OT/ gravel

Has anyone here ever been in the gravel business and know about what it cost per yard to get gravel out of the ground and into a pile ready to be sold?

It's not for the average guy you need a way to remove it large scooploaders, Large trucks for transport, a crusher a system to wash it a system to grade it a scales to weigh it. And lots of people to run it. And a fortune to fight off the Wackos who don't want it.
I would just leave it to the big rich people.
Walt

About 2.00 per ton to produce...3.50 to 5.00 to sell.When some buys a large quanity you generally reduce the sale price...

Dont know what state your in but most likely you will need a mining permit and need comply with state and federal mining laws plus post a reclamation bond..... BTDT

Depends on where you're at I guess. Around here you generally don't dig gravel. You blast rock off the face of a mountain and then crush the rock. Those guys are selling it in the 5.50-6.50 tonne range right now I beleive.
There are certain types of granite around here that will rip if you've got perhaps a 7+ class machine and 2 barrell single shank ripper.... but that's also the kind of stuff that is quite soft so it doesn't make for an ideal roadbed in high traffic areas and it has limited uses for other things.

Basically, gravel crushing is a million plus operation to set up unless you just hire in a mobile crusher crew... then you might look at probably crushing 5-10000 tonne in a shot to justify the move. This is small scale stuff that flies under the radar for the most part. Big quarries get into big trouble and dollars for permits here....
It's generally cheaper to leave that headache to someone else.

Rod

I've hauled out of a lot of local pits in this area, and you do need all the necessary permits and will probably have to comply with environmental regulations, depends on where it is, how things are in your area I suppose.

Whenever we worked out of a new quarry/mine what have you, you have to push all the overburden off the gravel vein, to clear it. You will also want to have a sieve analysis, and or some other similar testing done, to establish what kind of material you have, nice when you can meet a D.O.T. specification or similar, will make it easier to sell, though R.O.B. (run of bank) even with large round stones like we have here, unscreened or processed, makes for good compacting fill, it has the composite sieve sizes naturally in it, lot of it seems to be glacial till, some loams and clay on top, some is mostly round stone, no small aggregate, others is almost ideal right out of the bank. You may have to screen it, you also need a healthy size loader, with heavy bucket, with teeth. Digging out of the bank is hard, it's naturally compacted, many times while waiting or having down time I would jump on one of the D8K Cats we had and push off a heaping pile from up top, we were working a face, you also have to be well aware of safety issues, can be dangerous if you have a face started etc. Theres a lot to it, but in capable hands, and the right equipment, plan out how you will excavate, try to work things in your favor, it's not that hard. You will also have to control drainage and silt, do some mining research, might help clear some things up. Equipment size, you really need a loader that will reach over a tandem dump sideboards, 950, 966 or 980 Cat, 950 being minimum, will work.

Cost is whatever it takes to clear the overburden, clean grub the site, build the haul road, drainage, permits etc. etc. then depending on how you go about getting it stockpiled, dozer and a good sized loader may be all you need, though a large excavator could also work, have to be careful around a sheer face, keep a 45 deg angle of repose on the banks, and or bench down as you get deeper etc., sudden collapse might give you a nice pile, but could also bury you.

Thanks for the input. I live in Minnesota. I have seen a few mom and pop gravel operations around here. They don't have a crusher just a screen and a conveyor and possibly a rock pile. I know crushers are expensive and take a little power to run. I have two ridges of gravel and rock about 1/2 mile long and 60 feet wide at the base and I had thought about digging some of that out. I may have a lot more below grade. I may think on this some more. Thanks again

i work for a gravel company that also produces what it sells , first you have to get the proper permits from the state as well as epa, and msha, thats right MSHA, since all gravel pits are now declared open pit mines by the feds, you also have to meet all their b/s then you have to have equipment to excavate, transport, and you'll have to have at least a reasonable size crusher to process the material into gravel, basecourse rip rap rock, ect, then you'll have to have enough crew to operate all the equipment to be efficent add in their pay and tax stuff, [they also have to be msha certified]your looking at several million bucks just to start assuming you can do it at all where you live, [ certain geographical areas are off limits to mining operations], add in tree huggers if you have blue and pink bunnys or something in the area , making gravel is a expensive business to get into the days of 1 guy with a used loader and a screening plant are gone, regulated right into the past

you forgot to add the ten trillion dollars in liability insurance necessary before you can break a rock. This is to make sure the ambulance chashing lawyers will not bankrupt you if a rock you make falls on someones toe.

There should be an open season on attorneys, well most of them. Like in all professions, ten per cent gives the rest of them a bad name.

Gene

job, is it suitable for building? cut it into stone for walls. either a full wall or just thick enough for a facing an mortar it on. That is where the money is at if you hae good rock.

In North Mo I am paying $8.00 a ton at the mine for 3/4 in clean lime stone.

If you are contemplating rock and making crushed stone, crusher run type sub-base, costs will probably rise exponentially, around here, there is both, mining of rock for crushing, and run of bank materials, latter often times can be approved and an as = to D.O.T. specifications, crushed stone also is what the concrete batch plants use for aggregate.

That is a sizable deposit, I've seen some smaller operations around here, getting approval and or variances might be a task, but it does not hurt to try, I have a friend who mined several smaller deposits, he's got quite a bit of equipment and trucks now, but I've seen a few construction outfits, that own their pits to cut out the middle man. If the permit process is not too stringent, you don't have pesky neighbors, don't need a variance, this would make things easier, it can be a viable business, even if small, see what kind of a market you have, and you really need to get the raw material analyzed by a materials testing lab, using ASTM criteria, gradation, sieve analysis etc. If it's a good material, without processing, which is often the case here, I've seen really nice clean deposits of everything from fine sand, coarse sand, clean gravel to real boney( round stone/rock) gravel, all is marketable, some requires processing.

Just to show you how things are differant with location.

Our gravel is mined with a suction pipe dredge mounted on a barge that is floating in a big pond. The gravel and sand that comes up needs to be seperated but no crushing is involved.