NEED HELP - Road Grader

[ZemaHoffman]

I am trying to locate plans for the Trail'GradeR road grader. Allow me to explain. I am a missionary in South Africa and reside in an area that is off the paved road. The road to our camp is less than adequate and our spring rains have begun. We have no way of grading our road and I am trying to locate some type of plans that I can weld together a road grader before the rains totally wash out our road. Our electric and internet varies depending on the day. In the little research I have done, I saw a video of the Trail'GradeR and it looks like something I may be able to cobble together with scrap I have here in Africa. If someone knows of some free plans or a free PDF download, please let me know. It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance from South Africa. Sunbury Christian Camp.

 

[PhysAssist]

I am trying to locate plans for the Trail'GradeR road grader. Allow me to explain. I am a missionary in South Africa and reside in an area that is off the paved road. The road to our camp is less than adequate and our spring rains have begun. We have no way of grading our road and I am trying to locate some type of plans that I can weld together a road grader before the rains totally wash out our road. Our electric and internet varies depending on the day. In the little research I have done, I saw a video of the Trail'GradeR and it looks like something I may be able to cobble together with scrap I have here in Africa. If someone knows of some free plans or a free PDF download, please let me know. It would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance from South Africa. Sunbury Christian Camp.

Hi,

Welcome to TBN!

I don't have what you are asking for, but there are other alternatives.

Hopefully, these will help:

Check this out: homemade driveway drag - Yesterday's Tractors


From there I saved these:
1)This is the same as #5

2) This can be made with various other methods of adjustment [other than hydraulics] same as #10:

3) The longer the tow bar, the less waviness of the road- it keeps the blade from moving as much up and down with shifts in the tractor

4) Same as #3

5)Same as #1 upside down for details

6)

7)

8) This is perhaps the simplest way to grade, but probably also the least aggressive and efficient. It could be made more so by either adding weight on top of it, or, adding bolts through the tire sidewalls similar to the tines on #1 & 3.

9) This is an example of a more sophisticated type of grader called a land plane:

10) This is a box grader [same as #2] and again, the adjustment mechanism could be fabbed from a screw and thread assembly like a trailer jack or even using a pin-through post and sleeve arrangement.

While none of them are plans- most would be easy to figure out a way to copy - and the 6th and 7th pictures in particular would be amenable to kludging up with whatever parts/pieces of scrap you could lay hands on.

On the other hand, many people here have used such makeshift graders as a towed I-beam or a raft of tires very effectively.

One thing they all mention is that adding weight almost always makes it more effective in use.

I hope this helps.

God bless and good luck,
Thomas

 

[PhysAssist]

There is also this: http://www.green-trust.org/junkyardprojects/FreeFarm&GardenPlans/BoxBlade.pdf

From here: http://www.green-trust.org/junkyardprojects/FreeFarm&GardenPlans.html

where there are all kinds of free plans and instructions for construction.

 

[CNC Dan]

This is one I built:

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/build-yourself/258933-homemade-road-grader.html

 

[Ed of all trades]

I will be praying that God meets your need. Ed

 

[bcp]

A three point hitch tractor implement doesn't help much if you might have to rely on an occasional truck to pull it back and forth.

I suggest using a steel version of the King road drag which did so much to improve dirt roads in the US. But it can also be build mostly from wood. It can be pulled by animal, tractor, or truck.

Bruce

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_road_drag

https://books.google.com/books?vid=07_NqAFuRZP3L5bTiVX&id=0LgJAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA114#v=onepage&q&f=false

https://books.google.com/books?vid=...AAIAAJ&pg=PA143&lpg=PA143#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

[EddieWalker]

What I think he is looking for is something that will act as a motor grader behind a tractor that he can pull. I saw this problem just about everywhere we went to in South Africa. The roads have eroded away to the point they are almost impossible to drive on. Nobody can afford to hire a dozer or grader to come in and re cut a new road, and they all seem to be looking for a cheap way to pull the rock from the hillside and use it to grade the road and cut bigger ditches to handle the rain run off. Nobody that we met had found or been able to create something to replace a bull dozer, and in the end, that is what it will take to fix the roads

 

[R W]

You didn't tell us what you intend to pull it with.
Something along the line of the grader that comes up from post #4 would be the way I'd go.

 

[KubotainNH]

How about something like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dpeg9yTPuEo

 

[ZemaHoffman]

Hey, Thanks for all the help on this. Eddie Walker was right in that the main roads have craters for pot holes and once you are off the main roads, watch out. To get to us, you have to travel about 2km on a clay/rock/mud "road". I say "road" because you would not see this in America. You must go down a hill and up a hill that lies among the sugar cane fields. It is more of an access road for the sugar cane tractors than anything. Once the rains come, it becomes a river on both sides washing all the clay to the bottom. I have seen it rain so hard, you can no longer see parts of the road as it is just a river. The tractors dont help matters either. The bottom of the hills now have all the clay that needs to be pulled back up both sides filling in all the gully areas and in between the rock. And what will I use to pull this grader - A Mahindra Scorpio SUV. That will give all you car guys something to go look up on the net. All I can say is turbo charged diesel. It gets through and up anything.

I will scour through all the links everyone sent me and will post as I figure out a solution. Or as they say in South Africa - I must make a plan. In Zulu - ngiyabonga kini nonke (thank you to you all).