Another Gauge Wheel Build Post

[Runner]

Hi everyone, and Happy New Year.

I just built some gauge wheels for my rear blade that I hope to also be able to use on a landscape rake when I get one. Not sure if they're heavy enough for box blade duty.

I used the commonly available trailer jacks and wheels (Harbor Freight, etc.), 3 x 3 angle and a couple of different sizes of steel tubing. The object was to do this without modifying the blade, so I used existing bolt holes in the RB2060.

Some pics (pardon the awful welding job):

[MrJimi]

Look fine to me, do you use ski's in the winter instead of tires
just kidding
Fine job
Jim

[charlz]

How much did the parts and steel run ya?

[Runner]

I've got about $100 in the steel and parts including some leftover steel for other projects. HF has those jacks on sale from time to time for $15 apiece, but they only had one the time I went in there and I didn't feel like waiting for them to go on sale again, so wound up buying them for more at another place.

[djradz]

Nice job, but have you tired just back-blading or turning the blade around and going forward. Please pardon my comments, but the wheels seem kind of unnecessary, and if you create any kind of pile pulling forward, they seem to limit your ability to then push the pile backward and off of the drive. Otherwise very nice and versatile. Really will come in handy on a rake!

[Runner]

Even with the blade turned backwards, I still seem to tear up the gravel more than I want. I see your point about not being able to push backwards when I get to the end of the drive and that is a concern. I plan on just using the loader bucket to move any piles out of the way in that situation.

Also, more than anything, the wheels are going to be for grading the gravel drive, since I do have a regular front-mounted snowplow and blower for this tractor. I'm only using the rear blade for snow plowing right now for a couple of reasons. First, I knew I'd be needing to use the loader and didn't want to go to the trouble to change over to the front blade just to have change it back, and second, I wanted to see what kind of a job the rear blade would do on the snow.

The first time I tried using the rear blade, it became apparent to me that, in order to get smooth results while grading gravel, it would be easier with some wheels or skids.

[lhfarm]

Originally Posted by Runner

Hi everyone, and Happy New Year.

I just built some gauge wheels for my rear blade that I hope to also be able to use on a landscape rake when I get one. Not sure if they're heavy enough for box blade duty.

I used the commonly available trailer jacks and wheels (Harbor Freight, etc.), 3 x 3 angle and a couple of different sizes of steel tubing. The object was to do this without modifying the blade, so I used existing bolt holes in the RB2060.

Some pics (pardon the awful welding job):

I've been scratching my head over how to mount my 2" receiver on my curved back blade. Great design! I've been using your same setup on both my rake and box blade with lots of success. Thanks for posting.

[SkunkWerX]

Nice set-up, great job.

You will enjoy having the precise control!

[Runner]

lhfarm - in the interest of full disclosure, this is the result of several running design changes, based on failure. First, I thought it would be neat to keep the pivoting feature of the trailer jacks, however, when I did that, there was too much side play and the wheels tended to spread out more than I thought they should.

So, I decided to 86 the pivot feature and just rigidly weld the jacks to the tubing. Once I did that, I found that the torque on the tubing was bending the receivers mounted to the blade because I only had them mounted on a single angle clip. So I added another angle clip to stiffen the receiver mounting.

If I was doing it again, I'd just use regular 2" trailer hitch material for the tubing and pre-made receivers, even though it would have cost more.

Finally, I must admit, it is a mystery to me why the back blade has the pre-drilled holes in it. Not sure what Frontier intended to be bolted on there. One was square, so as to accommodate a 1/2 inch carriage bolt, and the other was round, about 5/8 inch. Anyway, they were in a handy location for mounting the angle brackets.

Here's what happened before I stiffened-up the receiver mounts:

[2manyrocks]

It would stiffen this a lot more if you run a cross member between the two jacks.

I put wheels on my dirt blade because I was tearing up more than I was fixing.

Now if I just had hydraulic controls for the tilt, angle and each wheel....