A sheet of plywood.

8 feet a few steps at a time .....how long is the run ?

Too small of a job but a appliance mover/delivery crew with shoulder straps do this sorta work all day....could find crew and offer some greenbacks if you spot one driving

@a1an An appliance is rectangular and easily fits on a standard hand truck. A shoulder strap product is designed to work with rectangular loads. This concrete planter would require special straps to secure by that method. If you know of a product rated for 500 pounds that would adapt to this please point to it. It would not be safe to move with standard shoulder straps designed for rectangular loads.

I am hiring three guys to help me move it.

The appliance guys who have delivered stuff @ house generally use the shoulder straps and barely use the hand trucks these days. Either it's directly under the thing, or they will 1st use the dolly where the surface is flat and move it on flat surface before getting to the house and then transitioning to shoulder straps. Heaviest I've seen is maybe a 6 burner range. Just 2 guys with a 3rd being the spotter. In other scenarios, non appliance but movers, I have seen them use special shaped boards, where they have secured to X furniture and then hook the shoulder straps into the boards.

3 Guys + Westes. Home-Made Pallet strong enough to support pot, lift onto pallet, secure pot to pallet and then shoulder strap the entire thing to it's destination. That's a whole lotta pot tho. I'd rather lift and walk in 1 shot then stopping every 8 feet ;-)

The dolly and wheels sounds easier - since it's on wheels . Moving the plywood every 8 feet - depending on distance might be annoying. I think ur fine either way...just a lil sweat equity.

How thick is the layer of stones and how wide is the path?

Does the truck sink into the ground on either side of the path.

Exactly what type of gravel we are taking about. https://www.differenttypes.net/types-of-gravel/

If the truck does not sink into the ground on either side of the path and If it is the finer type, you should be able to move it with no problem.

If your path is the coarse type, then you may have trouble, especially rolling over the larger stones.

As insurance, pick a time when it has not rained for several weeks, this will insure that the gravel base is firm and not mud.

If the truck sinks into the ground on each side of the path, you may be able to rent something from scaffolding rental agency that can be used to create the "road" to do the move..

It may be cheaper to rent, than to buy several sheets of 3/4" 4X8 plywood is about $70 each.

I didn't see where this graveled access was a driveway....I assumed it was a gravel walkway, in which case, it is unlikely to be as solid or compacted as a drive might be.

Using plywood sheets or a thick piece of timber (like a 2x10) is how landscape contractors move equipment and supplies over uneven and infirm ground that is not accessible by front loaders or skid steers. They also use a similar method over lawns to protect the grass from excessive damage/compaction and divots.

westes - just noticed the pic you put has it sitting on a pallet. I would not use that one though. It looks weatherd and dry. Might crack during isolated load movement.

I'd go with planks. They can be easier to manuver around in smaller areas like paths like you are trying to travel over than fuller plywood sheets can be. 2x8 or bigger- if you try with 2x4's you will only drive youself nuts trying to keep it on the wood. Since you haven't done this before you want the wider wood for ease.

Since you say you have 3 people helping you- that should make it fairly easy to get it onto and off the dolly, and multiple people to make sure it's steered right on the planks. If your path is wide enough to accomodate a person on each corner, great. If you path only allows for front and back, it can still be done pretty easily.

krnuttle - What part / places rent plywood. That would a be a 1st in reading !

Re the last 2 posts Westes. I'd still aim on moving it on something with a supported bottom rathern than moving bottom of the pot along the - moving medium you use-. Stuff happens and last thing you want is a chip that you caused.

Rental places I've used haven't had rental plywood as far as I know. But they do rent things like loading ramps and planks and also stuff called portable path/floor. That stuff is meant for portable paths/floors or a subflooring for outdoor dance floors. It comes by square feet rather than something more linear like ramps/planks.

Rental might be an option, but you might be better off just buying a few boards as far as cost goes. Check with your local place to see what they have and pricing.

The way this thread is going, Westes might have more in this move than the pot itself ;-)

Quote" " What part / places rent plywood. That would a be a 1st in reading "

I did not intend to say rent plywood, but rent scaffolding or equivalent to use to create the "road" to move the planter.

