I have been trying to get asphalt contractors out to convert the chip seal surface that sits between the asphalt driveway and the telescope garage into asphalt. Unfortunately, some of them are indicating that it just isn't worth their while to drive the ten miles or so that we are beyond Eagle doing 1000 to 1500 square feet of asphalt. Weird.
It is possible to make your own asphalt, but remember that in Britain, DIY stands not for Do-It-Yourself, but also Disaster Is Yours.
One other possibility is to replace the 4" diameter hard plastic wheels under Big Bertha with these 8" diameter, 3.5" wide pneumatic casters. (Actually, these with the swivel and brake would be better, although about $25 each.) It would be a bit of work, but I was meaning to disassemble Big Bertha to weigh components are part of the rebuild, anyway, and these casters would only be about $90 with shipping. It still would not be as elegant as having an asphalt layer poured, but if I can't find someone willing to do it at a reasonable price, that may end up being the solution.
Inexpensive is elegant....
ReplyDeleteHow about concrete?
ReplyDeleteYes, inexpensive is elegant, but if the price is closer to a $1000 or $1500 to do this, then it increases the value and improves the value of the property a bit. It also does not require me to immediately do the disassembly of Big Bertha to get new wheels on it.
ReplyDeleteConcrete? Lovely idea. But concrete people are even less interested in driving ten miles for a job than asphalt people. It appears that they are all busy building new houses. I am not sure who these people could be -- you can't buy a house from the proceeds of selling Obamaphones or by collecting disability. Perhaps Obama's supporters are turning their profits from greenscams into something harder to trace.
I'd be cautious about pneumatic tires; I put a pair on my large generator to make it easier to wheel around, and was too clever by half (they replaced the small non-pneumatic wheels it came with). The generator would sit for several weeks (it needed to be moved occasionally to create more temporary workspace in the garage), and when I moved it I frequently found the tires half-flat and had to pump them back up. Several months of that and I did what I should have done the first time - got some non-pneumatic wheel assemblies the same size as the pneumatics.
ReplyDelete