Dig stoke, who else likes to play in the dirt???

[evdog]

Back to the other project. The whole point of this one is to get people off a short connector road and avoid a dangerous intersection where it tees into a busy road. Cars haul ass on the main road, and turn onto the side road at speed exactly where pedestrians and bikes want to cross.
Trail along the connector road is now done, and we're adding an extension so they can cross away from the intersection and provide a better sight line to see approaching traffic.

I cut much of the trail last week. Just need to tie in the ends now.





Machete is usually pretty worthless for trailwork but it is the only good tool Ive found to chop through ice plant



Last week's work



Benching the trail up to the main road. Riders will be facing incoming traffic when they reach the road. There is limited visibility from that direction so this will help them see any incoming cars.



I like how this turned out. Just need to finish the last 15 feet.

[jackstraw]

Blowdown next to a rock! There is such little rock here! So I was able to move some rock and make a little skinny to rock feature.
This was from the day before having to go over it.

[evdog]

Been busy ....We started working on another trail.

First project was to re-route a steep fall line section. Original line went to the left of the blue agave (now covered up by ice plant cuttings) and then dropped steeply down. New line contours down with a couple small grade reversals.



At one spot on the trail there is a an old concrete pump structure with a pretty solid pipe that sticks out about 3 feet just above ground level. Trail runs right between it and a tree. We had an old bridge left over from elsewhere so we rebuilt it into a ramp here, supported by the pipe and some stakes. Fun little feature that will prevent anyone from riding into or tripping over the pipe.



The next project was about 500ft of re-benching the tread. Trail was really narrow and in spots had migrated off its original line becoming off camber as bushes grew into the trail corridor. Tread was collapsing in a bunch of spots.









I went back to the previous project again to do some final touch up. Had not been real happy with this bench cut section since it turned out flat and straight - boring and unnatural. So I cut a dip into the middle of the section and used the dirt to fill outwards, creating a couple small turns in addition to the dip. Small change but looks way better now.

[jackstraw]

^nice. Bench cutting is so much work!

[evdog]

Agreed. But 100% necessary around here because we have so many terrible riders who can't hold a line.

Some guys built a trail some years ago at my other local spot that they mostly just rode in to existence. It was fairly well laid out but was off camber and riders were migrating the trail down the slope all over the place, especially where any rocks poked out of the tread. It went from 12" wide to over 6 ft wide in places. We spent three seasons bench cutting all the problem areas and the trail is back to 12-18" in most places.

[jackstraw]

Agreed. But 100% necessary around here because we have so many terrible riders who can't hold a line.

Some guys built a trail some years ago at my other local spot that they mostly just rode in to existence. It was fairly well laid out but was off camber and riders were migrating the trail down the slope all over the place, especially where any rocks poked out of the tread. It went from 12" wide to over 6 ft wide in places. We spent three seasons bench cutting all the problem areas and the trail is back to 12-18" in most places.

Yeah, our local SCMTS just filled in this single track corner that had been turned into a double track.

I went out and took this downed tree down. It's been a long time coming, but I was a bit sketched by it. It was hung up on another dead hanger on top of another dead hanger, so three piled up. It finally dropped enough so I could get a saw on it at waist-chest level.

[jm2e]

After crazy wet cold winter left us feeling like this build season was a complete bust, we got out and discovered this gem.

imagine a photo here of someone standing in the woods on a twenty degree slope with what looks like mossy leafy weedy slab underfoot that extends well up and out of view above

Almost uninterrupted slab for maybe two hundred meters.
The whole trail will be about two miles down about a fifteen hundred foot descent. And won’t get done until next winter. But this discovery will keep me stoked.

imagine a photo here of a twelve inch log being cut with a sawzall

Cut this fukker with the sawzall. It worked, but definitely left me reconsidering an electric chainsaw.
Anyone with opinions?
Am I dumb to consider one that will work with my large and growing collection of Ryobi batteries

[jm2e]

EDIT TO ADD: Who do you have to blow around here to share a picture from your phone?

[jackstraw]

The app is the only way to post pics it seems.

Hard to go against your current battery platform, but I cannot speak to Ryobi saws...never used one. I committed to the Milwaukee platform, so that's what I use. Key with probably any saw is a sharp chain will make the battery last longer.

[evdog]

The app is the only way to post pics it seems.

Ive never used the app but have had good luck lately with Tapatalk. Its still janky and slow, but works. I attach pics one by one from my phones Gallery and it seems to work whereas attaching as an attachment via Tapatalk does not. Oh and no matter what I do any punctuation gets a bunch of funny characters inserted and whatever I type with spaces between lines gets condensed into a single paragraph with all the pics I attached lumped together. Then I go in and edit via web so the post looks normal.

