Flail Mower Let's talk flail mowers

[electrycmonk]

Keep the old rotary alive enough to do your first pass. Let it eat the heavy stuff & rocks. You arent likely to cry to hard when the beater dies. Then look at a nicer mower to maintain things.

Not a fan of some of the light cheap Titan impliments like mowers. I'm happy with their pallet forks, but there arent really parts you need for repair on those.

Given your stated history, I'm going to strongly "2nd" what Fallon said. And I'd actually ante a few morsels here:
A) do you have spare blades, bolts, pieces already for the Frankenstein mower?
B) Maybe even a spare/backup gearbox?
C) given your experience & learning curve are so high with the Frankenstein, how fast (do you believe)would you be able to fix it and be back 'cutting the trail'?
D) if funds are too tight, then I'd suggest a couple months with Frankenstein to add some extra scratch for the "new to you flail" that's around that $1500 & ordering a spare set of blades and hangers etal so you will start out with a shortened learning curve.
E) that way it's Dave Ramsey style 100% down & nothing a month.

 

[JonBoyHunter]

Given your stated history, I'm going to strongly "2nd" what Fallon said. And I'd actually ante a few morsels here:
A) do you have spare blades, bolts, pieces already for the Frankenstein mower?
B) Maybe even a spare/backup gearbox?
C) given your experience & learning curve are so high with the Frankenstein, how fast (do you believe)would you be able to fix it and be back 'cutting the trail'?
D) if funds are too tight, then I'd suggest a couple months with Frankenstein to add some extra scratch for the "new to you flail" that's around that $1500 & ordering a spare set of blades and hangers etal so you will start out with a shortened learning curve.
E) that way it's Dave Ramsey style 100% down & nothing a month.

Thanks for the comments. The old brush hog is still functional - I just need to do some more welding on it (already put a new deck on it, reinforced some other areas) - I just need to weld up some cracks on the tail wheel support, weld up the rear skirt some, and tighten up the blade mounting (the blades loosen quickly enough to contact the deck, which eventually opens it up like a can opener, this is what's caused me to rebuild it twice before). No big deal. It's not worth anything to sell, so I'll certainly keep it for rough duty and grinding up the rocks! I don't have any spares for it, anything that was replaced was scrapped long ago.

I'm keeping my eyes open for a used, but they don't come up often around here - hence why I was looking at the Titan pricing. Once the trails and a few areas in the woods are cleared (putting up a couple of log lean to's for camping down by the ponds), most cutting should be fairly light duty.

Thanks again.

 

[electrycmonk]

Hey @JohnBoyHunter I just did a Craigslist search around you..... Either I'm not using the right words or your neck of the woods have almost no shredder mowers.....

 

[Fallon]

Hey @JohnBoyHunter I just did a Craigslist search around you..... Either I'm not using the right words or your neck of the woods have almost no shredder mowers.....

Rotary cutter, bush hog, brush hog, rough cut mower. Shredder isnt a common term here in Colorado & I only figured out what they were from context on other TBN posts.

 

[electrycmonk]

Rotary cutter, bush hog, brush hog, rough cut mower. Shredder isnt a common term here in Colorado & I only figured out what they were from context on other TBN posts.

Yeah, I used those terms as well & found 3 finish 3-pt mowers & a single post of bush hog parts. Ohhhh & a Ford flail for $1500 that's either a 907 or 917 model.

 

[electrycmonk]

Given the vastness of the wisdom on this thread & its mixed amongst all our banter simultaneously, I've spent some time scanning back thru the thread for: details, pics, name & part #'s & websites.

Found these sites:
Alamo/Mott Flail Montage Enterprises
Alamo Models Parts Listings & I went to these two:
Alamo AC6� (May-91) Parts Diagrams
Alamo Brahma 6� Archive (Jan-96) Parts Diagrams
Clean Cutter Tiller Blades
TractorJoe
and even though they are supposedly closed down since November of 2019 their info is still up and PDF catalogue still available
http://flailmaster.com/our-products/

Regarding the advice that the Ford 917 model can use some/certain Alamo/Mott flail blades I couldn't figure out how to scan-search for what will swap in "plug n play" style?
Thanks to @TheFarmerInAdell for posting the picture in post #6576 that is from the Flailmaster PDF. The bottom of page 23 for the Ford 917 specific blades/hangers etal.

