Clod Buster Hand Tool Build.

A Fall project installing 4" schedule 40 rain gutter downspout runs out to and through the street curb. The A/C unit was next to the house and moving it would have taken more effort than tunneling under. However, I needed something to "drill" through the dirt.

A section of 3/4" iron pipe and a section of scrap from the screw jack build was all it took.

It worked fine for this one-off application. However, if I was to do it again I'd cup the shovel end like a spoon so it could be shoved into the clay and rotated cutting a chunk of dirt free. The straight piece of steel just plunged into the ground without breaking anything free most of the time. The altered design would have cut the effort in half.

Can not tell you how many tools we have made with the welder. Pullers a lot, press and break, adding metal to turn something. Nice work. Glad it worked for you. What did you turn it with?

Manually used. Basically I put a 6"x6" on the bottom of the trench and slid the bar of the buster over it ram style.

Nothing fancy but it sure was nice to be able to fabricate a needed implement within twenty minutes utilizing scrap on-hand.

The pictures say you sure moved a lot of dirt. Is that code work?

Oh, it was a lot of dirt. The run to the street isn't visible in these photos. I'll put a few up of the whole shootin' match in a few. Code doesn't cover rain downspouts but I did want to keep it as deep as possible for freeze protection. The house sits six feet or so above the street where the pipe terminates in a port bored through the curb. Of course, as you get closer and closer to the street the depth of the pipe decreases.

The trench is three feet deep with a level floor as the house is approached. The pipe gently slopes for positive drainage.

And yes, the neighbors were stunned I performed all the digging, hauling, and refilling manually in one week.

Photo at street level.