I am trying to bid a fence job that would be considerably faster and easier if I could just doze wire, posts and light brush (10' yaupon, huisache, assorted vines) over before putting up new fence. Bidding the job, not by the hour. But I'm trying to figure out how to do the job competitively without widdling my labor to nothing. Its about 4000' feet total. It's old fence they want removed completely and replaced. If it's not crazy high, it would just make a nicer, cleaner job. It's not that its hard to clear by hand, but it is time consuming.

How much does a dozer big enough to do that cost to rent in the Sealy area?

Assuming you don't need a big dozer, I'm guessing $750/day plus delivery, environmental (usually 6%), fuel (3%), etc.

Based on rates out of Austin @ $645/day from Sunbelt & $650/day from Blueline out of Houston.

Looks like there's a Blueline out of Sealy who could probably help you out.

D4 or D5 will run anywhere from $550/day to $800/ day, depending on outfit. Figure $150 each way for delivery. 3 days is a week, 3 weeks is a month.

I'd probably pull the wire so it doesn't get wound up in the tracks.

How big are any trees in the old fence line?

If they are big, you might see if you could find a local dozer operator and sub out that work. We did some 10 years ago and a 550 and 650 JD with wide tracks seemed to take forever. The neighbor renting it had to swap to the bigger machine that still wasn't really big enough. Big hackberry trees had to be dug out instead of just pushed easily.

On the most recent job we had done, a guy used a Cat D6T to clear about 1400 ft and it took him 5.5 hrs @$125/hr. Some shaping of ditches was required.

This was part of a larger job so we didn't have move-in /hauling fees.

Problem with hiring it out is getting anyone to show up when you need them.

If the operator knows what he is doing, it isn't a problem. But are you going to be able to burn piles and then haul off the wire afterwards, OP? If they are going to be picky about small pieces of wire left scattered about due to decades old wire busting off when pushing, you need to factor that in.

A bulldozer + operator will run you, what, the same as 4 laborers per day? That's my rough estimate.

We've paid $800 for a full day, slightly larger dozer. It was in sealy. If you find one cheaper please recommend, because I'm looking to rent a dozer again.

I'd assume you or one of your crew know how to operate it. You can make quite a mess and do a lot of damage pushing trees if you don't know what you're doing. You'll find it's far cheaper to sub the job out in that case.

SCHTICK00 said:

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I'd assume you or one of your crew know how to operate it. You can make quite a mess and do a lot of damage pushing trees if you don't know what you're doing. You'll find it's far cheaper to sub the job out in that case.

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This. Brush piles that are 50% dirt don't burn so well.

I'm nearly as protective of my trees as I am family and animals.
Are the landowners good with you pushing over trees?

Is this a cross fence creating pastures within a property or are you about to get sued by the tree loving neighbor after your contract flatten errthing dozer dude gets done?

Thanks for the pricing. Yes, I know how to use it. It's brush and small hackberry trash along existing fence lines.

I probably wnot need it. Im just being aware. I've inspected the fence and complete demo is a bit over the top.

carpe vinum said:

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I'd probably pull the wire so it doesn't get wound up in the tracks.

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This, I had 250 yards removed and dozed a couple of years ago. The dozer operator gave me the option of removing my old fence myself, or he could bring his crew to remove it. He would not try to doze until the wire was gone.

I don't remember his price, but this is not in your area anyway.

I had him remove the wire as it was an old, way overgrown fence that was located in the wrong spot.... a few feet off of where the survey said it was supposed to be, and getting to the old wire and posts was the biggest part of the job.

I recently purchased a place that had been in the same family since the 1880's and the old fence lines were very over grown and I had/have to replace them. I've done about 3,800 feet so far. Will do more when the growing season ends. Here's what I did that worked pretty well with my skid steer:

- Cut the wire about every 300 feet (wherever wire is most convenient to reach in that range)

- Pull up as many of the posts as you can get to with the tree/post puller attachment.

- Use your grapple to pull the wire and posts out from the fence until it doubles upon itself---about 150 feet. To be clear...start in the center of the cut wire section, grab all 4/5/6 wires with your grapple and just back straight back. Your next go will be grabbing the center of that group 8/10/12 wires and do the same thing at 90 degree angle. Now your 300 feet will have become 75 feet. Keep doing the same thing until you have a mass of wire and posts together in a pretty small mass...mind usually goes from about 300 feet to 15 feet.

- Dispose of however you desire....I'm hauling it off, lots of folks bury it in a pit. If you drag a pile of this stuff onto a flat bed, make sure you don't drag a t post into a tire and puncture it. Can't imagine why I would make that comment.

- Then have the dozer driver pretty easily go in and remove the brush/trees that you want removed and to clean up the line as much as possible.

- After the dozer finishes, use your grapple to pull the briars/vines out of the remaining trees that didn't get pulled out by the dozer.

- Build new fence.