Ground Implements w/ Craftsman

[exeter_acres]

Thought I would toss this out there. Has anyone here ever used any of the ground engaging implements (plow sleeve or discs) with a Craftsman garden tractor(or similar) with any luck?
Can it really handle these for small projects or would it just beat up the tractor?
I do know that they require the sleeve hitch as an extra to work.

Just curious.

Curtis

 

[justractors]

The small implements do work well with a garden tractor designed to use them. Some of the larger garden tractors even have the hydraulic three point hitch systems just like the bigger tractors and are either cat 0 or cat 1.
Many of the older Sears tractors have manually operated three point hitches as do some of the other brands.
There are several Yahoo and MSN clubs and communities that discuss the Garden Tractors and their attachments, if you are interested I can post some of the web site addresses.
Bill

 

[JJT]

I have a 20hp Craftsman, the only ground engaging implements I have used are a 4' york rake and a 4' dozer/snow blade. With my heavy soil, (with lots of stones) there is no way it would pull a plow or a disk. I cannot complain, it's 20 years old and still runs like a top. With chains and wheel weights it will push a decent pile of snow or loose material, (sand/gravel).

 

[John_Mc]

I was pulling a home-made rake (large spikes driven through a wooden frame, with a few rocks on the frame for weight) from the regular hitch on my Craftsman 22 HP garden tractor. It worked pretty well, breaking up some packed soil and hard clay. There were 12 "tines" on my rake, and they were penetrating about 2" into the soil. I had no problem pulling it, even at half throttle. I do have ag-type tread tires with 55 pound weights on each rear wheel, but chains would probably have worked just as well. There was no tire slipping with my set-up. The only problem was that it egged out the hole in the hitch plate (pretty light, cheap construction). I've also seen someone pull a small box blade behind a similar tractor with good results. I would not count on plowing very deeply in "virgin" soil, but if the ground had been worked previously, I'd bet you could get decent results.

I went to Sears to price out their "Sleeve Hitch". I decided that for $150, I could make something myself to reinforce the existing hole. I don't really need the raise and lower feature that the sleeve hitch offers. (I have a 33 HP deisel compact tractor for the bigger jobs)

John Mc

 

[nnicklas]

I have a Craftsman GT3000 25hp Kohler. I have used both a 10" moldboard and a boxscraper and the tractor pulls like a sun of a gun. But I have turf tires so traction is not very good without wheel weights and ag tires. The biggest complaint is manually raising and lowering the sleeve hitch. Even with the tension spring fully extended raising and lowering a 80lb moldboard was quite a chore. My arm was sore for 2 days afterward.

My ground is pretty loamy so it seemed to plow quite well. I am in the market for a small Kubota to do my plowing and other chores. I'll keep the craftsman for cutting grass.

Thanks for the post