Those 2 X 8 of 10 or 12' will be equal to the plywood mentioned will be equivant to the cost of the plywood and would be better.

If it were me, I'd probably tip it on its side and roll it. Sure it would take a while because you always have to adjust the direction it will roll. But where there's a will, there's a way.

I would drill a hole in the middle 3 - 2x4s on edge and sandwiched between the wider 1x6s, large enough to slip the working end (with a grab hook) through through the hole, then secure the grab hook to the standing end of the chain. The chain will have formed a loop that runs through the hole in the 2x4. Back up a vehicle with a trailer hitch as close as possible to the pallet and secure the chain with as little slack as possible and drag the pallet to wherever it needs to go. If rigged correctly, the pull force should be upward and toward the hitch, which will keep the leading edge of the load from digging into the gravel.

This container holds 35 gallons of soil and is made of high-fired clay,

so it's heavy, more than 250 lbs. I move it about on the concrete easily while it's on the dolly. When I move it across the lawn, I use 2 planks and leap-frog them. The pot gets tipped at a 45* angle and I manage to move it myself without any particular difficulty. With the help of several, you should be able to tip and spin/roll it to wherever it needs to be.

The trees are Acer buergerianum and Thuja occidentalis "Zmatlik".

Al

@krnuttle The stones are 3/8" crushed Lodi, which is a jagged edge crushed stone. The path is 24 inches wide. The dolly I show in the original post sinks into that stone even when unloaded.

You are saying you can "rent" plywood? Can you point to an example of that online?

@a1an That pallet is too wide to even get this pot out in front through the side yard gate.

@a1an You aren't joking about cost. I shared in another thread the story about some $350 statues that the shippers wanted $10K to move. People who own infrastructure for moving heavy things own the world.

@popmama (Colorado, USDA z5) The path is narrower than the height of the pot. Rolling it is a nonstarter.

OH I just roll right over the grass or whatever is there. But it's not for every situation. I have no experience with a pot this size though. They are out of my financial scope.

@popmama I got the pots almost for "free" and then as @a1an suggested, got eaten alive in all of the costs associated with transport and install.

Keep us posted. I'm sure you will find a way!

@a1an Your idea of using straps would work if I could find a cargo net or other engineered strapping system for pots that would work with it. I find many specialize pot strapping products but all of them look designed for toyish amounts of weight:

https://www.amazon.com/CancoFam-Plant-Pot-Mover-Landscaping/dp/B08Y7YDFRF

There must certainly be rigging systems designed for industrial applications when hauling something that has a circular shape.

With all I have heard, are you sure you don't want to leave it where it is and use it as a "gatepost". It would look pretty in the front yard planted with verbena, and daffodils round the base

Assuming you have the clearances to get the urn where you want it an upright positions. here is a twist on the moving Idea. When they move the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse the used many dollies under the platform that they created to support the light.

Applied to your situation if you can get the urn on to a firm platform, and you had several pieces of 6" PVC pipe you could use them as rollers and move the urn across the yard. Since the weight would be distributed to the several pieces of pipe that were supporting the urn no one piece would have a lot of weight.

You would roll the platform forward and when a piece of pipe came out of the back place it in front and continue the process until the urn is where you want. If the platform were lengthen the ( 2 - 2X8) in the direction being moved you could use more pieces of pipe distributing the load over a bigger area on the yard, with and move faster..

Westes -

I got one of notifications in the tab but the post seems to gone AWOL.

I've seen those plant strap thingies you mention. They cinch down by sheer force as you pull/handle them upwards. It's reviewed fairly well but my only concern would be how it holds. The straps where you hold should be duty rated. Maybe 4 straps = 4 men holding each strap and walking it. But based on your post re: fence, dolly and ply seemed the most obvious and narrowest..... The weak point is how it attaches to the -diameter- of whatever it is supposed to be strapped/moved with. The adjustable piece is fine but the -end hook- appears to be plastic. A failue point. But hey, if its a one time move and you feel confident it won't fatigure as long as the one you were looking at is 500lb rated (i've seen lower lb rating and higher lb rating ones). The higher being about $100