Bulk Aggregate Delivery Across Shelby County, IA
Iowa Rock Supply handles gravel, stone and aggregate delivery in Shelby County, IA. Start with the calculator on any product page to size the load, then pick your material.
Class A roadstone is the crushed limestone base course most drives and farm lanes here are built on.
This county sits on the Southern Iowa Drift Plain, where old till under a loess mantle leaves clay that holds water. That ground shapes what you put down and how deep it needs to go.
Ground Conditions Across Shelby County
Across the Southern Iowa Drift Plain, the subsoil is old pre-Illinoian till under a windblown loess mantle, usually 5 to 30 feet thick. Beneath it sit buried paleosols, including the Yarmouth-Sangamon paleosol, a thick grey clay that water will not move through.
Farmers working that clay call it gumbo. A drive built over it without a proper base will pump and rut, because the water has nowhere to go.
This is the most eroded landscape in Iowa. Streams cut deeply, hillslopes carry a fine texture of rills, and gully and stream bank erosion after heavy rain is the main reason rock goes in on slopes and at outlets.
Surface drainage is quick on the rolling ground, but the clay subsoil does not take water. It perches, runs off, and leaves drives soft at the bottom of a grade.
Spring rain on saturated clay is the worst of it, and a wet spring pushes base work back several weeks because clay soils need to dry before anything gets compacted.
Winters bring repeated freeze and thaw, milder than northern Iowa but still enough to heave gravel drives and lanes every spring. Frost depth is commonly 42 inches, and the local building official sets footing depth.
Materials Delivered in Shelby County
Match the material to the job. A driveway, a patio and a drain each want a different stone.
Class A roadstone is the standard Iowa base course, and it is what the local vocabulary calls roadstone.
11 and Class C gravel to Gradation No. 10.
County engineers and city entrance standards call the same material roadstone and write it as Class A roadstone.
Section 4130 covers revetment stone, erosion stone and gabion stone by class letter, and Section 4123 covers modified subbase. Riprap is sold locally as revetment stone, with Class D revetment and Class E revetment named in that section.
For drainage work, clean rock and 3/4 inch clean stone are washed and open graded. Water moves through them instead of sitting against a foundation or a wall.
Decorative and finish materials round out a project. River rock and large river rock are rounded gravel washed out of the Missouri, Mississippi and their tributary valleys, used in beds and dry creek beds.
Natural Pea Gravel covers walkways, play areas and patio bedding. Iowa says Natural Pea Gravel, not pea stone.
Sand and soil finish the list. Mason sand goes into brick and block mortar and paver joints, and washed sand beds and levels under slabs and pavers.
Top soil is screened black dirt for lawn repair and bed prep, and fill dirt raises grade and backfills before a roadstone course goes down.
Choosing the Right Material
Pottawattamie County and Harrison County both sit on the Loess Hills and the Missouri River valley. Wind blown silt runs more than 60 feet deep there, and 150 to 200 feet in places, forming steep ridges along the valley with flat, sandy river bottom west of the bluff line.
That is a different ground from Shelby County's till and loess mantle. Deep silt on a steep ridge sheds water fast, and sandy bottom ground drains freely, so the base and drainage choice shifts with the ground under it.
Carroll County spans more than one zone, reaching into the Des Moines Lobe and the Southern Iowa Drift Plain. Where it meets the drift plain, the ground is the same as Shelby County's, and the same roadstone base applies.
On Shelby County's own clay, a fines-bearing base like Class A roadstone binds and compacts. Where water needs to move, clean rock and washed chips carry it away instead.
Delivery Across Shelby County
Order online and choose a quantity by the ton or by the yard. Each product page has a calculator to help you size the load before you check out.
Pick a delivery date at checkout, and a dump truck tips the load on site in one pile. Coverage runs across the county, including Harlan, Shelby, Elk Horn, Earling, Irwin, Panama, Defiance, Portsmouth and Kirkman.
Order Class A Roadstone for Your Shelby County Project
Class A roadstone is the crushed limestone base course that drives, pads and farm lanes across Shelby County are built on. It binds, compacts, and stands up to the freeze and thaw this ground sees every spring.
Size your load with the calculator, pick your material, and place the order online for delivery to your site.