Mangled my subsoiler pulling rocks

[Slowpoke Slim]

No where near the size of most of those posted, but this one had an edge that was sitting just high enough to cause the blades of my riding mower to "sing" when they went over it. I started off trying to pry it out by hand. Then got a shovel. Then just went and got the tractor. Lol.

Should have said, the only part that was visible above ground was about the size of my fist. All the rest of that was below surface.

 

[DieselBound]

Even with a small backhoe, the easiest way to deal with rocks too large for the machine to handle, is often to dig a deep hole alongside, and roll the rock in.

Yup! I've done that with some massive stumps. (stumps that I could only but push with a 19k lb excavator) I could share pictures but I don't want to have such out in the public sphere!

Regarding subsoiler mangling, I tossed a Cat1 subsoiler on my Cat2 tractor. Tractor had no issues bending up the pins! Did break one of the shear(?) bolts, but I think I might have replaced it and then bent up the pins. Oh well... don't use it that much anymore and it was only like $100.

 

[oosik]

I have scarifiers on my LPGS and ROBB. Plus, I can strip down my moldboard plow and have a single tooth digger. I learned early, with my first tractor, not everything is a big rock. A lot of what I have here is basaltic lava bedrock. It pokes up above the surface and tries to fool you.

See that big rock over there - get the hand shovel and do some exploring first. I might just be able to dig out around it and break up the top part with my sledge hammer.

 

[S H Bishop of Bliss]

We were digging a basement for our pump house when we found a large lava rock bed about two feet down. It literally laughed at the contractor's 100lb jackhammers so he turned the project back over to us. We used 1&1/2 in rock drills to drill holes in it about every six inches. We then filled every third hole with Chinese Dynamite (search for it by that name on the internet). It took us awhile but we eventually were able to break up the rock and have a basement for our 500 gallon water tank and food storage shelves. We were doing this about 3 feet away from an existing building. Instead of exploding, Chinese Dynamite exerts growing pressure over several hours. On Idaho lava rock it was a weekly cycle of drill and pour on day one, wait four days for maximum effect, and then a day of hauling out the results.
To get the rock fragments out of the hole we cut a 100 gallon vertical water tank in half horizontally. Then we cut two holes in the sides of the tank next to the open end and welded two loops of iron rod on the bottom end, so they stuck out like penguin feet. This gave me two 50 gallon buckets made of 3/16ths steel. I then made a bridle out of 5/16ths chain, complete with hooks, and attached the bridle to the bucket of the front end loader I borrowed from my neighbor. While a day laborer was filling one bucket I would be hauling the other bucket out to the field and dumping it. I would put hooks in the two top holes for lifting and carrying the bucket while loaded. When it came time to dump it I would put the bucket on the ground, move the hooks to the loops on the bottom, and then lift it up. I would carry the empty bucket back to the hole by the loops. When I got back to the hole I would lower the bucket in the hole, the laborer would move the bridle to the other bucket's holes, and I would be on my way again. The bridle had a short piece of chain between the two lifting chains. This was put on at the right height to ensure that the bucket would flop forward when lifted, and not dump the rocks back on the tractor.