NH TC40A Brushguard Buildup "Mad Max" Style

[Mcfly89]

Just like Hot Rod magazine and their small block Chevy buildups that seem far too common....this is yet ANOTHER brushguard buildup. Some of our others to watch for are skidplates, logsplitter, tree getter, brush bucket with grapple, rock bucket with grapple, landscape rake, snowplow, tractor cab, and a rotary brush cutter....for now.

This is our first project of many to be posted here on TBN. My father and I have become hooked on these forums and are constantly looking for new ideas. In a sense....these projects are all your fault.

Ok on to the project. We have destroyed one hood and damaged another moving brush and clearing trash off of homesites. While we really intended to buy the factory brushguard, we just never got around to it. It's just as well, because we would have never been happy with it.

I originally intended to build the brushguard out of 1/2" and 3/8" flat plate cut to shape with the plasma torch. very similar to the rough draft i cut out of cardboard. My dad however wants to try to make it out of 5/8" round solid rod because of its simplicity. on one hand, the flat stock would be far easier to make patterns and cut several pieces exactly alike. on the other hand the rod would be far easier to bend and shape to the curves of the tractor. another benefit of the rod is clearance...the hoses on each side of the hood are VERY close to the curved pieces that wrap around the hood. if we make it out of rod, we wont have that to worry about. the final consideration is aesthetics...afterall, we didnt buy an ugly tractor, and don't plan to bolt an ugly brushguard to it, lol. after everything was factored in, i still liked the beefy look of my flat design, but decided (once again) that dear ol dad was right. the round rod would be better overall. I'll keep updating as we make progress, and I'm sure dad will drop in and have a few thoughts to share as well.

 

[Mcfly89]

Here are a few pics of the rough draft cut out of cardboard and taped into place.

pardon the mess and the dirty tractor.

here are several other photos in my folder of the brushguard if you wish to browse cornfedih - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

 

[Bedlam]

Looks like that is going to be useful and also good looking.Best of luck with it. we look forward to the finished guard pics.
Al

 

[BTDT]

That looks pretty impressive. I like the way you made your templates. Is this going to be in the way when you have to raise tractor hood? Are you going to have pins instead of bolts for mounting for easy removal? Maybe you could mount with bolts at bottom, pins at top. Pull pins, guard will swivel down (tilt forward) from bottom mounted bolts.

 

[Mcfly89]

That looks pretty impressive. I like the way you made your templates. Is this going to be in the way when you have to raise tractor hood? Are you going to have pins instead of bolts for mounting for easy removal? Maybe you could mount with bolts at bottom, pins at top. Pull pins, guard will swivel down (tilt forward) from bottom mounted bolts.

funny you should mention that...when we destroyed our old hood we got an entirely new unit. that left us with an extra hood latch. the brushguard will have positive stops welded in to keep it from being able to push into the hood, but the latch will be a hood latch off the old hood. much slicker than having to listen to the thing rattle all the time driving thru the rough stuff. and i really hate having to pull pins, losing snap rings, etc.

 

[Mcfly89]

i guess i should have changed the title to "tractor bling" instead of mad max, lol

 

[river rat]

Mcfly should have some new updates on the "tractor bling" brushguard project any time ..... somebody please ask him if he had any trouble welding on the hinges .... I'll be watching to make sure he's completely truthful with his answer!

 

[river rat]

Well, mcfly just e-mailed me to say he's almost got the files downloaded, so it shouldn't be long.
If anyone else is going to tackle a project like this with one of these little boomers, a word of advice; it's all in the pattern! These guys are tight, with little clearance anywhere. They stack all they can get into as small a footprint as possible, then round EVERYTHING off!
Makes building something to fit it, be it a brushguard, tool box or whatever, a pretty complicated project. Makes it a challenge, though, and that much more satisfying when it comes out okay.

 

[Mcfly89]

the picture of the mis-welded hinges must have been misplaced...hmmmm

one of the problems we have had is brush and the occasional rock falling out of the bucket onto the top of the hood. a factory brush guard doesnt even attempt to help this situation. so we set out to build a better mouse trap.


here we have the pattern for the vertical bars getting ready for the plasma cutter. The verticals will be 1/2" steel cut to the contour of the hood

here are the horizontals that will have to be weaseled thru the verticals before tacking into place.

i might also mention that we didnt have the right size dies for our jd2 model 3 bender, a conduit bender proved futile, and the hydraulic press made square corners. so we ended up having to cold bend these things using an old fashioned vise then heating and tweaking where neccessary. not fun.

more to come...

 

[Mcfly89]

next i needed to assemble the hinge mechanism and bolt it into place. we used greasable weld on hinges and 3x3x1/4" angle for the base and a scrap of 1/2" to bolt to the front of the frame.

heres a pics of most of the parts dressed up and ready to go together.

here is when things start to come together and you begin to think all that welding cutting bending and grunting are gonna pay off...

read on...