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Originally Posted by EddieWalker Ron,
Thanks for sharing your experience and insight. I hadn't considered turning. I'm still confused how the pivot works for turns? If it's staight for picking up sticks, does it turn somehow on it's own when you turn your tractor? |
The point I was getting at is that a free pivoting rake dosn't work real well. When I say free pivoting, I mean that the cross bar that holds the tines is allowed to pivot in relation to the drawbar portion of the rake. The second rake I built for the garden tactor was allowed to pivot. I thought this was a good idea and that the rake tines would continue to be drug in a straight path(relative to the direction of the rake travel) even as I turned the tractor. As soon as I started to drag with it, I realized it was not such a good idea. The tines will hang up on different objects so the force across the rake will not be even and the rake crossbar would pivot and hop all over the place as the tines hooked up on objects, even while pulling straight ahead. Or the rake would pick up more debris on one side and stay over on that side permanently. I wound up adding diagonal chains from the ends of the crossbar to up near where the rake attached to the tractor to hold the rake fixed at the desired angle. Fixing the rake angle means that the tines will be drug at an angle sideways while turning the tractor.. IE. The front wheels of the tractor move forward and right in a right turn The center of the rear axle is the pivot point and the tines on a rigid rake will move forward and left, the opposite direction of the front wheels. This can allow some material to be spilled out the side of the rake on the inside of the turn as the tines are drug sideways. A tight slow turn can just about empty the rake of material
If the rake is built rigid but allowed to pivot where it attaches to the tractor(like towing a "T" shaped trailer), it will follow along behind the tractor like a trailer and the tines will stay relatively parallel to the direction of travel just like a trailer axle does. Some of the
ATV type pull behind rakes are like this. This type rake would handle corners better and drop less material but be more involved to lift with the
3PH. If you are going to be pulling straight ahead, then it is not really an issue. If you can pull the material into windrows then pull the windrows into piles that you can pick up with a bucket, that should work well. I found myself working in big circles, pulling the debris into a central point like spokes on a wheel and either burning it there or re-locating those piles to bigger piles with a trailer. This was before I had the tractor with the
FEL, so I burnt a lot of small piles on rainy days in the fall as it was less manual labor
Good Luck with your project.