lhfarm
Veteran Member
I picked up a set of snowmobile dollies at a clearnance sell (not big snowmobile country here in central Indiana) a couple of years ago and have used them on my landscape rake. It was a 3 piece set with 2 grooved platforms and 1 flat platform. I wanted to replace the flat platform used in the front, since it required the front of the rake to be too low when trying to attach the rake to the tractor. My plan had been to pick up a jack at HF and weld it on to the rake, but as luck would have it, I found myself in a TSC store, where I found a bolt on/swiveling wheeled jack for $34.
The provided bolts where about 1/2" too short for the 4" box steel, so I ran to town to a big box store to buy some 5" bolts. Rant on - The only 5" bolts they had where grade 8 in packs of 3! When do you ever need 3 bolts? So I ended up having to buy 2 packages. Our town no longer has any hardware stores, so I guess I'm lucky to access to bolts and nuts at all. - End rant.
The jack bolted on without a problem and I took it down to the barn to try it out. With the jack fully extended and rake lowered, the jack was angled back close to 45 degrees. It caused the wheel to bind, rather than swivel when I tried to move the rake to the side. This isn't what I had in mind. But wait, this is a swiveling jack, so all I need to do is drill another hole in the right location so the when lowered, the jack is at a 90 degree angle.
Back to the garage. I'll omit much of the next two hours, but it involved fighting with the large snap ring that holds the mounting plate to the jack, missing the mark when I drilled the new hole, and breaking a bit when I tried to ream the hole. I did get it to lock in the new hole and remounted on the rake.
As I was inserting the last bolt, I stuck it in the fourth hole of the bracket, instead of the third (the bracket was drilled for 2, 3, 4 or 5 inch tubing). It was then that it dawned on me that I could have made the angle correction with a simple shim under one bracket. A 5 minute job vs. a less than perfect 2 hour job.
Back to the barn. As you can see from the pictures, it does work, even if I didn't end up at a perfect 90 degrees. Another case of over thinking a simple problem.
The provided bolts where about 1/2" too short for the 4" box steel, so I ran to town to a big box store to buy some 5" bolts. Rant on - The only 5" bolts they had where grade 8 in packs of 3! When do you ever need 3 bolts? So I ended up having to buy 2 packages. Our town no longer has any hardware stores, so I guess I'm lucky to access to bolts and nuts at all. - End rant.
The jack bolted on without a problem and I took it down to the barn to try it out. With the jack fully extended and rake lowered, the jack was angled back close to 45 degrees. It caused the wheel to bind, rather than swivel when I tried to move the rake to the side. This isn't what I had in mind. But wait, this is a swiveling jack, so all I need to do is drill another hole in the right location so the when lowered, the jack is at a 90 degree angle.
Back to the garage. I'll omit much of the next two hours, but it involved fighting with the large snap ring that holds the mounting plate to the jack, missing the mark when I drilled the new hole, and breaking a bit when I tried to ream the hole. I did get it to lock in the new hole and remounted on the rake.
As I was inserting the last bolt, I stuck it in the fourth hole of the bracket, instead of the third (the bracket was drilled for 2, 3, 4 or 5 inch tubing). It was then that it dawned on me that I could have made the angle correction with a simple shim under one bracket. A 5 minute job vs. a less than perfect 2 hour job.
Back to the barn. As you can see from the pictures, it does work, even if I didn't end up at a perfect 90 degrees. Another case of over thinking a simple problem.