If you look at the top of page 2 on the Flailmaster PDF for the Alamo/Mott blades there is the "fine cut" model #MH-386. Is there any data that anyone has showing/proving (past experience?) these are too long to try and use in the Ford 917?
If you look at this page from clean cutter in California, it gives the size & measurements of the blades that match the pictures and measurements of the craigslist ad I am referencing below.
http://www.cleancutter.com/CL102086.htm
As a comparison from the Messicks PDF for the Alamo/Mott mowers [Model # AC60 and the AC60 Brahma from the archive] have the same looking blade but, the measurements are not something I have found yet..

I ran across someone on craigslist selling off a bunch of them... IIRC they have about 155-ish blades left. They measured them and said each "almost L shaped" blade is 1 1/4" wide, about 5" tall, is sharpened on both sides & is stamped with MOTT.

That would mean I'd still have to find & buy a bunch of the hangers, clips, as well as a bunch of bolts & nuts to mount them.

The hangers via Messicks are almost $6 each & the Blades are $5-8+ each.
Bolts & nuts are solved via the bigbox store given their size is 3/8" X 1"(OR 1 1/4") 16 thread pitch Grade 5 full threads from the Messicks PDF.


That being said. To clarify, recap and finish my post.
How would I figure out if these "Mott stamped blades" on craigslist are too long for the Ford 917 mower?
Is there a needed distance for flow of the cut up debre/mulched grass/etc as well as the tip of the blades minimum distance to the rounded shell of the housing that the 3-point arms are bolted to?

If so how much and where should I try measuring? (There, I hope the focus was better this time and the dyslexia doesn't byte me this time)

 

[TheFarmerInAdell]

The MH-386 will not work. Go down to the 917 section of the Flailmaster catalog and it says the measurements of the 917 fine cut blade at 1-1/4" wide 3-1/2" tall. You could use the MH-293, but it will be shorter than the Ford version. I would suggest the airplane wing blades in place of going to a fine cut as you already have the hangers and brackets for them. This will give you a nice flat cut. If you want a very high quality cut you can switch over to the fine cut, but stick with the Ford blades.

 

[Trillium Farm]

Well you have 1 Brit & 3 italian companies, seems like italy has more competition and therefore potential for better product. I only know that Maschio (Maschio Gaspardo) enjoys a very good reputation, but that could be due mainly to better marketing.

 

[Fallon]

The MH-386 will not work. Go down to the 917 section of the Flailmaster catalog and it says the measurements of the 917 fine cut blade at 1-1/4" wide 3-1/2" tall. You could use the MH-293, but it will be shorter than the Ford version. I would suggest the airplane wing blades in place of going to a fine cut as you already have the hangers and brackets for them. This will give you a nice flat cut. If you want a very high quality cut you can switch over to the fine cut, but stick with the Ford blades.

Some dents in the back of my 917 they I really cant see in these photos lead to the knives hitting the hood. When I got the flail ($100) it was missing knives, presumably to combat this issue. I cut out & patched a large chunk of the rear of the hood & replaced knives to fix this.

Which is probably a long way to say there is probably between 1/4 & 1/2" between the knives & hood when its it's running right. I can't comment on what blades may or may not fit beyond ones designed for a 917.

Yes you can also see the cracks in the hood in the missing knives photo. I never did bother getting around to dealing with those as it ran fine (for a $100 mower), if a bit noisy. Ran it for 2-3 years like that before retiring it & upgrading to a Peruzzo Brush Bull.

 

[hayboy48]

Airplane wings and Y blades are different. Airplane wings are a folded one piece blade that is flat across the bottom (factory option on Ford mowers), Y blades are a pair of blades that when mounted together look like an upside-down "Y" hanging from the mower (factory option on Mott/Alamo mowers).

If you look at the picture below the airplane wings are on the left and the Y blades are on the right:
View attachment 638856

Both will fit the Ford mower, but don't try to mix-and-match them. All one or the other.

I have had good results with the flat wings, I do sharpen with a hand grinder.