Minihoe attachment idea

[ScoopCzar]

I haven't yet purchased a planned 425, but I'm getting close. I recently made my second pilgrimage to Tazewell, this time to demo a grapple bucket. Probably will take the plunge late this summer.

Anyway...here's my idea: Has anyone played around with attaching custom tools to the bucket of the minihoe or in place of the bucket? The benefit would be to get some special attachments for different purposes--kinda like sticking various nozzles on a vacuum cleaner hose.

For example, if you wanted to rip up some tough ground or rip out some roots, what about a pair of "fangs" perhaps using sharp plowshares. (MossRoad has posted about his ripping up ground by pushing a single plowshare; my idea would using the hydraulic pulling force of the minihoe instead.) These might be bolted onto the bucket either by drilling holes in it or else welding nuts onto it. Or, if you didn't want to modify the bucket itself, maybe some kind of collar could be fabricated to bolt around the mouth of the bucket and the new attachments could be bolted to the collar. A third alternative for attachment would be unbolting the bucket at times and swapping it out for a custom-made framework that bolted on in place of the bucket and which had various holes to bolt attachments onto.

A second example of such an attachment might be row of teeth much wider than the 9" bucket for heavy raking--say, 2-4 feet. I'll use my PT at times to scrape gravel out of ditches back onto a mountain road. It could be good to have the extra reach of the minihoe, combined with curling action, without doing just 9" at a time. I wouldn't need the power to dig deep in this case, just enough to scrape.

So...any thoughts about these ideas? Has anyone modified their stock PT minihoe (other than adding a thumb)?

[MossRoad]

That's the beauty of the Power Trac design and its plate steel construction ... if you can think of it, you can always weld it up, weld it on, test it out, cut it off, grind it down and try something else without worrying too much about hurting the thing.

[BobRip]

I use the 2 inch receiver adapter and make things to connect to it. I have a home made receiver adapter which has 3 receivers. One points forward, one down, and one up. You can make very cheap attachments this way.
http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/p...-receiver.html

[BobRip]

I think your idea has merit, I did not mean to imply otherwise. You could put a chain saw on it with an extension. I wonder if the tilt cylinder would give you finer control than the quick attachment plate tilt?
I would like to here suggestion on other attachment possibilities.

[ScoopCzar]

Using a receiver setup would be a lot better than bolting things on and off. I'm going to mull that over...where best to attach a receiver on a minihoe... The advantages of using the minihoe for such a rig is that I'd get all the lift and tilt control of the QA plate plus the extra reach and curling control of the minihoe.

[ScoopCzar]

I just found this 2007 thread where you guys discussed this minihoe attachment concept before.

[BobRip]

I just found this 2007 thread where you guys discussed this minihoe attachment concept before.

I had forgotten that one. We have discussed the 2 inch receiver ones. I have made several. A boom pole, a trench splitter, and a very narrow two inch wide bucket (it clogged too easily).

[SpringHollow]

I have a blade that slips over the teeth on the bucket and is used for cleaning out ditches.

Ken

[ScoopCzar]

I have a blade that slips over the teeth on the bucket and is used for cleaning out ditches.

Ken

Do you have any pictures of it?

[SpringHollow]

I added some pictures of the blade to my minihoe page of my PT1850 web site.

Ken's PT1850 - Lackender Mini Hoe and 3 PT Adapter

Ken