Looking at used 1850's - its Charlie's fault!

[Charlie_Iliff]

now about the old PT 72" decks. do i understand you and sedge discovered they can accept either rough cut blades or finishing blades? would i need new spindles to accommodate hinged blades and stump jumpers? plan would be to pull the 72" behind and angle-boom a 48" deck out front...

Our rough-cut 72"mowers came with the stump jumpers and 8" or so blades swinging on a bolt. Sedgewood and I cut that length blades from high-lift finish mower blades (mine Gravely) and drilled them to replace the heavier essentially straight PT blades. PT actually sold a ring with four fixed blades to make the rough-cuts into finish mowers, but I dug one into the ground and threw a blade, as in out and fast, so I went back to the articulated ones. You'd have to ask Terry what the finish deck would need to accept the stump jumpers. I'll bet they bolt in.
I am afraid a 48" out front and a 72" in back would overload your PTO. As I wrote before, in heavy stuff going uphill, mine can bog all the way to stall, just with the 72"
To get more width, I tow a Kunz Acrease 50" rough-cut deck. Not elegant, but I get almost 10' when I'm mowing level enough stuff that the Acrease doesn't drift downhill. I have the sickle bar for sides of trails, from vertical to 5 feet out. I think it's safer than a rotary mower on a boom, but not as flexible.
PS: Your wife's right. Two tractors are better than one, even if one is the world's most capable and flexible PT.

 

[Gravy]

that would be scene one...scene two would be a couple of back woods mechanics trying to figure out how to put proper brakes on the @#$% thing...

Well, I've thought about that myself...

Somebody with more time and energy than I've got should be able to replace the lame parking brake slotted discs with actual brake rotors from a common small car or maybe a motorcycle. Then weld up some brackets for calipers and use a motorcycle master cylinder.

Sounds easy if you say it fast enough, huh?

 

[SpringHollow]

If you are getting close to 30% of a used PT, I think it makes more sense to get the used PT. The second tractor will have residual value and can also fill in for the other tractor in a pinch. For all the modifications you are talking about, i would be tempted to build my own PT from scratch, making it longer, heavier, and with greater lift capacity.

Ken

 

[wasabi]

Our rough-cut 72"mowers came with the stump jumpers and 8" or so blades swinging on a bolt. Sedgewood and I cut that length blades from high-lift finish mower blades (mine Gravely) and drilled them to replace the heavier essentially straight PT blades. PT actually sold a ring with four fixed blades to make the rough-cuts into finish mowers, but I dug one into the ground and threw a blade, as in out and fast, so I went back to the articulated ones. You'd have to ask Terry what the finish deck would need to accept the stump jumpers. I'll bet they bolt in.
I am afraid a 48" out front and a 72" in back would overload your PTO. As I wrote before, in heavy stuff going uphill, mine can bog all the way to stall, just with the 72"
To get more width, I tow a Kunz Acrease 50" rough-cut deck. Not elegant, but I get almost 10' when I'm mowing level enough stuff that the Acrease doesn't drift downhill. I have the sickle bar for sides of trails, from vertical to 5 feet out. I think it's safer than a rotary mower on a boom, but not as flexible.
PS: Your wife's right. Two tractors are better than one, even if one is the world's most capable and flexible PT.

thanks for clarifications...

if my configuration of mowers off the neab and out front works, but at times overloads the hyd pump, i conceivably could adapt by shutting down either 4' or 6' mowers according to conditions. In theory, with up front boom mower and side to side control, i could park at the base and work a hillside side to side and then move up a bit and continue the practise....

now if that was all mounted on a used 1850 acquired for a kind price...all the better.

 

[woodlandfarms]

..where is Carl when we need him with cameras rolling for his PT CD's...

Screw all that. Just ride it to the bottom like a real man.

 

[Sedgewood]

FYI, Here's how the spindles in my 72" roughcut are built. It looks like PT took a simple 5 lug trailer hub and welded a stump jumper "bucket" on the stub end and called it a day. It works well except for the tapered lug bolts drawn into straight holes in the deck they use to mount it - it keeps loosening up from the limited contact area.

I'd wager Charlie is right that these assemblies would bolt right on a finish mower.

PT-1845 Rough cut mower

Sedgewood

 

[wasabi]

FYI, Here's how the spindles in my 72" roughcut are built. It looks like PT took a simple 5 lug trailer hub and welded a stump jumper "bucket" on the stub end and called it a day. It works well except for the tapered lug bolts drawn into straight holes in the deck they use to mount it - it keeps loosening up from the limited contact area.

I'd wager Charlie is right that these assemblies would bolt right on a finish mower.

PT-1845 Rough cut mower

Sedgewood

thx sedge. i remember seeing that along with your exceleent research and writeups on deck and blade improvements. I've been looking into used pt decks. asdie from blade configurations they all seem to be typical PT bulletproof construction. I'm thinking about a three or four foot rough cut deck on the front and finish mower on the back.

While our fields are tall in weeds, poke and locust saplings right now, we'll eventually get down to maintenance so perhaps finishing mower would be fine for the six foot pull behind...I don't recall if you ever just had finish blades on yours...any insights into how the finish mower handles high grass...how big is the difference between finish / rough cut mowers?

 

[Sedgewood]

I don't recall if you ever just had finish blades on yours...any insights into how the finish mower handles high grass...how big is the difference between finish / rough cut mowers?

In my search for better blades to cut high grass I cut and drilled some high lift lawn mower blades to try. The issue in high grass seems to be the left spindle in the multi spindle setup getting overloaded with its neighbors clippings and leaving an uncut stripe. I've tried several blades and eventually came to the conclusion that the problem is inherent in the simple rear discharge deck design. So I gave up, took the rubber deflector off the rear discharge and just mow shorter grass Except when I don't :-(

There's a discussion about this problem on here somewhere in a thread back-in-the-day not long after Charlie's great early posts convinced me I HAD to get me an 1845 (it's Charlie's fault!).

Sedgewood

 

[aczlan]

if my configuration of mowers off the neab and out front works, but at times overloads the hyd pump, i conceivably could adapt by shutting down either 4' or 6' mowers according to conditions. In theory, with up front boom mower and side to side control, i could park at the base and work a hillside side to side and then move up a bit and continue the practise....

Have you looked at/thought of using a swisher style mower behind the PT? something like this perhaps: Swisher Mower & Machine Co.: T-66 Trailmower

Aaron Z

 

[Charlie_Iliff]

So I gave up, took the rubber deflector off the rear discharge and just mow shorter grass Except when I don't :-(

There's a discussion about this problem on here somewhere in a thread back-in-the-day not long after Charlie's great early posts convinced me I HAD to get me an 1845 (it's Charlie's fault!).

Sedgewood

I still have the rubber deflector on. The high-lift blades do a smoother job than the original, and I seldom have a stripe as long as I keep the back of the deck adjusted an inch higher than the front. When it gets a foot high, or so and thick (particularly the wire grass stuff the horses won't touch), some stripe is inevitable.