Gauge wheels for landscape rake

[MadReferee]

For the past several weeks gauge wheels for rakes and box scrapers have been big discussion items here on TBN. The price for landscape rake guage wheels has been reported to be around $225 give or take. Well that is more than I wanted to spend so I decided to make my own for my homemade landscape rake.

After a little search I found the 13" wheels on Ebay and the rest of the material came out of my scrap bin and from leftovers of previous projects.

The next few posts contain the details.

[MadReferee]

Here are the parts before assembly but after welding.

[MadReferee]

Here is the stringer tube and one of the forks. The tube is 1" ID schedule 40 pipe and the stringer is 2" x 2" x 1/4" steel tubing.

[MadReferee]

Here is a closeup of one of the wheel forks. The spindle is a 1" x 6" hitch pin I bought from Agri-Supply. The forks are 2" x 3/8" flat bar and the fork base is 2" C-channel. I drilled axle holes for 13" and 10" wheels just in case.

[MadReferee]

This picture shows the brackets made from scrap. They are 2.5" angle. The reason for the diagonal cut is that it came from the short side of a rectangle and is cut at 45 degrees. I screwed up on the length so into the scrap bin it went only to be resurrected for this project.

[MadReferee]

The wheel installed. I still have to make a few spacers for the spindle to set the proper height.

[MadReferee]

Now for the best part, the cost. I have less than $35 invested into these gauge wheels and $22 of that (including shipping) was for a pair of wheels from ToolsAmerica on Ebay. Total time spent was less than 8 hours, only because I work slow. [img]/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

Finish was 2 coats of Rust-Oleum protective enamel.

Now all I got to do is figure out how to spend the $200 I just saved. [img]/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[Henro]

Paul,

Those wheels look great and may actually work a lot better than what I have as far as making things flat.

I am attaching a pic of the KK gage wheels I bought for my KK rake at a cost of $150. Probably more like $175 since I had them UPS shipped, rather than wait for the normal truck... [img]/forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

The wheels are mounted the way the KK instructions said to. This surprised me as I thought they should stick out more, like yours do.

The one advantage of the KK setup may be that I can rotate the rake without the wheels getting in the way...

[MadReferee]

Bill, I took your advice and moved the wheels out fairly far. The stringers are 3' long which puts the wheels out almost 2' from the tines. I chose that distance because that is what I had leftover for tubing.

Although my rake was designed to rotate 360 degrees, I have never tried it or needed to rake backwards. I do have angle settings for 15 and 30 degrees both right and left.

I can remove the stringers very quickly as only 2 bolts hold each one to the brackets.

[Junkman]

Very nice project. The only thing that I see missing is the grease fitting for the wheel spindle and one drilled in the wheel for the axle. I find that running in dirt, my Howse wheels need a lot of grease all the time. What is the next project?????? [img]/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]