How do I do it?

The first pond I will do is simply a 140 ft long x 100 ft wide oval, 3:1 slope and 17 ft deep.

The dirt needs to be pushed to one side along the length.

How do I do this with my D6C?

The soil is 7.5 ft of sandy loam, then 2 ft of red clay, then 3 ft of gray clay, then I hit glacial till after that. (mixed red & gray clay, some rock)

What is the procedure of cutting to push out an oval, then line it with clay?

I have not found any useful excavation books to help me...

• My Project Progress

I did some calculations last night.

• 3D Cross Section View

I have the 4th edition of that book, not the 5th...

Bought it on Amazon and thought I was getting the 5th edition, not sure how much better the 5th is...

• Pond Building

Not to scare you or discourage you or anything. I guess the thing that got me the most, is that there are a lot of wet conditions where I could move around and work well in - and never get stuck. This builds your confidence, and can lull you into a false sense of security. But as you move around and perform different tasks in different locations, you can unknowingly transition into different soils without fully realizing just how different they are. And then with a moment's inattention in a just a few seconds, you're like a Mastadon in a tar pit - you ain't gettin' out!

So what I've learned is to keep things as dry as possible. I'd keep a motorized pump around and keep the pit drained and pumped out at all times, don't let water sit in there. And grade the surrounding area to facilitate drainage away from the areas you need to work in. Simply don't even try to work if it's too wet, and probe the suspect areas you're going into very gingerly at first to test their ability to support the weight of the machine. Avoid turning and following in your same tracks over and over. Watch out on sideslopes or in situations where one track can get shifted down into a rut or ditch or off the side of a road/path. This will shift more weight to one side and off another and make it more likely for that side to sink into the mud and cause the belly to contact the ground. And my machine always seems to back out of messes much better than it ever would go forward in them. My crawler is a loader (which is heavier than a similar class dozer), but I believe most front engined crawlers are similar in this sense. If you're just into a mudhole and it's 50/50 to go forward through it or back out, from my experience backing out works better.

Not trying to freak you out, but you do NOT want to bury that beautiful D6. Have fun!

Had muck over top of one of the tracks, don't know how I got out...

I only plan to dig in the dry mid-summer up here. Also, I'm hoping the small pond will only take me 1 week...

To the guy who asked about the big pond, it will be about 1 acre...

I need to learn how to be efficient on my D6C, how to go about the actual excavation part.

And, I have been looking into a Winch for it...

Problem is, when ppl say "scrape off the topsoil first" Well, my topsoil is 7.5 ft deep, so not sure what they mean by that...

I'll use it in conjunction with my Ford 575D and my Dump Truck.

I just need to know how to start the cutting, the procedures, etc...

By my calculations this 1/4 acre pond will yield about 1500 yards of top soil, and 1500 yards of clay. Roughly.

I need the topsoil for landscaping, and clay for various driveways & roads...

I'm not looking to hire anything out...

I'll move the dirt with my backhoe & dump truck, not push it all over the lot with the dozer...

Rod

I'm told the water table in my area varies 50" from spring to summer.

We are having another dry srping so far, so I hope summer will be the same.

Last summer when I dug a test hole with my backhoe, I did not hit ground water until I was 15 ft down.

I'm hoping that's a similar case this year.

In any event, I'm going to pick a week to take off this summer, and try like hell to get this pond done in that time.