Anyone Bent Their FEL Using a Snow Plow

[LouNY]

I have an 8 foot blade on my 8050 on the SSQA and always have the rear chains on and some times front chains.
I an not do not float the loader, I carry the loader and let the pin slack take care of the blade.
I have not damaged my loader frame on my gravel and rock driveway but I also plow slowly, I have seen one that did get bent it was on a 200 Hp tractor being used in a parking lot at high speed and got slammed into a concrete curb.
My tractor is over 10,000# and I wish that I had a 10 foot instead of my 8 foot blade, I did add a 2" spacer on the blade shoes as I didn't like the clearance from my loader arms to the ground.
View attachment IMG_20171108_144640134.jpg View attachment IMG_20180105_112324248.jpg

 

[Hilbilly]

Like Ford850 said get a blade that floats on the SSQA plate and also has lateral oscillation. You just set the height of the loader arm and let the blade float on its own. The lateral oscillation helps with leveling the blade when you angle it besides allowing it to follow the contour of the driveway better.

You can see how the blade can move both up and down and rotate on the SSQA plate:

I had a rubber edge on in this photo since the gravel wasn't frozen over yet and it folds over as you go forward and doesn't dig into the gravel.

Based on everything I have learned on this thread and others, that setup looks to be exactly what I need for my application. Thanks for the great pics and the name of the company that makes that mounting method.

 

[Hilbilly]

LouNY, I love those chains. What brand are they?

I gather you use your blade for pushing and piling. I use my rear blade on the tractor, for pushing snow and my my skidsteer with a snow bucket for moving snow, around the house and other buildings but my long driveway requires a different approach. For that I need an angled blade to push the snow over as far as possible. Eventually I usually end up have to use the rear mounted snow blower while backing up to to get rid of the snow, when the driveway gets too narrow. I want to reduce or eliminate the need for using the blower because it takes a long time and kills my old neck to look backwards for that long.

 

[Ford850]

Based on everything I have learned on this thread and others, that setup looks to be exactly what I need for my application. Thanks for the great pics and the name of the company that makes that mounting method.

Those pictures of Oldafretired's blade are the same brand as mine, and his is very similar to my blade. Mine might be taller and has a different spring system, but the float and pivot features are the same. The blade trips very easily, but it stays upright when pushing snow up into piles.

 

[LouNY]

LouNY, I love those chains. What brand are they?

I gather you use your blade for pushing and piling. I use my rear blade on the tractor, for pushing snow and my my skidsteer with a snow bucket for moving snow, around the house and other buildings but my long driveway requires a different approach. For that I need an angled blade to push the snow over as far as possible. Eventually I usually end up have to use the rear mounted snow blower while backing up to to get rid of the snow, when the driveway gets too narrow. I want to reduce or eliminate the need for using the blower because it takes a long time and kills my old neck to look backwards for that long.

In not sure any more they are either the TRYGG or the Aquiline over the years we (my brother and I ) have purchased several sets from different dealers and different brands of this type of chains.
I also use my front blade to plow the snow driving ahead on my driveway, quite often I will have the front blade angled and the rear blade offset and angled to windrow the snow over. Most of my driveway has quite a bit of bank and I just push the snow over the edge. At times I will need to swing in a j type pattern to push some of it over the bank and avoid the trees, but the angled and offset back blade will usually knock it over the bank.

This was from earlier this year.

 

[TSO]

I agree with the others, DO NOT use your loader in float with a front plow on gravel.

I used a front SSQA plow (converted truck plow with trip springs, plow shoes, manual angle) on the front of my Massey 1648 cab & 1652 cab tractors. So basically same setup as you with updated loader (DL130). The overall loader weighs 1100 lbs, which includes about 300 lbs for the subframe. So, that's throwing an additional 700 lbs of loader directly onto your snow plow if you're using it in float.

Personally, I hated the front plow on gravel, and i sold it. When you're cruising along at 16-17 mph pushing snow and the front plow blade hits something causing a trip, it's still a huge jarring shock to the tractor. I currently use a 90" large capacity "light material" bucket on the front, and an 8 ft BackBlade with hydraulic angle for the rear. For me it's a perfect setup.

 

[LittleBill21]

whats the issue with float? too much weight and the plow just digs?

 

[LouNY]

whats the issue with float? too much weight and the plow just digs?

Some where in the geometry of the loader frames when you start pushing with most of these FEL and blades the push really loads the tractor and it applies a large amount of down pressure, enough to actually lift the front wheels at times. I have the SSQA plow and it does a good job for me but I have to carry it, I also do not plow fast I'm usually under 5 mph. I think that the truck plows mounted to the SSQA plates with a chain top link are a better idea. I would also put a skid on the adapter plate to protect the loader arms.

 

[Deerherd]

Deerherd, that's a real nice looking tractor. How wide is the plow on there?

It is 9 foot plow.

For best results, especially early in the season you need to plow around freeze thaw cycles, not when it is convenient. More importantly, you need to buy a snow plow with skid shoes, not a snow blade. The difference being, a plow will roll snow but a blade only pushes snow. The blades inability to adequately clear the snow is also a huge contributing factor in pushing the front of the tractor around.

I can whole heartedly recommend the HLA products, I have owned both the 2000 and 3000 series. They are compact true plows and have built in float.

I have a gravel driveway a little over a quarter mile long with a couple hundred feet of asphalt near the house. I make sure the driveway is well graded before snow hits and for the first couple storms, will do no plowing, just pack the snow down to build a base.

Once the base is frozen plowing is easy. If you set the skid shoes to keep the blade 3/4-1 from hitting the drive you can fine tune that using your curl.

If you decide to build your own, keep it as compact as possible. There are some extremely long setups on here and that really exacerbates the front end being pushed around.

Good luck in your search!

Here are some photos of the 2000 series

 

[DK35vince]

Thanks for posting this. I was still concerned about using an 8' blade but if your using a 9' one then I should be fine with the 8. Do you find the tractor gets pushed around with such a wide blade when it is angled?

Occasionally my front end try's to push a little, but not often as long as I don't try floating the FEL. (pushes bad if I try to float the FEL)
I run chains front and rear and it does a great job pushing a 9' plow..
With no chains even with my previous 7' plow the steering sucks and the tractor (with R-4s) sits, spins and goes nowhere trying to push even a small amount of snow.