Hydraulic 54" snow plow (home made)

[jd4310man]

Ive been working on a 54" snow plow for my John Deere 655. It has hydraulic lift and angle. Was looking at used ones and They are decently priced, but I decided to build one myself. I wanted to make it heavy duty compared to the factory built units. Extra bracing and thicker metal in key areas. I hate cheap and flimsy. Anyway its really taking shape and am looking forward to its completion!

 

[PHPaul]

Nice work so far!

Two questions:

1. With a double acting cylinder for angle, how are you going to provide for shock loading if you hit something with the edge of the blade?

2. Are you going to tie the mounts on the tractor frame to something further back for bracing?

 

[jd4310man]

The blade has 4 mounting bolts to the A frame, it will pivot on the two lower bolts and there will be a set of springs that will provide tension in case of an obstruction is it. If I need to, there is two upper bolts to hold the blade firm for dirt work. Im trying to build it like most factory units. Ill post some pics as soon as I get the springs.

 

[blackd]

Are you saying the blade and mount pivot on those two lower mount bolts? I think a more common point would be the pin mounts on the blade to push tube. Where you have welded the blade to the mount. You might also consider taking the corners off the scraper blade, so they are less likely to grab something.

Very nice and strong build.

 

[Deleted member 216442]

Nice fabrication work - straight and clean and neat. At the risk of being critical, I offer a word or two of caution. I'd be wary of the side to side bending and twisting loads on your brackets, and the isolation of all loads to only the front of the frame. Catching an edge while angled puts a large side load on the brackets. Say you were on ice and slid the blade into a tree causing an abrupt stop, or catch a manhole cover with the spring trip mechanism frozen by ice. It puts a lot of loads on those brackets. The factory frames are carried under the front axle all the way back to brackets by the clutch and brake pedals, as well as brackets up front for a reason. I have a 1070 with factory setup not too far from you if you'd like to look at it. I'm going to be mounting it and chains in the near future, probably today. I almost made my own setup and was preparing to do so when I stumbled upon a used factory blade. I also have a beat up Western or Meyers power angle blade and frame here you might find useful.

 

[Gordon Gould]

I really like the way you fabbed that blade up. Nice design and professional looking work.

gg

 

[Whatswrong]

Very nice job ,I don't see how you could do any harm to anything with that unless you are ramming into something in road gear .That looks like a perfect match for the size of tractor .Personally I would not build any shock absorbers into it .I have never seen a Degelman dozer with springs built in.
Keep on I'm looking forward to the finished product .

I will add I also agree the two vertical brackets attached to the tractor would be an area to consider some extra bracing .

 

[jd4310man]

Thanks for all the compliments! I am using the factory front mount that the Deere blade attaches. It should be fine as this is only a garden tractor on steroids. If you look at the John Deere factory built 54" blade, It doesn't have near the bracing as mine does, and there blade is made from thinner material than mine. If it fails, I will fix or rebuild, I guess that's the beauty of being able to build from scratch!

 

[Kevin M]

That looks great, Nice job !

 

[jd4310man]

Well I got it painted and I made a mount for the control valve. Today I got all the hoses and fittings, but im having problems taping into the hydraulics on the tractor. There is only two outlet ports on the flow divider. I thought I could get power from the port on top, (like I have it hooked up in the pics). But it will only work when I activate the rockshaft valve for the 3 point hitch. This is getting frustrating. If this thing came with the dual selective control valves from factory as standard equipment, I wouldn't be having this problem. Any Ideas?