[evdog]

As for 18v Ryobi thats the platform I ended up with. Bought a drill first then got a hedge trimmer through the local bike club. It was working well so I bought a couple 4ah batteries for it. For tools that you run fairly continuously like hedger or chainsaw make sure you get the 18v high performance batteries. They last a lot longer than the regular ones. There is another tier above that now called High performance Edge or something like that. Have not tried them.

I do have the 18v chainsaw with 12in bar. Its ok. Like jackstraw mentioned keep the chain sharpened and it works much better. Ive cut out logs as big as 18in cutting from both sides, but that uses almost one battery. So its fine for occasional trees but heavy log outs youd want a gas saw. I ended up using is mostly for brushing and it does that well especially thicker stuff like like manzanita and ceanothus. But its a bit cumbersome to pack in to sites. One of my projects is a 5 or 7 mile ride in depending on how you approach it. So I decided to try the 6in pruning chainsaw which has been great since its much lighter and easier to pack in. And for brushing its almost one-handed operation - the release button is a bit hard to push at same time as the trigger. I recently got a cordless pruner as well which is definitely one-handed. Its way faster than using loppers since you can toss brush aside with the free hand. Max cut is between 3/4 and 1 inch diameter. Between all of these I am well covered for everything up to 18inch logs.

If I was starting over and wanted decent tradeoff with cost I might go with 40v Ryobi. Local club recently got me a 40v hedger and brush saw, and so far I find the hedger way more powerful than the 18v which mainly means it doesnt jam as easily. The first 18v hedger I had lasted 5-6 years which was super impressive. When it died I tried the closest current model to it. One lasted less than two weeks. The second lasted 2 days. No more. I bought a Stihl gas hedger which is rad but I cant use it everywhere due to noise. So far the 40v ryobi has been solid. But if youve got lots of 18v batteries Id go with that. Its expensive to move to another platform, which sucks. Milwaukee and even Dewalt make really good stuff but much more $$$ than 18v Ryobi especially since you have the batteries already.

[evdog]

Some dig stoke from Sunday. This project has been on my wish list for ages and I finally got my hands on a powerful enough roto hammer to make it happen.

The trail drops down a 4ft roller at the bottom of the pic, and then climbs up steeply to where all my gear is stashed in the distance. In between is that rock which sticks out, forcing you to the outside of the line. All too often, the tread along the edge collapses. It is a steep side hill and there is no good way to support the edge. To make things worse there is an old moto trail that crosses at the low spot and they have recently rediscovered the trail, often damaging the bench when they try to climb it. This line has been enough of a pain that many riders skip this section by riding down the moto trail from the switchback above. This has also damaged the bench cut above, where they turn down.



Milwaukee SDS Max with two 12ah batteries had better get this done. With tool, drill bits, splitting tools, batteries, rock bar, etc my pack weighed over 70 lbs for the two mile hike out.




One side of the rock was noticeably harder than the other, but even so drilling holes went much easier than I thought and took only 15 minutes



Ready for action.



Splitting the rock was just as easy as drilling the holes. Tap tap tap tap tap....



It took a bit of working with the rock bar to finally get the slab to tip over. It was so heavy I couldnt budge it so I split it in half again. Getting the two halves moved into place was the hardest part yet. But I was able to dig them into place on the outside of the tread to help support the trail (and hopefully block motos from climbing up through here).



Then it was a matter of knocking over the other half. The rock on this part was more decomposed so once it fell over I was able to knock a bunch off the edges. Was able to get it to an orientation that worked and then filled in all around it.

Finished product will ride much nicer now and hopefully not need regular maintenance to fix up the damaged edge.

[jackstraw]

^thats some effort right there? The thing was too big to move with a digging bar, eh.

Stumbled upon this little build yesterday. Seems new.

[evdog]

^^ Yeah it wasn't the best rock bar for heavy work. It's a collapsible Trail boss rock bar. Not super long and comes in three sections. More flex than I'd like. But I wasn't going to carry a full rock bar 2 miles in. My pack already weighed over 70 lbs with the roto hammer and other tools.

Went back out one more day last week. Worked my way up from bottom to top on one of our other tech trails, touching up dirt work, cleaning drains and adding a couple new ones.

We built a new line on this section a few months ago. Original line was next to the big boulder on the right. New line is up next to the boulder on the left. There is less room than there looks in the pic.


Looking up from below. The runout for both lines is this rut. The original and higher lines drop in right next to each other.


After. No more rut...for a few months.


Moved further up. Tread here was getting cupped pretty deep with a rut forming. I added a drain, shaved down the edges and filled in the middle to raise the tread back up.



