attachment for road work

[jenkinsph]

I built mine 8' wide with bolt on reversible cutting edges and set them straight because most of the time I use it to level and smooth lawns. I agree with MtViewRanch though these need to be heavily built with long skids. Mine is right at 1000 lbs and 1500 lbs wouldn't hurt a thing. I find it to be a very handy tool to have and an even larger one with 14' grader blades would work well behind a large tractor on a farm or ranch.

A good heavy duty rear blade with hydraulics would help alot with crowning and ditching too. These aren't cheap but for your use I wouldn't get a lighter duty unit, it won't hold up in Caliche.

To work Caliche you need to get on it when it has just the right amount of moisture in it to be workable without sticking. When it dries out it is like concrete, I would think you have a very small window of opportunity to work it.


edit; Include two pictures of the landplane and heavy duty boxblade with hydraulic scarifiers.

 

[jackh]

thats a good point about the narrow window of opportunity on caliche, hadnt thought about that. so i need a heavy (weight) and heavy duty grader blade like the road boss ones to smoothing out roads. maintaining bar ditches would need a rear blade and moving lots of material and filling in holes would need a box blade? is this right in general?

 

[jenkinsph]

Jack
That about says it all, understand that the plane will carry quite a bit of material to smooth and fill holes but the boxblade will carry a great deal more. The boxblade in the picture is a Frontier BB1284 and weighs about 1250 lbs and is cat 1 - 2 so this would work with your tractor.

I mentioned the narrow window of opportunity because you need to get your equipment in order and ready to use ahead of time.

 

[jenkinsph]

MtViewRanch could post a pic of his rearblade as his is better suited than mine is.

 

[MtnViewRanch]

A good hydraulic rear blade is the only way to go.

 

[jackh]

would it be better for smoothing out caliche roads?

 

[jenkinsph]

would it be better for smoothing out caliche roads?

Jack,
To do a good job on the roads so that you can drive them at 20 to 30 mph you will need the rearblade and a plane/grader. If the budget will allow for all three implements, so much the better, get the boxblade too.

Alot can be achieved with any of the three choices, the rearblade is great for the ditching and crowning the road, the plane/grader is the best for smoothing and flattening (making the surface planar) and the boxblade is great for cutting down the surface to remove pot holes and redistribute large amounts of material.

So what you need the most depends on your road condition. My experience has been that the rearblade is essential to shape the ditches and crown properly, a hydraulically operated blade is ideal but the less expensive version of this blade is available with manual control. You can add hydraulics later if needed. If the ditches and drainage is already in place then a landplane/grader may be the best first tool to smooth out the road.

All three of these implements can be used for smoothing the yards, pastures and other areas on your place as well. So they are all beneficial and "keepers" in my book. I deal with a lot of properties that are rough with holes, slight depressions, mounds and have tilled and disked these places then run the landplane or boxblade over the top to smooth everything out. Makes a huge difference in the final result.

Hope this helps you decide what to do.

 

[jackh]

well some of our roads are pretty smooth while others have pot holes. some of the roads have had all the dirt and light caliche washed away and whats left is rocks fist-sized and larger coming out of the ground and making the road teeth jarringly rough. spots like this are what im really interested in smoothing out. i dont feel like a grader like a road boss would cut and smooth this out nicely, then again ive never used one.

 

[MtnViewRanch]

well some of our roads are pretty smooth while others have pot holes. some of the roads have had all the dirt and light caliche washed away and whats left is rocks fist-sized and larger coming out of the ground and making the road teeth jarringly rough. spots like this are what im really interested in smoothing out. i dont feel like a grader like a road boss would cut and smooth this out nicely, then again ive never used one.

Nothing is going to cut those rocks smooth, sounds like you need to have material brought in and you need to get that material in shape so that it does not wash away. In other words, it sounds like you need to build yourself a road. Any of the blades that we have been talking about are all in excess of 1000lbs with the Road Boss being the heaviest of them all. Now I have not worked with the conditions that it sounds like you have, so I am not really qualified to further suggest what it is that you need to do, but if you have an endless supply of rocks coming out of the ground, then I would think you would need to cover them up.

 

[jenkinsph]

Jack,
You may find that you can do a combination of things to lessen the problem. I would look at the side of the roads for fines to bring back up to the center of the road. I would dig down to see if fines are below the rocks, if so then you might need to remix these with the rock, in other words plow this up deep and then pack the rocks down in the loose dirt. You can also look for areas on the property with material you can use to cover the rocky areas. And as mentioned previously haul in fresh base course. If you try the remixing of the rocks and fines first it will reduce the amount of fresh material you need to cover with.

I think you would be pleasantly suprised how well cutting down the road about 6 to 8 inches deep and then planeing and rolling will help with the surface rock.