Land plain blade height help

[john40981]

Hi all, this is my first post. I am very impressed with all the info that is given here, everyone seems very nice and helpful, great to see. I am in Australia, so Hi from down under.
I'm starting to build a land plain to make road ways on our 1000acre property but don't know what height to set the blades at. I intend to make the thing 6' wide and 8' long with 2 blades angled about 20deg left to right and about 2' apart. I will post some pic's of it as I build it.
Some advise about the cut depth of both blades would be a great help. I am not cutting hard packed gravel, our land is quite sandy and this is to tidy up and level the tracks after I push through with the dozer. I am thinking about half inch below skids for front blade and level with skids for back blade. Am I on the money??

 

[Grahamguy]

Hello and welcome! There is some great info on this web site!
I dont know anything about land plains but I have to ask... How in the heck did you get a goat to ride a dirt bike? :laughing: :drink:

 

[john40981]

Our goats are pretty cleaver here in QLD:thumbsup:

 

[bcp]

I'm collecting material to make one with an adjustable front blade.

There are several methods used on commercial graders. I plan to weld the first blade to the end of a pair of trailing arms made of heavy plate. A front bolt will be the pivot, then at the rear near the blade will be several staggered holes to give a range of about an inch down to an inch above, with half inch intervals. This is to experiment with different settings. Sand, soft dirt, hard dirt, gravel, roads, fields, moisture levels may each need different settings. If I find one setting that is good for all, I can just leave it there.

Bruce

 

[Leejohn]

When I made mine I laid the sides on the floor and raised the front about 1". The 1st cross was back aways from the front and it put it down about 3/4". 2nd one I would guess maybe 1/4". Then I put one stright across and if I remember right I think I raised it up about 1/4"off of the floor. I use mine on a gravel road and most of the time I the have to rase the front just a little.

 

[MtnViewRanch]

Both of my blades are down 1". I control the digging depth using a hydraulic top link. If you get into some hard ground, you will want both of those blades cutting. Can't do that very well if the back one is set flush. If I were you, I would set the blades at 30" apart. Mine are 24" and one of these days I intend to move the back one out so that they are 30' apart. Just seems like they might work better that way. don't know for sure though. :confused3:

 

[john40981]

Thanks for the super fast reply's. What's your thoughts on making the two blades angle different ways, one angled right one angled left to move the dirt one way then back again? I was thinking of doing it this way but it does require a lot of space. At 20 degree angle it will fit at 8' long but I have not seen any done like this, is that because it doesn't work?? or just because it require long sides to fit and most I have seen are not that long. I don't have any tight turns in any of the roads I intend to make so 8' length is OK. I was going to incorporate a 44gal drum on it's side on top of the frame over the blades to fill with water to give adjustable weight.

 

[Leejohn]

Brian mine is longer then yours and if our road was like yours I think I would want all the blades 1" down. Right now with mine only down real close 3/4" I start popping big old rocks up. My angles on the 1st 2 or more. As long as I'm not popping up the big rocks it looks someone raked the road. Now this road is river run rock and some of the old base rock is big as a soft ball.
You said you use your top link to make it dig in. I can see how that would work good. I just couldn't do that with what I'm using it for.

 

[Jeembawb]

Love the goat rider (I think that came out right )

U can do a lot with that AT7 champ, but I know a little something to tidy up & smooth with makes it nicer. I have a tow behind the patrol land leveller similar to the previous post which is good (photos in the home made compact tractor thread) but I am in the process of building a land plane - which by my definition requires a set of wheels behind the blade & preferably with the blade roughly centred between the rear towing wheels and the trailing wheels.

There are plenty of ideas out there, but what I'm leaning towards in my design is a trailing axle that has adjustment in 3 axes with the vertical being hydraulic and able to do on the fly. Another axis allows tilt (in bulldozer language) another axis allows the axle to steer to lay the whole rear end off to one side to get into ditches (may need a bit of weight to stay over there unless the material is fines). Then the blade just needs to angle and various pitch changes would be handy also. Then you can utilise proper grading techniques and make decent crowns and ditches.

This link below gives a lot of good ideas for what is required

Trail'grader-The Portable Road Grader

 

[BHD]

you man want to consider a box scraper, (it is adjustable, can move dirt short distances, and I have a very old John Deere version, great machine)

RB Box Scrapers, Pull-Behind Scrapers, Drag Scrapers the further back the wheel are the easer leveling is (line in the link for the grader).
I knew the guy that designed the box scraper in the web site, I posted. now made by another company,

I have made roads and maintained roads, moved and leveled truck loads of dirt, (you back the box up on the pile and pull it down), knocked off mounds and leveled, moved dirt/soil short distances, (few hundred yards).