Best Mountain Tractor?

[Charlie_Iliff]

Re: You really know how to torture a guy ;-)

<font color=blue>I wish they still made Jeeps with 3-point hitches and PTOs! </font color=blue>
I never saw one with a 3 point. In the 50's, we had several surplus jeeps (one by Ford). A couple had PTOs, but only drawbar, not 3 point. I do not pine for them. They were a lot of fun for us kids, but miserable as utility vehicles. Occasionally, we'd rake or bale with one, but they were down on PTO power.

 

[RoyJackson]

The Degree of slope can be found by taking the rise/run and looking it up in your tangent tables

So, considering the run as the base of a triangle and the rise as the vertical side, this equates to a tangent of one (1), hence an angle of 45°.

I'll go with that since trig used for civil engineering and trig used in manufacturing (my field) are applied differently.
But does it follow that a 48° slope is a 111% grade?

I'm looking for an education here...

 

[Egon]

A 111% grade would be the tangent of 111/100 . Now I'm too lazy to find my tables, If I still have any, but the calculator here says its just a little over 48 degrees.
Trig is trig.

Egon

 

[CSAW]

Re: Has anyone installed 4-equally sized wheels?

Kent

The tractors are designed for the diameter tires they come with. You got the 4wd part not working right. One more reason it would not is that the tractor is designed to sit level with small tires on the front. If you put four tires the same size on a tractor not designed for it you would be looking at the sky. /w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif

 

[ByuBill]

Hi All, guess who is back to see what he stired up /w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif. Well my monday is over and three more days until my third vacation this year. /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif. Looks like the bees have been buzzing pretty good while I was at work. Looks like that MossRoad and Charlie both love their Power Tracs as much as I love my Subaru. I suggest that they go to work for Power Trac ( assuming that they don't already of course ) that way they could convince all of the TBNers to buy one and cut us a good deal./w3tcompact/icons/eyes.gif Sounds good to me. Now if I had a place to use it or if I needed one in a business, I would would love to have a Power Trac. Since my tractors are just toys that are used as a tool once in a while. I guess that I don't need one. Since the Smokey Mtn Natl Part is the most visited Natl Park in the good old USA. I would think that some of the TBNers have visited it. Well, that is the part of the country that wasabi and I are in. If you have visited this area You have noticed the houses way up on the sides of the mountains and prob. wondered how they got there. Very carefully /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif. I must admit that most of the homes way up there are summer homes but some of us do live here year round. ( from another dicussion ) That is why a lot of city folks have SUV's. To be able to get to there summer home. I have learned from these forums that the Power Trac is a great machine and that the Earthforce is awsome. For my personal uses, I don't even need a tractor. In the long run it would be cheaper for me to hire someone to maintain my driveway. I just happen to be an old country boy ( well I was a boy a long time ago ) just don't sound right saying, just an old country man. I guess that old man would do. That likes to play on tractors. So, I now have three of them and barely a place to park them. So, let's not stop now. wasabi needs a tractor and a little help in deciding what to buy within his budget. Maybe the next time he is up this way he can take a few pics so everyone, including myself can see the lay of the land that he is refering to. Looks like I got a little carried away here. Have a goodun. Here's the bottom half of my driveway, that needs gravel,/w3tcompact/icons/blush.gif can't tell much about how steep it is because I was looking down at about the same angle.
Bill

 

[Egon]

Roy:

My appologies as I did not explain the difference in grade and degrees properly.

% grade is the feet of elevation gain in one hundred horizontal feet. [ 3% grade would be a three foot elevation gain in one hundred feet.]

Degrees are just what you learned in school. There are 360 of them in a full circle. They represent a specific angle.

Hope this is clearer.

Egon

 

[MossRoad]

I've been throughout the Smokies many times, so I am familiar with the terrain. It is a beautiful place. One of my most favorite palces to visit. I remember watching a prefabricated house being delivered up one of those hills. The delivery truck could not make the switchbacks in the driveway, so they brought a crane in that lifted the house up to the next level of the driveway. Then the crane went up the hill and lifted the house up to the third level of the driveway. Then the crane moved for the last time and set the house on the foundation. Amazing that someone even saw a potential building site way up their, but they did it.

 

[Charlie_Iliff]

Re: Percent Grade

Roy:
When I searched yesterday for percent grade on the net, I hit that one site, on howstuffworks, and assumed there would be a number of others. I haven't been able to find them, however.
As I understand it, a 48 degree slope would be over 100% grade. Although I can't recall the source, I remember something about percent grade first being seriously used in railroad construction, because it is easier to apply in the field than anything requiring trig calculations. Since trains are actually pretty miserable at handling hills, the chance of anything approaching 100% was nil, so the system worked easily, with no thought of big percentages.
Maybe the thread will stimulate a historian in our midst. It wouldn't amaze me to find that the Romans, Chinese, Egyptians or other ancient road builder had a system that forms the basis for the percent grade convention.

 

[RoyJackson]

Thanks to Charlie and Egon for the clarification of grade percentages.

I'm setting here with my Machinery Handbook...but it doesn't discuss this issue.

 

[wasabi]

All this newbie knows is that steep can scare the whooie out of me, especially when headed sideways and having to turn up hill!