Power Trac vs 4wd Tractor

[KentT]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I do not own a PT yet but am looking for a good used 1430. I wonder if some sort of ballast box could be used off the rear tow hitch and if it would be effective. )</font>

BobRip has one (of sorts) that he made of wood for his PT-422, and I've got my friend trying to scrounge up the materials to weld one up for me...

I was running 40 lb wheelweights for a while on the rear until I reversed the wheels -- I'd now need MUCH longer bolts. Rather than remount them semi-permanently, I'd rather put them in a ballast box when I'm doing something that needs the extra ballast, but leave them off/out otherwise...

The extra weight made a noticeable difference -- and my lift arms would still not bypass. It would still lift the rear of the machine instead...

 

[Spiffy]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I do not own a PT yet but am looking for a good used 1430. I wonder if some sort of ballast box could be used off the rear tow hitch and if it would be effective. )</font>

I don't think you'll need the extra weight on the 1430 as much as the 4XX, but as KentT noted I'd think fluid would be the a good place to start adding weight.

My 2445 doesn't seem to traction issues due to have a lack of weight, but 1000lb of backhoe hanging off the rear end probably doesn't hurt! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[toolz_not_toyz]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( 1. Even a traditional backhoe requires two hands to operate it -- and there's no steering wheel back there... /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif )</font>

Well, on the PT that's one hand on the steering and the other on the stick. On the backhoe that's both hands on the sticks.

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( If you put a switch on the existing joystick, you'd want it to be for an actual electrically controlled valve and not just a diverter valve. With a minihoe especially, you sometimes need to lift, curl and curl the bucket all at the same time -- you can't do that with a simple diverter valve...)</font>

I know I put a lot of thought into this several months ago. I'm sure it's somewhere here in this forum if I looked. But I was thinking of hooking up an electric diverter to the aux PTO. The diverter would simply switch from the quick attach valve to a new valve to which we connect a second stick positioned close to the current one. You would not have to disconnect the QA hoses then AND you would be able to control ALL of the minihoe functions with one hand provided the sticks are close enough together (that's the tricky part because of the way things are right now).

I was doing more work with the minihoe today. Digging in more rock hard clay. It would be very easy to tip the PT IMHO doing this type of work. Outriggers would help the stability issue I would be. The PT is so light that it's a piece of cake for the arms to lift the whole thing up. Unfortunately, with the mini hoe you have such a small surface are down there (side to side) that it creates a side to side pivot point.

 

[KentT]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( It would be very easy to tip the PT IMHO doing this type of work. Outriggers would help the stability issue I would be. The PT is so light that it's a piece of cake for the arms to lift the whole thing up. Unfortunately, with the mini hoe you have such a small surface are down there (side to side) that it creates a side to side pivot point.

)</font>

Reversing my wheels widened the stance and decreased this tippiness, while loading all four tires added about 150 lbs of extra weight to hold the front down, in addition to about 150lbs on the rear...

That was my way of addressing those issues...

Personally I don't want outriggers -- then I couldn't articulate the machine to dump the bucket, nor could I rapidly reposition it to finetune the location of the bucket.... much less the ease of moving the machine completely....

I've haven't tried blocking/locking the machine to prevent oscillation... I don't yet have a feel for how well that might work.

Meanwhile, if I want to dig a big hole, sitting still, I'll rent (or hire) something better suited... as I envision it though, once I have have the septic system installed I won't have much need for that.... instead I'll be digging small shallow things like trenches, roadside drainage ditches, planting trees, grubbing brush and undergrowth, etc., where mobility is as important (if not more so) as lenght of the dipper stick,, i.e. reach...

Your needs and desires may be totally different....

 

[RegL]

" I was doing more work with the minihoe today. Digging in more rock hard clay. It would be very easy to tip the PT IMHO doing this type of work. Outriggers would help the stability issue I would be. The PT is so light that it's a piece of cake for the arms to lift the whole thing up. Unfortunately, with the mini hoe you have such a small surface are down there (side to side) that it creates a side to side pivot point. "

I think your leaving out the main force you need to use for hard digging with the minihoe, reverse treadle. Unlike a regular backhoe, if you try to dig with the loader down and curl you will pick up the front of the tractor. Your main digging force comes from tractor reverse and bucket curl.

