# Terraplen y desmonte



## Pipicalzaslargas

No se como traducir en un cuadro estas dos palabras desmonte y terraplen, no es un texto es un cuadro con cantidades asignadas. Si alguien sabe gracias


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## Peter P

Hola Pipicalzaslargas

Cut and fill

Salu2

Peter P.


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## vr46aragorn

Desmonte (retirar vegetacion sobre el terreno existente): Clearing
Despalme (retirar una capa de aprox. 20cm de espesor del terreno superficial): Grubbing
Terraplen: Fill

Saludos


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## Grey Fox

Would "levelling" be acceptable for "terraplen"? The strict translation is "embankment", but in the preparation of the land for building a road, I feel that's too specific, since the idea of an embankment is precisely as suggested above, to fill in the dips and hollows to level off the surface and smooth out the steeper slopes. Only in very specific instances does it actually require what is commonly known in English as an "embankment", which is seen as an artificially raised section, but equally with the aim of maintaining the "level" and allowing slopes to be negotiated more gently.


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## k-in-sc

Well, a "terraplen" is not just any embankment (=slope), it's an embankment that's leveled on top ...


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## Grey Fox

Spooky! I was just revisiting this as it's perplexing me again in another translation, and your comment pops up!

So, yes, you're right, although it still doesn't help with what to call it in English! Also, in the light of the thread on "piso de terraplén", and the term "terraplenado" I've got to translate now, and the very specific way "embankment" is used in English, I'm getting a feeling that Spanish uses "terraplén" in a much broader sense. 

What about "filling and levelling"?


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## sergio11

Hola,

Actually, the DRAE gives several meanings for both words, so that depending on the context, it may mean one thing or another. And sometimes even the context may not help, and unless you know exactly what the author meant, you are gambling with these words with multiple meanings. Context often helps, but not always. Sometimes it is overrated.


> *terraplén.*
> (Del fr. _terre-plein,_ y este del lat. _terra_ y _planus_).
> *1. *m. Macizo de tierra con que se rellena un hueco, o que se levanta para hacer una defensa, un camino u otra obra semejante.
> *2. *m. Desnivel con una cierta pendiente.
> 
> *desmontar1.*
> (De _des-_ y _monte_).
> *1. *tr. Cortar en un monte o en parte de él los árboles o matas.
> *2. *tr. Deshacer un montón de tierra, broza u otra cosa.
> *3. *tr. Rebajar un terreno.


 
So I guess a "terraplén" may be translated as levee or embankment, and a "desmonte" may be clearing, leveling, bulldozing, etc.

Maybe someone else comes up with yet a few more possibilities.

Saludos


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## Grey Fox

It's the "embankment" thing that's got me stumped. The suggestion for "levée" only goes further down that specific sense of "defensive" banking up of earth, or it even moves away from the man-made "terraplén" into the natural world, being formed by the action of a river.

I'm stuck with building sites (and land to be used for roads or whatever), where the land isn't so much "filled" as a load of rubble/earth/stones/aggregate etc is piled up and levelled off and then compacted, to raise the effective "ground level" over either the specific area to be covered by the building, or over a vast area which will then become the "ground level", effectively eradicating everything that was there naturally, and (hopefully!) avoiding the incoveniences of the topography as nature made it, with uneven levels, natural water courses, different types of subsoil (and surface coverage) etc. It's a very different approach to building (and road construction too) than what I'm used to in UK! And I still don't know what to call it in English!


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## k-in-sc

A raised or built-up roadbed?
A levee would only be to contain water (as I understand it).
BTW, it wasn't coincidence that I replied to this as you were looking at it. I looked you up when I was trying to find that thread about crimping/swaging for somebody else


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## Grey Fox

Aha! No good lurking around, someone's bound to track you down - funny, the fox being caught up by the horse! Where are the hounds! 

Back to this terraplén. What would it be when it's like the foundations of a building, but instead of digging out and filling with aggregate and concrete etc, it's a properly compacted and levelled off mound about 1-2m above natural ground level? Then the concrete slab is laid on top and the building constructed on top of that. And, as explained in the other thread about the "piso de terraplén", maybe even a fairly humble or precarious structure straight onto the compacted earth or whatever.


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## k-in-sc

Ejem ... that's a mule. 
A built-up foundation? An elevated foundation on fill dirt?  
Just inventing here ... I'm not an expert, in case you haven't noticed!
Edit: This may interest you:
[PDF] Ingeniería Civil Diccionario Ingles/Castellano - [ Translate this page ]
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat
construcción en avance en voladizo : cantilever construction / cantilevering ... *desmonte y terraplén : cut and fill *... losa de hormigón armado : reinforced concrete slab .... vivienda aislada : detached house ...
www.franjafceia.com.ar/i/apuntes/glorsario-civil.pdf - Similar
Good old OSHA also gives the meaning of "fill":
OSHA Dictionary > Construction Industry Terms
pisos prefabricados, lift slab construction. placa de soporte, placa de base, base plate .... *terraplén, relleno, bloque de soporte adicional, fill* ...
http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...ill&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&ie=UTF-8&client=ms-rim - Cached - Similar


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## Grey Fox

Sorry about the mule  Have a virtual sugar cube, anyway!

Interesting Argentine website, although for that reason alone I'd immediately mistrust it as far as the English terminology, haha! Like your sig says...  But in any case, it's not as "authoritative" and universally official as the OSHA (BTW the link doesn't work), or something like the NHBC in UK, if I could only track down what on earth the average UK builder would call what I've explained above!! I strongly suspect that each country has its own approaches to solving the same or slightly different problems in the building industry, as formed by the history and geography specific to each place, and its interaction with others - or not! And hence as many ways of naming the same or things or regarding them as not the same! Ugh!


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## k-in-sc

Well, try the link now, but I don't think building houses atop 6 feet of fill is exactly standard operating practice in most places, is it? Seems like you would have some pretty bad settling problems ...


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## Grey Fox

Oops! Yes, you're right, 2m=6ft! I've got no head for numbers  Prolly got stuck with the idea of 2, 2ft, yes, up to 1m=3ft. I know, it sounds a lot, but once the compactor and leveller's been on it, it sorts out all the settling, and yes, it's sort of banked up. The house I'm sitting in right at this moment is built on that sort of base. It's supposed to be anti-seismic, sort of "floating floor slab", if I understand what the local builders/engineers/architects explained. 

But further down the road they're filling up a vast tract of land and passing machines over it spreading and compacting, to level it all off. It will end up at the same level as the land is naturally on one side, but about 500m or so further over it certainly will be up to 6ft of "terraplén", and quite a bank down to the natural ground level there. I honestly don't know how they intend landscaping it to fit in, gently or steeply.

Actually, the translation I'm working on isn't about this, it's just that with all this local evidence of "terraplén" that doesn't seem to be "embankment", I'm hoping that in the process of describing it, either I or someone else can hit on the right term in English! So far without much success, though


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## k-in-sc

Still sounds like fill to me ...


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## sergio11

k-in-sc said:


> Still sounds like fill to me ...


Hola again,

The Oxford-Duden gives the following for "terraplén": embankment, backfilling, backing, filling. 

By that standard, "fill" is correct, but I would not object to "embankment," because "embankment" has various meanings, some of which encompass "fill." _(But then, again, I may be wrong, because English is not my native language).
_ 
Saludos


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## k-in-sc

An embankment is elevated and/or sloping, while fill and backfill don't have to be. I think that may be the source of the confusion about "terraplén."


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