60" Rear Finishing Mower Question...

[ChrisHyde]

I recently swapped my 60" MMM to another TBN member for a Taylor Way 60" RFM. All seems good for two things.

1. When I lift it off the ground with the 3P, it pulls the front of my B7510 off the ground ever so slightly, so I guess ballast is in the future. Whats the cheapest form of front ballast for a B7510?

2. The mower stirs up the ground and dust so bad that it makes cutting over dry, dusty ground virtually impossible without choking to death. Are there any options besides wearing a dust mask and just plowing ahead? Do you think raising the cut heighth would help at all? Here is a small pic of the area that I am talking about that is more dirt than grass. I know the pics are in Winter, but they are all I have right now of the area I am referring to.

 

[ejtaylor822]

Hey ChrisHyde,
Can't help with the ballast question, but, was in similar situation when we were building our house regarding stirring up the dust while mowing. Do not think raising the height will help all that much, you will still be stirring up the dust - espesially with a 60" RFM. The best thing, obviously, is to get some grass/ground cover so you are cutting grass and not fanning the dirt.

Do not know what the heat is like down your way, imagine hot & humid in GA, but, you might try to put down some annual rye and try to get it established pretty quick. If it's like here though, any type of grass sowing is a waste of time & $$ due to the heat. I wait until fall to sow - learned my lessons the hard and expensive way.

About the best I could do, until my grass really started growing, was mow early in the morning while there was some dew on the ground. It didn't keep all the dust down but it did help. I would also mow during light rain, or, right after the rain stopped. Of course, not suppose to mow wet grass, but, your situation looks like what I had and clumps of wet grass were definitely not going to hurt anything.

Just hang in there and work on getting that grass established. Trust me, it will happen.

Take care,
Eddie

 

[wushaw]

Cheapest form of ballast for me was railroad track (free) there is a railroad track repair facility in town, I asked for a short piece of scrap and the man in charge had no problems giving me a 55" section.
I already had welder, chopsaw, other metal and the tools to make it fit. I was out paint...$4.00
I was able to get 179lbs of ft. ballast on a 16hp tractor I have and it works great. Looks ain't too bad either.