This turn was pretty off camber and some riders were sliding down into the inside edge. I shaved down the outside to reduce the camber.



This drop used to be to flat. I built up a lip a few years ago, and usually build it up a few more inches each year. Doesn't affect anyone who hits this with speed. But for people like me who hit it slower the lip makes it a lot smoother.



I add some material to this berm after every big storm using whatever material washes down off the cheater line above it.


Added dirt back to the ramp up onto this rock. It's a 3-4 ft drop off the end of the rock


And, at the top of the trail I cleaned up the tread some. Rut was forming on the line next to the rock.



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[jackstraw]

It's one of those where building an up n over with rock would work, but probably 80% of riders wouldn't use it and the erosion would continue. But that's where I wouldn't give a shit. Ride the rock line or deal with the shit line

[evdog]

Are you referring to the last pic? The proper line is to go over the rock. But a lot of riders go around it for some reason. And some who were getting caught in the rut seemed to get squirrely and were riding off the outside of the tread just out of sight to the rear and making a bit of a mess. I usually don't fix up b-lines but if they get to the point they are causing further issues I do. Same in places where riders are making go arounds that I can't block. Sometimes the better solution is to make the main line more rideable. I like to keep my trails narrow as possible.

[evdog]

After major storms I have a few problem child trails I always check out first.


Part of this trail runs next to a creek that feeds through two major canyons, and receives storm water from all the residential communities on the mesas above. Rain water pours into the storm drains and hits the creeks in a rush, causing them to hit flood stage quickly. Youll often see debris caught 10ft up in a trees branches because that is how high the water got. This trail always takes some hits in a big storm. In this case some large branches piled against a downed tree and trapped all sorts of debris, forming a huge pile that covered up the trail. Rather than clean it up the first riders blazed a straight line cutting the corner. Lame. We don't need more straight lined trails. So I took 30min and cleaned it out. Piled a ton of debris on the shortcut.


Before.





After





Ive been using this pruning saw a lot. It can handle up to 10inch logs if you cut from both sides. And its easy to carry in almost any pack. Its the 6in bar model





This trail is my other problem child. The trail pretty much follows the bottom of the canyon. I have installed a bunch of drains that get water off the trail where doing so was possible, but so much sediment has accumulated in those low spots along the trail that more and more the trail is becoming the lowest spot, especially as the tread erodes from usage and high water flows.


There is a road crossing near the bottom of the trail. Just above the road there is a drain that water flows into, with a pipe that runs underneath the road. Early last year that pipe burst south of the road and a sinkhole formed. The city came and fenced it off and did nothing else. A few weeks ago we had a pretty heavy storm and the sinkhole doubled in size. The city came out and put another ring of fencing around it. And did nothing else. You can see the inner and outer rings of fencing in this pic, and an almost full sinkhole.





In the next storm, the sinkhole filled completely with water and then the lower wall burst sending a wall of water down the trail, blowing it out.





The trail crosses under a freeway and enters one of the parks I do a lot of work in. It washed out the entrance to a trail just south of the freeway leaving holes in the tread and a rut next to the rock crib wall.





This trail is heavily used so I fixed up the entrance. Rangers told me not to bother fixing the section under or north of the freeway as the city will probably dig that whole section up to install a new pipe. If they ever do. Three news networks did stories on the sinkhole after the first major storm and the city said it had planned to fix it, but had to delay as the next storm was approaching... Well see if they ever do fix it. A trail has already formed around it so it wont affect trail use. But it might swallow up the house on its east side.





I headed further up the trail to fix what I could. I cleaned up a few drains and widened or fixed the bench where it was worn away by water. Much of the trail had water flowing down it for a few days. I am planning a re route or two to move the worst sections of trail to higher ground. Some sections either cant be moved due to steep canyon walls, or the only option would involve cutting through a field of poison oak. No thanks....








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[evdog]

Same trail, further up near the top was todays project. I hadnt planned on doing this project at all. A few of us who work on these trails were thinking of building a 3ft wide bridge next to the skinny as a solution to the ever-growing stream channel. For a long time the trail dropped into the stream crossing. For a long time the stream crossing was not nearly as long or as deep - or as washed out - as it is now. These days if you dont want to hit the skinny, dropping in to the stream channel has been your only option. Its possible to cross it heading down the trail but very tough going up due to erosion. Hitting the skinny going uphill is very tough as well because theres a 90 degree turn to get onto it.

When I hiked in today I stepped back and looked at the whole area again, and noted that underneath the bushes on the far side of the chasm was mostly level ground since there was not a deep channel beneath the bushes. It would also provide a much better line onto an existing bridge that is out of sight of the pic. The new bridge would also have a 90 degree turn immediately after, and could also be impacted by continued erosion of the stream channel over time. I decided to go ahead with the re route rather than the bridge.





