Adam, there is two types of machines and methods being discussed here. The 410SX and many other small plows can be outfitted with what they call "RotoWitch" which is a compaction boring attachment. This is basically a long floppy drill bit that can be used to bore under short obstacles like a sidewalk or driveway. It is not steerable or locatable, you just cut a trench, lay the bit down in the trench, try to point it in the right direction an hope it comes out where you want. Our maxi sneaker has this setup and we use it occasionally for sidewalks and single-car driveways. We've had trouble on 2-car or wider driveways with it getting off track. We've poked through someones asphalt drive with it once, and had to dig almost 5 feet deep to find it on the other side once.
The other method is Horizontal Directional Drilling, which is a much much more expensive and involved process. This is the steerable, locatable process you'd typically use for boring under a road or for going longer distances. The discussion about whether you should drill or plow a certain stretch is subjective. Remember that every time you plow and need to go under an obstacle you have to figure 8 the whole cable run, or cut and have a splice point there. That can be a lot of labor if you're trying to keep a long run intact. Personally, when we are running in a rural area, if we have driveways every 200-400ft we drill that area. If we can go 800ft or more without obstructions then we plow that. Chris On Wed, Apr 6, 2016 at 9:37 AM, Adam Moffett <[email protected]> wrote: > I was eyeballing a Ditch Witch 410sx because it seems to be an all-in-one > kind of deal where you can use one machine for horizontal drilling, > trenching, and plowing. > > The instructions for horizontal drilling talk about digging a launch pit > at least 20' long. My concern there was that when we're drilling under a > road, we'd be digging this launch pit way outside the ROW. I'd worry about > a landowner stopping a project because they don't want us to mess up their > grass (we have people like that around here). > > Is there a different machine I should be looking at for going under roads > and driveways? > >
