being built in a real hill with a dozer. Though I think the hill is a little bit more serious than my hills.

I think I have a pretty good idea on how to get a road cut now.

There are hillsides as steep as Glum pictures! Logged a few of them when I lived out there! I can't remember who built the roads up the sides of them but they were built like Glum describes!
I cut some roads for oil well locations in New York State with a straight blade one Fall. I started at a flat spot working out, constantly trying to keep a Berm to keep the blade tilted into the hillside. I would lose it, then go all the way back to a good angled spot to get the tilt back. It was hard but I did get it done over time!

Hi, Folks.
I have never had the benefit of livestock to set out the roads that I have made in the past 'cos I never got to do any of them on farms - not to mentions that the farms that I worked on didn't have any even 1/2-way serious hills anyway.

I did pretty much all of my side hill road cutting using the original 'Mark One Eyeball' Surveying Instruments, including a few here on the ranch at Santa Margarita. Worked out pretty well too, even if I do say so my own self.

Gotta say though, a track front loader can be a very useful 'instrument' for cutting side hill roads too, especially if you have some fairly deep cuts to make, because of the additional reach. Same general principle, get your cut started and keep a berm on the outside edge to reverse your outside track up onto to the tilt the inside of the bucket down into the hill. The other thing that a track loader has going for it is that you can grab a bucket of material out of the face and spread it along the outside edge of your road to give you some tilt back into the hill.

If you happen to have a dozer with the 'luxury' of a hydraulic tilt cylinder, it can save some wear and tear on the steering clutches and brakes if you tilt the outside corner down while raising the inside corner at the end of your pushes to encourage the material to fall away instead of trying turn it out.

Just my 0.02.

The technique I was taught and have used many times with straight blade rigs with no power tilt is pretty effective once you get the hang of it. You start to pioneer in from the top of the slope, this allows gravity to do what it does best, pull soil down hill. You set up your cut so you are following the proposed course of your road and take short passes where you cut and turn to the outside while raising your blade. This will build up the outside edge for you and allow you to chop away the high side little by little putting it where you want. All dozers turn poorly with a full blade so it is a natural movement to raise the blade to drop some fill and turn at the same time stopping short of going over your new road edge. This technique allows the dozer to move as much dirt as possible with gravity aiding both the pushing and placement, you can clean things up as you go and track in the slope on the outside when finished. I don't have the years many on here do, but I have been in bridging for a number of years and most every bridge has slopes to deal with and we build roads to move large cranes and trucks in and out. I have found trying to use manual tilt to be less effective or efficient than learning to use the machine I'm blessed with that day.

I think my hills are mostly dirt. So it is easy enough to push it around. Though I do get surprised with rocky areas.

There does seem to be some volcanic rocks lying around and it makes me wonder what I will find if I dig there. Also, the road up to my property is the end of the road and it is a big pile of shale type rocks. The kind of stuff that breaks apart in sheets.