I had my pruning saw and electric loppers with me so I went to town. It didn't take that long to cut out most of the brush. There was a lot of storm debris mixed in as well.


Same view, finished product.





Looking at it from the other end





And a view that shows the bridge after. Much better line. The skinny is still there for those who want it. A guy did a face plant off it while I was working. He might be taking the new line from now on : )





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[evdog]

^^^ the trail isnt as wide as it looks in the last pic. Photo was taken using 0.5 zoom.

[evdog]

One of this weeks projects. Originally the trail ran right along the edge of the bushes on the right side of the pic. Chopped through a ton of ice plant in order to move it up hill 6-8 feet.





This was part to get it away from the brush so I won't have to trim every year, and part to give the trail a better alignment into the next turn below. With the trail being close to the brush the turn was very tight. I cut back the brush by 3-4 feet on the turn as well on the initial turn and the second one. The line can now self adjust as people ride it in.





Other entrance to the section. I like the curves here too.





Also did some brushing below this. The trail is pretty much done down. We had planned one more re-route where the trail crosses over a private parcel that juts out into the canyon but the head park ranger said no.








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[evdog]

Last project for this week.

This part of the trail needed a re-route. You cant tell in the pic but the slope drops off steeply just to the right of the trail.





A ten foot long section of the slope collapsed in the most recent storm leaving a near vertical wall right next to the trail. My feet are on the trail. The slope is a lot steeper than it looks.


Not pictured are a couple sets of MTB tracks that slid off the edge. And it looks like some hikers either slipped off and had to slide-step down, or they are trying to use it as a shortcut.


The trail does a switchback 200ft further and then comes back right below this spot, about 25-30 vertical feet lower. Either way they went down this chute it may not have turned out well for them. All those leaves below are poison oak and you wouldnt get through there unscathed. There is PO coming up all along the low side of the trail.





The goal was to move the trail about 8 feet up the slope, away from the poison oak and away from the steep dropoff next to the trail.





I had to clear a few thick patches of brush but much of the slope just had grass on it.


And this entire hillside has some of the nicest dirt Ive ever worked with. It is like silt with the perfect amount of clay in it, so it is almost powdery but always has a bit of moisture so it is easy to dig, easy to shape, and easy to tamp. At the same time it never gets too wet and it dries quickly.





I finished a rough cut of the bench by dark and tamped it enough that it would be passable and stable for anyone who came by. That took about two and a half hours.


This is what it looked like when I showed up today to finish it. I still needed to adjust the line a bit and make it wider. This section will need to be wider than Id normally build because the steep backslope will deposit material constantly.





I re-aligned both ends of the reroute and did three rounds of cutting and shaping in the middle before it was as wide as I wanted and had the right curve. I was also trying to reduce the steepness of the backslope. But its still pretty steep.





Almost-final product looking each way. The only things left to do were to tamp the trail surface and outslope, and pile brush on the outslope to make it look narrower.


There is one more shorter section 100ft down trail that I need to move up the slope as well. Then I'll be done with this trail for the season.








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[jackstraw]

You're busting out a lot of work Evdog!

I went to clear a blowdown and again someone got to it before me. This place is just full of builders!

So I had my chainsaw and decided to f around. These couple of roots were in the middle of the trail. You could bunny hop them or go around. I decided to cut a piece of a blowdown and make a little ramp. It's more fun now...for me anyway.

[VTskibum]

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My pump track tuned up and got first laps this week, little soft and slow in parts.</p>
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<p>
Also helped alongside another 20 riders re-route 1/4 singletrack bench cutting pretty much whole thing. Bit rainy so no one was riding anyway and made for good digging. Enough hands showed up to turn a 2 day project into 1. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk</p>

[jackstraw]

Just signed up for a national trails day event at a pump track. I've never worked with a "pro" builder, nor have I worked with "real" berms or jumps. Looking forward to getting some schooling after 25 or so years of rogue builds.

Meanwhile, covered in poison oak from the latest cleaning. Here a couple of the 8 I cut before batteries died

[toast2266]

Decided I wanted to build a big drop this spring. Did some wandering around and found this spot.



Moved a lot of dirt into the landing zone and gave it a guinea pig. I measured it out and it's about 13' down to the knuckle. Maybe 15-16' to where you actually land. The landing is steep so it's pretty smooth.



Still needed to link the drop back into the trail. I had a few options, but decided to run it through these rocks and make another smaller drop.



Had to stack some rocks for the take off.



Dirt on the landing and a couple test hits. It works pretty well.



The whole line.


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