Backhoe Ripper

[LD1]

Thought I'd share some pics of a ripper I threw together a few days ago.

Was needing something to start removing trees from around the pond and clearing a fence row. I only had a 2' and 3' bucket and those make a big mess trying to remove 6"-12" trees.

IT was just made with scraps. So nothing fancy. Its all 1/2" metal, and about 28" long. I was worried about the 1/2" metal for the mount where it attaches to the boom, but using it for a few hours yesterday, it looks like it will hold up to whatever my backhoe can dish out.

 

[LD1]

Here are some pics of the carnage from about 3 hours of play

 

[Herkypilot]

Looks like it works fine. I'll probably be looking to do something like that in the future. It appears the cutting edge is just squared off. Is there a reason you didn't grind it a bit and give it more of a "V" shape to assist in cutting roots?

 

[skyhook]

Nice, I like it.

 

[LD1]

Looks like it works fine. I'll probably be looking to do something like that in the future. It appears the cutting edge is just squared off. Is there a reason you didn't grind it a bit and give it more of a "V" shape to assist in cutting roots?

There are a few reasons I didnt "sharpen" it. But knowing that I always could later if needed.

Time consuming.

It would likely just dull quickly anyway.

Alot of the rippers I saw when gathering ideas were not sharpened either. Rather the ones I liked had teeth to help grip and pull. This one doesnt have alot of teeth, but left a step in the metal (was already there, remember scraps), them welded a piece on the bottom to also catch and rip stuff.

And likely the main reason I didnt, is cause I didnt want to slice through the roots. Since this is a pond bank, that will likely be getting reworked in the near future, I wanted to pull/rip as many of them out of the ground as possible, instead of just slicing them and leaving them in the ground.

 

[CDN Farm Boy]

Did you laminate a couple layers of the 1/2" together for the shank?

 

[LD1]

Did you laminate a couple layers of the 1/2" together for the shank?

yep. 2 pieces. touching in the front. and spaced by a piece of 1-1/2" steel at the back to make it more wedge shaped. And by design it wasnt really to make it like a wedge, but to gain some thickness so it had more side-to-side strength and not just bend over.

 

[CDN Farm Boy]

Thanks. I can definitely appreciate the "build with what ya got" approach. I need to make one for my BH77

 

[LD1]

Thanks. I can definitely appreciate the "build with what ya got" approach. I need to make one for my BH77

Probably not needed to build as heavy or big as this. I am using this on my 18000# machine and haven't hurt it yet. For a BH77, I'd probably just use a single 1/2" piece, and maybe 18" long

 

[lt190b]

LD1, do you have a thumb on the hoe? If not, add one, thet are a must for brush and limbs.