 

[Spiffy]

I've never used a mini-hoe, but really see the treadle as the key to it's usefullness too, so I don't think outriggers would be desirable unless you're making something like JJ or MR where you might do deep work too. Of course if you don't have outriggers, then I really doubt you'd want oscillation lock.

Again this is coming from a guy whose never used the mini; however, you can't imagine the times I've been facing rearward and wishing I had the treadle, or have been reaching behind me to control the hoe while treadling and steering.

As far as the one handed theory, I know for the functions on my hoe, three directions often come into play at the same time, so I'd think it'd be a real learing curve and tough even then, but perhaps do-able on the mini-hoe - beats me though! /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

 

[toolz_not_toyz]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">(
I think your leaving out the main force you need to use for hard digging with the minihoe, reverse treadle. ... Your main digging force comes from tractor reverse and bucket curl.
)</font>

I agree that seems to be the best way to use the minihoe. The problem is that you still need to apply downward pressure as you're backing up...otherwise you're not really digging are you? All you have to do is hit a large rock and instead of the bucket going down, the PT will go up. But not straight straight up, it will tend to lean to one side or the other.

I wish I could explain the one-handed operation of two hydraulic levers at the same time. Everyone seems to be baffled. If it was 15 or so years ago I would have taken a photo while I still was driving high reach forklifts in a warehouse. You can spin those things into position while simultaneously raising the forks and/or leveling the forks and/or shifting the mast out. This type of functionality could be duplicated on a 425 by locating another stick very close to the existing one. The new stick would control bucket curl. And with one hand you'd be able to control the mini hoe completely.

 

[toolz_not_toyz]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">(
I think your leaving out the main force you need to use for hard digging with the minihoe, reverse treadle. ... Your main digging force comes from tractor reverse and bucket curl.
)</font>

I agree that seems to be the best way to use the minihoe. The problem is that you still need to apply downward pressure as you're backing up...otherwise you're not really digging are you? All you have to do is hit a large rock and instead of the bucket going down, the PT will go up. But not straight straight up, it will tend to lean to one side or the other.

I wish I could explain the one-handed operation of two hydraulic levers at the same time. Everyone seems to be baffled. If it was 15 or so years ago I would have taken a photo while I still was driving high reach forklifts in a warehouse. You can spin those things into position while simultaneously raising the forks and/or leveling the forks and/or shifting the mast out. This type of functionality could be duplicated on a 425 by locating another stick very close to the existing one. The new stick would control bucket curl. And with one hand you'd be able to control the mini hoe completely.

 

[MossRoad]

The thing I found about forklifts is the levers only move forwards and backwards. You could thumb, palm and pinky any of them pretty easily. The PT joystick also moves sideways. A lever located next to it would get bumped too easily. Sometimes it would be too far away to reach and sometimes you would pinch your fingers between the two. Unless the lever was mounted on the joystick so that it moved with the joystick and was always the same distance side to side from the joystick, I wouldn't care for it.

Several solutions come to mind.

1. Electric diverter valve(s) with button(s) on the joystick .
like these. With these you can momentarily change the function of the joystick to go from say, dump/curl to tumb open/close.

2. A second joystick to the left of the steering column. A full function, two valve joystick would be mighty handy.

3. Do the MCKAT modification pictured here. This is my favorite, all time PT mod. Simply elegant. Another picture with more details. Here is a link to his description of how he made and installed it.

I should do that to my machine.

 

[MossRoad]

The thing I found about forklifts is the levers only move forwards and backwards. You could thumb, palm and pinky any of them pretty easily. The PT joystick also moves sideways. A lever located next to it would get bumped too easily. Sometimes it would be too far away to reach and sometimes you would pinch your fingers between the two. Unless the lever was mounted on the joystick so that it moved with the joystick and was always the same distance side to side from the joystick, I wouldn't care for it.

Several solutions come to mind.

1. Electric diverter valve(s) with button(s) on the joystick .
like these. With these you can momentarily change the function of the joystick to go from say, dump/curl to tumb open/close.

2. A second joystick to the left of the steering column. A full function, two valve joystick would be mighty handy.

3. Do the MCKAT modification pictured here. This is my favorite, all time PT mod. Simply elegant. Another picture with more details. Here is a link to his description of how he made and installed it.

I should do that to my machine.