The Republican journal., 1908-04-02
HINTS ON ROAD WORK.

United States Officer of Public Roads
Tells How to Make and Maintain a
Model Earth.
WASHINGTON, D. c., March 80, 1908.
While American road builders are as
capable of constructing good roads as
those of any country of the old world,
they have not been as loyalty support
ed as the men of those countries in
maintaining the highways after COM
petion, and the deplorable state of
many hundred thousand miles of road
is thus accounted for. County and
township officials may at the outset
stand the expense of having road
built, but they strenuously object
when asked to provide funds to rebuild
the road that has been allowed to go to
ruin.
1t is important that farmers learn of
the benefits to be derived from good
earth roads; that county boards be i'm
pressed with the need of proper
maintenance of the same, and that
road builders and overseers learn how
best to care for the roads in their
charge.
The persistent and powerful enemies
of earth roads are water and narrow
tires, and the constant effort of the
men in charge of the roads should be to
guard against their destructive effects
and remedy all damage as quickly as
possible. The simple implements which
have been found to be of greatest as
sistance in this work are the ploW, the
drag scraper, the wheel scraper, the
| road grader, and the spGt-log drag.
IL, II hcf of
clay, or clay and gravel, deep blowing
| so as to raise and mix the clay with the
surface soil and sand will prove bene-
clay road at trifling expense. On the
| other hand, if the road be entirely of
sand mistake will be made if it is
| plowed unless clay can be added. Such
blowing would merely deepen the sand
and at the same time break up the
small amount of hard surface material
| which may have formed. If the sub
soil is clay and the surface scant in
sand or gravel, plowing should not be
resorted TO, as it would result in clay
surface rather than one OF sand or
gravel. A road foreman must know
| not only what to plow and what not to
ploW, but how and when to ploW. IT
| the road is of the kind which according
| to the above instructions should be
plowed over its whole width, the best
method is to run the first furroW in the
middle of the road and work out to the
sides, thus forming crown. Results
| from such blowing are greatest IN the
spring or early summer
In bitches pillow can be used to good
advantage, but should be followed by a
scraper or grader. To make wide, deep
bitches nothing better than the ordi-
nary drag scraper has vet been devised.
For hauls under 100 feet, or in making
ellis" it is especially serviceable. 1t is
mistake, however, to attempt to
handle long haul material with this
scraper, as the wheel scraper is better
adapted to such work. For hauls OF
more than 800 feet, wagon should be
used.
The machine most generally used III
road work is the grader, or road ma
chine This machine is especially use
full in smoothing and GROWING the road
and in opening bitches. A clay SUB,
soil under a thin coating of soil should
not be disturbed with a grader. 1T is
also a mistake to use a grader lndls-
criminately and to pull material from
bitches upon sand clay road. Not in
| lIt4 utLlly Cull, oOll dlIO DIV AIOAi uloSAi
bottoms are piled in the middle of the
road in ridge, making mudholes
certainty. 1t is important in using a
grader to avoid building up the road
too much at one time. A road gradual
ly built up by frequent use of the
grader will last better than if complet-
ed at one operation. The foreman fire.
quently thinks his road must be high in
the first instance. He piles up material
from 10 inches to foot in depth only
to learn, with the arrival of the first
rain, that he has furnished the ma,
terial for as many inches of mud. All
material should be brought up in thin
layers, each layer well puddled and
firmly packed by roller or traffic before
the next is added. A common mistake
is to crown too high with the road ma
chine on narrow road.
The split log drag should be used to
fill in ruts and smooth the road when
not too badly washed. This drag pos
sesses great merit and is so simple IN
construction and operation that every
farmer should have one.