Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option?

   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #21  
I have a hard time imagining that thing to be effective over something with castor wheels. To my way of understanding, you look at the age old grader design. You want your mould board supported by the ground as far away as possible.

If you can that thing off a laser, totaly different thinking and would work well.

The one the local paving guy has doesn’t even have castor wheels and it does an excellent job. He used to use a mini grader and it’s rusting away in his lot now.
 
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   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #22  
xfaxman....you have all sorts of cool stuff to play with......er.....I mean WORK with. :thumbsup:
Here is my high tech super heavy duty land leveler! :D:

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   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #23  
xfax.....I like it. I normally use a long HD wood skid and tailor the action by how much weight I put on it.
 
   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option?
  • Thread Starter
#24  
I think I may have found the best option for my application and situation. Diggin-It should appreciate this.

B99DA18F-89E1-490C-9E3B-28493ECC18BB.jpeg

This is NOT my picture, just a random from the internet. Now, this will give me some versatility. I have an 8’ grader blade with a hydraulically adjustable tilt, angle, height and offset. I know that the SSQA dozer blades do not seem to work very well. I have heard very different opinions about these grader style units though.

I found one for sale semi-locally for a very reasonable amount. Going to go take a look at it this weekend.

Thoughts?
 
   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #25  
You stated its for maintenance. Then all you need is a rake with gauge wheels to comb the surface, pull up some filler material and level it into ruts, chop down bumps and give it a crown.

Just tow the rake with weights on it. Let it float so that the gauge wheel set the surface flatness by what they are running on. If you can rig up a 2 pt attachment on the front or rear, then rotating the rake at 30 - 45 degree yaw angle with the rake's hitch pin also at an angle from the vertical, a crown will be formed. You can push the rake from a front frame mount or pull it from a rear mount. The 45 degree yaw angle also chops down the hills and depressions formed by 20191105_141805.jpg20191105_141816.jpgrigidly mounted blades, scrapers and tillers.

If the gravel or crushed asphalt is already in place and all it needs is a trimming. This is all you really need. Mine is 8' so when angled it easily covers the tire tracks. High angle, 1 pass down each side, then yaw angle of zero and a run down the center.

Done. No need for a $4000 occasional use special purpose machine. Heck, I use my JD suitcase weights on it and do my 1 mile long entire gravel road. But, the 'nice' roadway allows my neighbors to drive twice the speed limit, so I leave some occasional speed bumps by lifting the rake once in a while.

If your driveway is really bad and needs more than this, use a rototiller in the spring to loosen up the gravel. If you really have a rock driveway, put down some gravel, then grade it with the rake.

Now I don't need the rake any more because I put down 700' of concrete and the road now has to be done by the county.
 
   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #26  
I think I may have found the best option for my application and situation. Diggin-It should appreciate this.

View attachment 641318

This is NOT my picture, just a random from the internet. Now, this will give me some versatility. I have an 8’ grader blade with a hydraulically adjustable tilt, angle, height and offset. I know that the SSQA dozer blades do not seem to work very well. I have heard very different opinions about these grader style units though.

I found one for sale semi-locally for a very reasonable amount. Going to go take a look at it this weekend.

Thoughts?

With gauge wheels like that I’d say it would be a useful piece. Without gauge wheels a skid steer blade is useless. I’d rather just have the bucket.
 
   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #27  
I have a "Roadrunner" and highly recommend it. It's on a 5 ton 115 hp skid steer (GEHL) and indestructible. Very small learning curve before your getting great results.
 
   / Gravel driveway maintenance - best SKIDSTEER option? #28  
I have good results with a back blade on a tractor. I angle the blade to bring everything towards the center of the driveway then set it straight to level off every thing that was bladed toward the center works great for me
 
 
 
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