Thanks for all the advice folks. While I ordered a Land Pride 2572, I actually wound up with a 1572 because of multiple screw ups by the distributer. But I'm actually pleased because the 1572 fits my grandpa's old Deutz D4006, which has sadly been sitting unused for the last 1.5 years. After lubrication, filter changes, fresh diesel and a jump start, she's now a fully dedicated road maintenance machine. That old Deutz just won't quit. My grandpa would be proud (he passed in 2014).
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Anyways, I quickly went to work and figured out pretty quickly that setting up the machine right is tricky. The right top link length was the first trick to get even engagement on most terrain between the two cutting blades. Then it was getting the right angle to eliminate the unnecessary high crown, but still put a slight crown in the road and recover gravel from the sides. Then it was getting the scarifiers adjusted right. Where I wound up was dropping the scarifiers all the way down where there were potholes and managing the depth with my 3-point. I went too deep in one spot and dredged up some large flat rocks and red clay - no doubt the original road bed. After repairing that I learned the right depth for the driveway and didn't have that problem again. By overlapping runs back and forth with the scarifiers I was able to tear every pothole out of my driveway. It worked very well.
The only issue I experienced was the sod. The old driveway crown was 100% grass and effectively sod. I sprayed it with roundup prior to working on it, but it still clumps up as sod when ripped with the scarifiers. Those sod chunks clogged up the grader impacting gravel flow over the blades. I had to stop and unclog it once, but the learned to keep the implement from digging so deep to prevent clogging.
All in all I'm happy with the unit. It made short work of a few spots in the driveway where there were significant potholes. I managed to regrade about a half mile of driveway in 3-4 hours this afternoon. Where I took the time to do 7-8 passes (pothole areas) the driveway is near perfect. Here's a few before and after shots of one area that was heavily overgrown with grass. Before the roundup it was actually hard to distinguish between the driveway and the surrounding field.
Before shot - again looks better than it was because of the roundup.
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After about 6 passes with the land grader
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Shot down the driveway for a small stretch. Note the clods of sod. I suppose I could rake those up and toss them by hand. It would look a lot better. But dang it if that doesn't seem like a lot of work!
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All in all I'm pleased with my results.
-Jeff
