Most useful implements?

[Xfaxman]

What have you guys found REALLY useful? Especially something you might not think about.

A receiver hitch: https://omni-mfg.com/OMNI-Combo-3-point-Trailer-Hitch-Imatch-Compatible-P320197.aspx

With a Carry-All in the top receiver:

Pulling a trailer with the gooseneck ball in the top receiver:

 

[90cummins]

Very nice versatile design
90cummins

 

[90cummins]

I think I’ll add a vertical 2” receiver to mine.
I like the removable carryall idea.
90cummins

 

[mwemaxxowner]

I don't have any gooseneck or fifth wheel trailers any more, but that's awesome!

 

[Xfaxman]

The carryall also has a horizontal tube that didn't show above:

It gets used a lot on the EV's front receiver hitch:

And some other receiver tube things:

 

[mwemaxxowner]

I may or may not have just placed an order for a Wicked48! Wooo!

 

[mo1]

The implement I have that I easily have spent more hours running than all of the rest combined would be the rotary cutter.

The implement that I would say saves the most frustration would be loader-mounted pallet forks. It is so much handier to be able to get forks under an object and lift it compared to hooking a chain over a loader bucket and trying to keep whatever you are picking up from spinning, tipping, or smacking the front of the tractor when it is lifted like I did growing up. Shoot, loaders were called "buckets" as that's about all you ever saw on one until both round bales and loader quick-attach setups became common.

 

[Vigo327]

Im 37 and it seems like i've been seeing round bales my entire life (didn't grow up on a farm, admittedly). I never stopped to consider just when they came into being.

I'm in the planning/parts collection stage of building forks and SSQA setup for my Kubota B8200. Hopefully it will be one of my most used 'implements' when done.

 

[mo1]

Im 37 and it seems like i've been seeing round bales my entire life (didn't grow up on a farm, admittedly). I never stopped to consider just when they came into being.

I'm in the planning/parts collection stage of building forks and SSQA setup for my Kubota B8200. Hopefully it will be one of my most used 'implements' when done.

Modern type large round bales came into being in the '70s but they weren't very common at least in my area until some time in the '90s. This area always has had quite a few cattle, but in the past there were a fair number of dairy operations, hogs, less-than-CAFO-scale poultry, and row crops. Today it's nearly all just beef cattle as most everything else has gone away. There is thus a whole lot more dry hay being put up and fed compared to before and small squares are not practical for most any more. It used to be common to see somebody else baling small squares when I was a kid, I don't think I've seen anybody else actually putting up small squares since I was a teenager. It's round bales with a small handful chopping silage, some of which also gets round baled and wrapped as baleage. I will say the first time I "put up" round bales by simply spearing them with a bale spear, driving them to a field edge, and putting them on the ground and calling it good, it felt like cheating compared to unloading a hay rack and stacking small squares to the rafters in a 110 degree hay barn.

Large square bales have been around for a little while but certainly are not popular here as I very rarely see them. Even on semis on the highway, it's 98% round bales.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

Large square bales have been around for a little while but certainly are not popular here as I very rarely see them. Even on semis on the highway, it's 98% round bales.

Large square bales are more popular in the PNW because of the export market. They take a 1000 lb. square bale, mash it to 1/3 the original volume with a high pressure press, then pack the results into shipping containers. There is a big export market for wheat straw and grass straw, not crops you grow a lot of in Missouri. I think there may be some shipped down the Big Muddy to the Middle East, but shipments to East Asia head right across the Pacific.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

So far for me, the box blade, loader forks, ratchet rake, and 3 point landscaping rake have proven most valuable. I really like having the bucket and box blade together as a pair when I'm doing some dirt work. Being business at both ends can be really valuable.

I haven't needed the boom pole at all, but I bought it for a very specific purpose, which is lifting my 8x8 leveling drag for backing and turning tight and whatnot. It was only $40 or something like that, so I was cool with picking it up knowing I'd rarely use it.

I have a Wicked Grapple ordered, which I suspect I'll get a lot of use out of. After that I'll get a tiller, and I suspect that will be most of what I need.

I'll pick up a PHD if I see one second hand at a good deal, or if and when I get a paying job that justifies it. I have a fencing job coming up requiring 20 post holes that will profit about $1000, and I would have purchased one for that, except I just pulled the trigger on a grapple. So I'll just dig those post holes with my 2 stroke auger.


The FitRite top link is really nice with the box blade and the rake. Especially with a small tractor and limited 3 point lift height.

 

[IndyJay]

"So I'll just dig those post holes with my 2 stroke auger."

Please post videos...

 

[mwemaxxowner]

"So I'll just dig those post holes with my 2 stroke auger."

Please post videos...

I don't understand. I have a two stroke auger I've used plenty of times to dig post holes for a fence. It works well. Little more labor intensive than using a tractor, but a lot better than a clamshell digger by hand.

I used to work for a landscaping and fencing company and that was all we ever used.


View attachment 736572

 

[IndyJay]

I don't understand. I have a two stroke auger I've used plenty of times to dig post holes for a fence. It works well. Little more labor intensive than using a tractor, but a lot better than a clamshell digger by hand.

I used to work for a landscaping and fencing company and that was all we ever used.

Just kidding, I hear horror stories of broken arms and people flying around in circles around these contraptions. I set a few dozen or so with the clamshells but moved to 3ph when I had to do a bunch of them.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

They're not "easy" to run, but I've dug hundreds of holes with them. Stories are exaggerated by people who are afraid of hard manual labor I think. I still much prefer it to using a shovel or clam shell. Yes if it hits a rock or a root you need to be braced for it. If we were in known rocky ground (and we usually knew from prior work on the lot doing maintenance grade and whatnot) we'd put two men on the auger.

Sort of like you said you did, I'll purchase one when there are enough holes to justify it.

If I get a small job that will pay enough to purchase one, if all my profit goes to paying for the PHD for my tractor I'll be all over it. I keep doing side work, and keep spending all of it on more implements.

 

[IndyJay]

The 3ph post hole digger helped a lot, now if I can figure out a better way to tamp around the posts...

 

[RoyJackson]

Some call them landscape rakes. But for the cost, those spring tooth grader-blade like rakes can't be beat for a variety of tasks. Make sure you get trailing wheels.

Yep, but boy! Do those wheels add a lot of $$$$ to the purchase price!

I have two additions:
A flail mower, if you have a field
A 3PH chipper with as much capacity as your tractor's PTO HP can handle

Oh yeah, one more...a 3PH snow blower if you're in an area that gets snow...

 

[mwemaxxowner]

I want to try to diy a set of gauge wheels for my rake.

If they turn out "meh", I will absolutely be buying a set for it!

As to snow, we don't get any of that. I don't have any need for a chipper, and I don't own any land to bush hog. Stuff I trim and prune at home I pile at the road and the town hauls it off. That's a very easy way to deal with it!

I do occasionally bush hog for other people, in which case I borrow a 4' rotary cutter from a neighbor. I'd like to have a flail though, but without needing one on property of my own, I hesitate to spend that much on it.

 

[pmsmechanic]

The 3ph post hole digger helped a lot, now if I can figure out a better way to tamp around the posts...

View attachment 736578

Just pick up some gravel or crushed rock. Dump some around the post and wiggle it a bit. The rock/gravel is self tightening. The more you wiggle the post the tighter it gets. I learned this from the power companies in our area. They only set power posts with crushed rock.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

Two thumbs way up for the boom pole in conjunction with the drag. Now I can use it in forward and reverse, and at the end of a run if I lift it it would sweep back and up and feather any material piled under it nicely.