Goodbye Kubota, hello EarthForce

[MChalkley]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

This picture probably belongs in a separate thread in the "Attachments" section, but it's for my EF-5, so it's going here.

I haven't seen any soil pulverizers as heavy duty as I wanted, so home-made was the only alternative. This soil pulverizer uses 78" of 12" H-beam as the starting point. When I added up most of the materials, I estimated the weight at about 1100 pounds. The teeth are purchased, but everything else is scratch-built. Well, the H-beam and 8" diameter thick-wall pipe were purchased, too, but you knew that, right? The roller spikes are 1/2" rod. Instead of those wimpy springs some pulverizers I looked at had, which you could push down with your fingers, the roller has pickup truck shocks to hold it down. I still have to weld a quick-attach plate to it. As you can see, it's now got a Freedom Hitch on it, because it was finished before the EF-5 got here, so I used it a couple times on the L4310 before I sold it.

MarkC

 

[Bird]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

Wow, that oughta do a job! And you made that yourself?

 

[MChalkley]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

Bird - Nope, I can't take credit for the workmanship - I only participated directly in the design and selection of materials. A friend of mine, who used to be a mechanic, but is now an equipment operator for a landscaping company down the road a few miles, did the hard part.

One of the features I really wanted to be different about it was in the scarifiers. I wanted them to hang down 5", instead of the 3-4" you usually see. The only problem with doing that is if you hit really big rocks, you can bend them more easily. So, I'm looking for stronger scarifier teeth that will still fit in the u-bolts so I can "move the weak link" as I replace existing ones due to atrition.

There's still a few wrinkles to iron out, but whatever you drag that thing over, short of bedrock, it's pretty well, well, pulverized.

MarkC

 

[gordon]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

Hay u don't have a couple of those freedom hitch plates left do ya?

One tough rascal, with the wieght to boot, thats the key to keep it from skipping across the ground.

Now will you have to revamp it to run on the new tractor?
The new software or upgrade has fixed the wide screen problem that I was having before ----Thanks Muhammad

Gordon

 

[HR_Mutt]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

MChalkley
I just picked up a 9' by 12" H beam to make a pulverizer also. All I've done w/ it is mount it to a cat 1 3ph that used to bolt to a snow blade. I was looking at using socket head cap screws. say 3/4" for the scarifiers. That's a lot of holes to drill for the u-bolts/w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif. I'll add a piece along the top so they don't push up. Originally I was going to cut the heads off the bolts, now thinking maybe turn an angle on them.
regards
Mutt

 

[MChalkley]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

Gordon - I might end up with an implement sections left over, but no tractor section.

I'm not sure how I'm going to install the quick-attach plate yet, but I'm leaning strongly toward welding it in the same place the Freedom Hitch is now. That would require backdragging it, but I wouldn't be driving over the part I've done. Plus, the EarthForce machines have excellent mirrors on both sides - I tested them pretty thoroughly, and when they're properly adjusted it's easy to backdrag without even turning around, unless you're in a really tight spot, of course.

 

[MChalkley]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

Mutt - We burned the holes - it was just too much trouble to drill them. I'm sure you'll be pleased with it, though. It'll definitely do the job. Still, I found that in some situations, I still needed more weight - if I hadn't known I was going to be using it on the EF-5, instead of the Kubota, I'd have added some concrete to it or something. When it's mounted on the EarthForce, it'll have the additional weight of the loader, which should be another 500-750 pounds, plus the ability to apply downforce. I don't think I'll be needing any more weight then.

 

[HR_Mutt]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

MChalkley
By needing more weight, did you get some hopping?? The reason I ask, when I pulled it around w/ chain it didn't hop. As soon as the 3ph was attached, top link adjustment was a little more sensitive. Looking at putting in a piece of chain so beam will float a bit but still be able to lift it up. Ack! Read your post again, guess that won't apply in your setup/w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif.
regards
Mutt

 

[MChalkley]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

Mutt - No, it wasn't hopping, just not digging in deeply enough to suit me. I was using it to resurface an existing gravel parking lot, though, so it wasn't the typical use a soil pulverizer would be put to. Still, it did an excellent job - after I chained my 600-lb box scraper on top of it! /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif One guy who saw it while driving up said he thought it was the strangest looking contraption he'd ever seen until he got close enough to figure out what it was...

 

[Egon]

Re: Home-made Soil Pulverizer

It kinda looks like what we used to call " a sheepsfoot packer "
Egon