10 Yard Dumpster Rental in Columbia, SC

A 10 yard roll-off is 12 feet long, 8 feet wide and about three and a half feet tall, rated for roughly two to three tons — call it three pickup loads. On a lot of Midlands jobs it is the only container that makes sense, and not because the pile is small. It is because the pile is dense. Weight stops a truck long before volume does, and in a market where half the driveways are original to the house and half the foundation work happens under a crawlspace, that catches people out constantly.

• Capacity10 cubic yards
• Footprint12 ft x 8 ft x 3.5 ft
• Weight allowance2 – 3 tons
• Holds about~3 pickup truck loads

Why people choose the 10 yard

Start with the arithmetic, because it decides everything else. Concrete, block, brick, mortar, tile with the thinset bed still attached, and the soil we dig out from under a footing all land somewhere around 2,400 to 2,800 pounds per cubic yard. Four cubic yards of broken slab — a piece of driveway barely bigger than a parking space — is already better than three tons, and it is sitting in the bottom third of the container, nowhere near the rails. A driveway, apron, front walk or patio tear-out is tons before it ever looks full. That is why our Columbia dumpster sizing guide starts with weight instead of volume, and why concrete and heavy debris hauling gets a container size of its own. A driveway replacement in Shandon is a 10 hauled three times, not a 30 hauled once. Load that same concrete into a 30 and it goes over legal axle weight while it still looks two-thirds empty, and the driver will not lift it. The 10 is built so a legal payload and a full box arrive at the same moment.

The second job this box does here is the one nobody sizes correctly: crawlspace structural work. Columbia houses sit on brick or block piers over a vented crawlspace or else on slab-on-grade — there are no basements in this market — and when a pier has settled, a footing has failed or the band joist has gone soft, what comes out from under the house is brick, block, mortar, broken pad footings and the sand or clay the crew dug out to reset them. That is masonry and soil, not remodel debris. Add the Fall Line problem on top: on one street you are digging loose sandhill sand that gives way under a loaded truck, and three miles away you are digging red clay that ruts, holds water and gets heavier the wetter the week has been. Keep that spoil in its own 10 and keep it clean. The light half of the same job — wet batt insulation, old vapour barrier, crushed duct — is a completely different stream, and our notes on crawlspace moisture and termite damage debris walk through how the two separate. Small structure work lands in the same category: chimney brick, porch piers, an old stoop, front steps that have moved, shed slabs, all of which we stage as heavy loads under demolition debris hauling.

Then there is the footprint. Twelve feet of steel tucks into the narrow original driveways in Shandon, Rosewood and Olympia where nothing longer will sit without hanging into the street or over a neighbour's line. The older stock is another reason to keep this box in mind. Plaster and lath weighs roughly two to three times what drywall does for the same volume, so a couple of rooms of it out of a 1920s bungalow in Elmwood Park, Cottontown or Waverly behaves more like masonry than like remodel debris, and the heart pine and old-growth framing behind it is denser than anything milled today. Before you pick the spot, read how we protect a driveway on delivery, because protection boards go down as standard on every set and they earn their keep on original concrete and on July and August asphalt that has been soft since ten in the morning. For the household side of a project see residential dumpster rental, and compare the whole range side by side on our dumpster size guide.

Good fit for

• Driveway, apron and sidewalk tear-out in staged loads
• Patio, stoop and front step demolition
• Brick pier, footing and foundation rubble from crawlspace repair
• Excavated sandhill sand and red clay spoil, kept clean
• Concrete block, brick and mortar from a wall takedown
• Tile and thinset off a bath or kitchen floor
• Plaster and lath out of Shandon and Elmwood Park stock
• Chimney brick and porch pier repair debris

Not the right size for

• Whole-house cleanouts full of bulky furniture
• Attic, garage, carport and shed clear-outs with light volume
• Multi-room remodels making airy, bulky debris
• Deck framing, fencing and commercial fit-out volume

Will it fit?

Give the truck about 60 feet of straight approach, roughly 10 and a half feet of width and 20 feet or more of overhead clearance for the hoist arm to swing. Around here the usual overhead obstruction is a low water oak or live oak limb hanging over the drive — ahead of service drops, basketball goals and carport framing — so walk the run and then look up. Twelve feet is the size that fits a short original drive in Shandon, Rosewood or Olympia, a narrow shared drive, or a tight pad when nothing longer will. Protection boards go down as standard, and they matter twice over on an asphalt drive in July and August, when the surface is soft enough to take an impression from a loaded box. Watch the soil: sandhill sand gives way under a loaded truck and red clay ruts and holds water after a storm. Out toward Eastover, Hopkins, Gaston and Swansea, flag your septic tank, drain field and well head before delivery, and tell us if the drive is long gravel, because gravel ruts badly when it is wet. In a covenanted subdivision around Blythewood, Chapin or Lexington, check the HOA limit on how many days a container may sit before you book. We photograph the set on arrival either way.

Before delivery, move cars and bins, mark irrigation heads and septic lids, and tell us about new concrete, soft ground, a steep grade or low power lines. Our delivery and driveway protection guide covers all of it.

Compare all four sizes