Edge Tamers on my gravel drive

the old grind · Dec 15, 2016

I should have rebuilt/redesigned the abominable OEM level indicator by now :duh:, but in the meantime what I quickly learned was to lower NH's lift arms as far as they'll go and float, then creep a few feet slowly uncurling and watching for the imprint of the ETs. Once I'm 'there' I can forge ahead at will, badda bing, etc.

I can also see where I'll be getting some welding practice building up wear pads after a season or two. :laughing: They'll never see pavement, but I'm mostly making contact just at/behind my 3 3s' front bends and it'll add up ... someday.

What my blade doesn't pick up is being nicely compacted (8" or more of semi-loose powder, ~20^F), making it easy to hold lines on successive passes. I've taken off some paint, but moved barely a handful of stones vs a bushel or more/area and fighting blade angle on several long runs and clearing three 4-wide parking T's.

My d-way's crown has a fairly small radius, but I haven't gouged it yet. Clearing our driveway entrance(s) has never been so easy. I 'carved roads' around the barn in minutes w/o stirring a blade of grass. Time to do so much was easily halved and ... that'd be say 1/2 gal vs 1.

Yeah, I'm pretty torqued on the concept and obviously would recommend the branded product(s) for design/craftsmanship, ease of use/installation (for the fortunate), and o'all value. Something worth reading this far for: 'walking' your fronts back out of a snow-filled ditch with the bucket just got several times easier.

TheMan419 · Dec 18, 2016

Just used mine for the second time today. They did a great job. I am convinced that I can push a larger mound of snow with these things on than if I did not have anything on them. Made short work of pushing the snow around.

Garandman · Dec 27, 2016

Soldier415 said:
The only downside I have found is that now I cannot use the back of the FEL cutting edge to pull snow back from the front of the garage

On the flip side, I learned yesterday they work great for carrying logs!

TheMan419 · Dec 27, 2016

They do work well for moving logs. I also got the edge extenders because I needed to move a ton of lumber. I have not yet found the need for forks and the extenders were cheap and a good compromise for what I needed to do.

They are also great for moving a bunch of T-Posts out to the fence line to start to install them.

cartod · Dec 15, 2017

TheMan419 said:
They do work well for moving logs. I also got the edge extenders because I needed to move a ton of lumber. I have not yet found the need for forks and the extenders were cheap and a good compromise for what I needed to do.

They are also great for moving a bunch of T-Posts out to the fence line to start to install them.

I ordered my edge extenders last month. I could never get along without my forks, I use them 3 times as much as I do the bucket.

rt014 · Dec 17, 2017

I'm hesitant to buy these unless they work ok over the Piranha Tooth Bar. Anyone successfully using these over the PTB?

kennyd · Dec 17, 2017

rt014 said:
I'm hesitant to buy these unless they work ok over the Piranha Tooth Bar. Anyone successfully using these over the PTB?

The PTB comes off with two bolts, why would you leave it on for snow removal?

rt014 · Dec 17, 2017

kennyd said:
The PTB comes off with two bolts, why would you leave it on for snow removal?

It gives a much more aggressive bite when moving piles of frozen snow.

the old grind · Dec 17, 2017

My problem had long been a lack of precision when angling the FEL bucket to not dig into gravel when pushing snow in 'float'. My 'level indicator' was vague as all heqq, and it mattered a lot before I bolted on three ET's.

Here's a patch I 'cleared off' in 5 min or so. Note the grass 'showing thru' but not obvious in the piles. This stuff came up so 'clean' I used some to make a hill for the neighbor kids to play on, as requested.

If PTB was all that vital for snow removal, it's hard to imagine gaining much by adding ETs. You either want to 'cut' or 'clear' with the bucket edge. Need a 4-way bucket to do 'all that'? Hmmm ....