Tiller Help! Clay packed into tiller tines

Beeenvenue · May 23, 2020

I am in North Texas with heavy black land clay. My 5 tiller did fine last summer with dry soil. I wanted to be able to plant this spring so I tried an acre that was very wet back in February. Now my tiller is absolutely packed with clay.

While it was still wet and gooey I tried to dig it out with a hand garden shovel, a small crowbar, you name it. Very little luck. I let it dry and got about 1-2 times clear with hours of manual labor. My last thought was to try again where I have some clay that has dried out and see if the act of tilling might dislodge the mess. That worked for more tines but I still have the center 4 tines in bad shape.

Anybody face this before? Remedies?

Sawyer Rob · May 23, 2020

I do custom tilling, but I would NEVER try to till soil that was that wet, basically mud!

So NO, I never have had that problem before, that's called operator error...

SR

Beeenvenue · May 23, 2020

Yeah well a) I’m new at this and b) has no choice. Rainy winter and early spring and I had a field I had to try to get in (clover for bees)

MossRoad · May 23, 2020

Beeenvenue said:
I am in North Texas with heavy black land clay. My 5 tiller did fine last summer with dry soil. I wanted to be able to plant this spring so I tried an acre that was very wet back in February. Now my tiller is absolutely packed with clay.

While it was still wet and gooey I tried to dig it out with a hand garden shovel, a small crowbar, you name it. Very little luck. I let it dry and got about 1-2 times clear with hours of manual labor. My last thought was to try again where I have some clay that has dried out and see if the act of tilling might dislodge the mess. That worked for more tines but I still have the center 4 tines in bad shape.

Anybody face this before? Remedies?

Since you're asking for help to clear the tiller and not criticism.... have you tried a power washer?

DIYOrangeDave · May 24, 2020

Pressure washer would be what I would use.

ptsg · May 24, 2020

Try play with different settings, like different ground speeds and with the tail gate open so it throws the soil back instead of keep packing up the rotor. Also with the height settings.

We were all new to this and needed to start somewhere but very few people are willing to admit that as you can see in one of the posts. Don't get discouraged by that.

I'm guessing the rice farms all over the world are doing it wrong since the till their soils completely under mud.

oosik · May 24, 2020

My problems was limbs and ancient barbed wire. I'd uses a pressure washer on packed-in clay.

fried1765 · May 24, 2020

ptsg said:
Try play with different settings, like different ground speeds and with the tail gate open so it throws the soil back instead of keep packing up the rotor. Also with the height settings.

We were all new to this and needed to start somewhere but very few people are willing to admit that as you can see in one of the posts. Don't get discouraged by that.

I'm guessing the rice farms all over the world are doing it wrong since the till their soils completely under mud.

YUP!...... MILLIONS of small farmers throughout Asia, use walk behind tillers, or small tractors w/tillers, in their muddy rice fields!
Knee high rubber boots, and the coolie style bamboo/straw hats are the fashion.

bullbreaker · May 24, 2020

Beeenvenue said:
While it was still wet and gooey I tried to dig it out with a hand garden shovel, a small crowbar, you name it.

I"am sure or at least hope so in your attempts to free mud etc from tiller when you have had it propped up on your three point hitch you have or are useing jack stands etc as "safety" support in case rear hydraulics come slaming down on you .
As a TBN secret safety officer just thought I would mention it .

Beeenvenue · May 24, 2020

Thanks for all the encouragement (from most of you). Op error? Perhaps but not unsafe and really no choice given timing and circumstances. Even now I’d try it again if I was in the same situation esp if power washing works and I could do some, wash, and resume.

New land without power or water so I have to haul the tiller home to powerwash - that was my thought but thought I’d ask first in case that doesn’t work or if there was another way.

Safety - all manual efforts were while the tiller was On the ground, off the machine, Resting on its tines and front leg. No issue there.

Egon · May 24, 2020

MossRoad said:
Since you're asking for help to clear the tiller and not criticism.... have you tried a power washer?

That値l be the easiest.

No operator error involved. Just very difficult material to work up.

TnAndy · May 24, 2020

I clogged mine doing a neighbors garden spot I told him was too wet to till, and then hit a REALLY soft spot in it. A long handle crowbar using the pointed end dug mine out without too much problem. I had mine on the tractor, lift up and every so often fired it up to help sling the stuff off.

MossRoad · May 24, 2020

Sounds like the perfect excuse, ah, err, I mean justification, for the OP to purchase a larger trailer, water tank, gas-powered pressure washer, tool boxes for the trailer, more tools, a generator and some portable lighting, perhaps a pole barn and a well.

bigtiller · May 24, 2020

I have put my tiller away when it was a sticky mess but not even close to your mess.

If the mud is still dry, hook the tiller up to the tractor, put the pto in neutral, lower the 3-point hitch all the way down and go for a ride. Go fast enough to get the tiller to bounce enough to loosen the dried and caked on mess. If it is dry enough, most the clay will bust apart and fall off. If it is still a little moist, this won't work nearly as well.

Oh, and drive a straight line and raise the tiller when turning. If you make any turns with the tiller on the ground, the tines will dig in and tear up the grass.

Try it, it works for me.

California · May 24, 2020

Kinda related: 1) The rice tillers that came over on the grey-market Yanmars have slender blades with a curve at the end, not the right-angle wide blade common on a US tiller. I assume this clogs less for tilling mud. Used in our US applications, the result is the same as a US tiller. (photo).

2)My problem is tilling tall grass where I haven't mowed. I made a tool to clean grass out of the tines - a cheap HF linoleum knife stripped and driven into the end of a piece of light conduit. This alternated with a spear might get mud out.

TractorGuy · May 24, 2020

Not on a tiller but I have cleared dry red clay with a water hose. It take s a while to get it loose.

The pressure washer idea may be better but sounds messy. I would certainly give that a try.

Beeenvenue · May 24, 2020

Thanks everybody. Got it clear today. (I had already tried the “dry tilling” and no luck). It took 3 hours to do the 2-1/2 center cavities that were still packed. I used a 0 tip on my pressure washer along with a wrecking bar hammered into the notches. From that I have about 150# of rock hard clay in my wheelbarrow from those compartments alone.