3 PH post hole digger

[kthompson]

Grandad4, I am a grand dad with four grands. One thing I have learned and do over and over I am glad to help a neighbor and do so often. Broke off my work yesterday to do just that. But the problem is I hate to ask for help myself. I support your suggestion to the op, ask for help. It something I need to do right now on a mower myself.

 

[Fallon]

Whenever I need help like for installing my fence I just advertise that I'm trading tractor work for manual labor. Nextdoor.com (kind of geographically restricted Facebook for neighbors) is excellent for that type of thing & for alerts of missing/found critters among other things.

It's a trade so you don't feel like you are taking advantage of anybody inappropriately.

 

[sbct]

I have been in your exact situation. My experience was that it was pure luck. I drilled 8 holes for fence posts through an area of oak trees. 6 went through no problem at all. Hit roots on 2 of them. No rhyme or reason. Just luck on where the roots underground grew.

I do agree 100% with the advice to dig a few inches at a time. An extra 5 minutes to dig a hole is a solid investment compared to the 45 minutes it took me to get my auger bit out of the ground after it screwed into a good sized root.

 

[radioman]

if you have tlb,, use the backhoe instead in the trouble areas. no need to swap augers and then find out you still screwed in. you only going 2 feet. on a scut size like yours the bucket is 12 inches anyways - so just forgo the posthole digging.

 

[Grandad4]

Radioman is on to something here. See if your local Home Depot has a rental department. Many of the HD rental places have a Kubota BX25 available for rent. Its little backhoe would be perfect for getting down a couple of feet around some tree roots. You'd have to learn how to operate it, and it might make something of a mess, but it would probably be an easy way to do your digging and deal with whatever roots you're going to encounter. Whichever way you do it, you'll need to cut away any roots that block your placement of the holes.

Other rental yards will likely have larger backhoes that would do the same thing, only you'd have a larger mess also!

 

[CobyRupert]

Sort of related topic:
When people screw in and hang up their auger, it seems the solution is to get a big pipe wrench (and cheater bars) to clamp onto the auger and unscrew. But has anyone unscrewed the auger by clamping onto the pto shaft and using the mechanical advantage of the PHD's gear box?

 

[bdog]

Everyone has to work with what they have. I have owned 3pt post hole diggers and I hate them. It seems they they are either getting stuck which is a nightmare since you can't reverse them or they simply won't dig into hard ground due to lack of down pressure. Getting rid of my 3pt and getting a hydraulic auger was the best upgrade I have done. I have dug thousands of holes with it.

Backing out a stuck auger by hand is not a fun job.

 

[Catoosa]

And a guy that digs 6 holes a year can't justify the cost of a hydraulic auger. I use my neighbors 3 point auger, it is all but shot but still more or less works. Good enough for the small amount of holes I have done over the last several years. And beats the heck out of a manual post hole digger.

 

[gwstang]

"And beats the heck out of a manual post hole digger."

Amen to that!

 

[Redlands Okie]

Perhaps use your back hoe as suggested to dig out in the needed area. When done you could do two things.
1. Put the dirt back in and compact it with the front tractor tires if nothing else then Auger out your hole.
2. Get sono tube (card board tube) from local supply house or box store and set it in hole. Back fill and compact around the sono tube.

Be sure the bottom of your holes have no loose dirt in them however you get it done.