Is a six foot heavy duty too big for the 24 for the following uses?
I have the opportunity to buy a King Kutter heavy duty 6 foot rear blade. It has tilt and offset option at $300. I will use it to keep grey rock in my drive and my son's drive in the proper area and smoothed out. I used one of my friends small howse rear blades and was much happier working the driveway rocks than I have been with my rear box. I will also use for small landscaping and smoothing out the dirt etc.
Has anyone used a front blade that used the fel controls? I assumed you hook up in lieu of the fel bucket. I saw one advertised and thought it might be worthwhile with my neck aggravations to be using a front blade instead of a rear.
Attached are some pics of a older 6 foot blade on my tractor. I used this blade with my DX24 (currently have a DX33). I'm not familiar with the blade you mentioned but the blade in my pics is a beast. It has 1 foot extensions I can add to each side to make it an 8' blade. One single extension weighs about 70 lbs. It's extremely heavy and I had no problems using it on by DX24. The machine had plenty of power and would pull sideways when accumulating too much dirt before it ran out of power. One benefit of a heavier blade is that is will dig a little better when grading where a lighter blade just kinda skims across the surface. Hopefully someone else is more familiar with the King Kutter blade.
No reason it will not handle the 6 foot blade. Worst case will be you run out of power. Heavy blades will work better for what you mentioned. A landscape rake with gauge wheels does a great job of grooming driveways.
I have a 5' IMCO behind my TC24 right now. I bought it used a few years ago, it is pretty beat up and rusted, but for $100 couldn't go wrong. I primarily use it for snow removal - if we ever get any - I guess I should say I put it on just for the practice. Anyway, I have some piles of dirt to move where we had a ditch cleaned out in the spring. I had been using the box blade and fel. Yesterday had some time to kill, but didn't feel like switching to the box so I just used the scraper (had straw in the fel that I didn't feel like taking out either). I was really surprised how much dirt...err....mud I guess... that I was able to move with that blade. I was able to eliminate 2 of piles in about an hour. Only caused the tractor to spin a couple of times and that was because I was at the "end" of the pile and dropped the blade down and really got a huge bite. I did feel the rear pushing sideways a couple of times but that was because I had a big bite, I was in mud, and I had the blade tilted.
I would say if you like the blade, and it is in decent shape, go for it. If you absolutely had to, you could cut 6" or so off each side, but I bet you won't need to.
Finally made it to Jackson this week to pick up my rear blade. Once we got to farm realized it was a Landpride instead of a King Cutter. It is six foot and is a 35 series. Weighs 461 and it tilts and twists and offsets and everything else you would want one to do. Had a lot of fun unloading from my Tundra. Good ole boom pole saved the day. Hooked it up this afternoon and it will do the trick on keeping the rocks in the right place in driveway I do believe. It probably is a little heavy for my 24 for other than drive leveling of rocks and minor push and dirt work. Noticed in the landpride book it was rated for 30-65 hp. It has a 17 1/2 blade height which surprised me.
I use the Pat's Easy change on my 24 and was wondering if using the PEC and a heavier implement further away from tractor affects the maximum weight being lifted or strains the machine anymore with PEC than without?
works great, ive stalled it out a couple of times but only while trying to "dig" out the better part of 6" of dirt with it... (figured i needed to take less of a bite)
it easly shaves 2" off the hard packed gravel drive when slanted as shown.
i cut nearly 4" off the edge (high area) to restore a proper crown to my driveway (or at least let the water runn off instead of puddling in the rut)
Anyway, I have some piles of dirt to move where we had a ditch cleaned out in the spring. I had been using the box blade and fel. Yesterday had some time to kill, but didn't feel like switching to the box so I just used the scraper (had straw in the fel that I didn't feel like taking out either). I was really surprised how much dirt...err....mud I guess... that I was able to move with that blade. I was able to eliminate 2 of piles in about an hour. Only caused the tractor to spin a couple of times and that was because I was at the "end" of the pile and dropped the blade down and really got a huge bite. I did feel the rear pushing sideways a couple of times but that was because I had a big bite, I was in mud, and I had the blade tilted.
