I started out asking around for a good contractor to build my lake. All I ever found was that it was more than I could afford, or they were not to be trusted. I got allot of horror stories about overcharges for their hours when nobody was even there!!!
This was such a common complaint that I bring it up. Keep an independent account of the hours they are working. If they start work at a certain time, write it down. If they are there and just hanging out drinking coffee, this doesn't count. If they decide to replace the sprocket on a dozer, this doesn't count. Be sure to know what hours you are billed for!!!
Anyway. I gave up on having a lake on my place and decided to just have a small pond. I rented a small John Deere 450G dozer to do the digging and realized that it was totally underpowered to do anything with. It's fine for makeing trails through the woods and smoothing out building pads, but digging in dirt, NO WAY! I ended up usuing my backhoe for this. Dig with the hoe and haul with the FEL. It took me two months to dig a 3/4 acre pond 5 feet deep with an area that is 8 feet and an island.
While makeing my trails, I realized I had a realy good spot for a lake. I kept thinking abou it and exploreing the area. Finally I decided to buy a large dozer and do it myself. $25,000 for a Case 1550 dozer. It's 160 hp and weighs 40,000 pounds. It's comparable to a Cat D6 or a John Deere 850.
The blade is 12 feet wide and it will move ALLOT of dirt in a day. If you dig in slots, the dirt doesnt' fall off the sides of the blade and you can get it to the dam fairly easily. It's allot faster than a dump truck if your moving it several hundred feet!!!
Renting puts allot of preasure on you to get it done right away. You get a newer machine, but for a large enough machine to be practical will cost you!!!
When I'm done with my dozer, I will sell it for about what I paid for it. I'll just paint "for sale" on the blade and park it in front of my place. Sooner or later somebody will buy it.
I have a few grand into it for repairs, but figure if I sold it for scrap, I'm already way ahead on what it would have cost me to hire it out. Not to mention all the other jobs I've been able to do with it on my land.
Learning to run it isn't that complicated. There is different skill levels on it, just like everything else. Digging dirt isn't one of those hard to learn things. Grading a road or making dirt flat does take some skill and allot of practice, but who cares if the bottom of your lake isn't flat?
Good luck,
Eddie
