Lengthen your top link to roll the box blade back and then it will not be as aggressive and it will ride a little on the back blade and that will pack it in, all in the same pass
I agree. I've had to make do with a box blade as an all in one implement so I guess I've mastered the art of adjusting it to fit my need. He doesn't pull the edges in to incorporate back into the road and he doesn't crown the driveway either, both of which will help keep the water off the road which means less potholes and less erosion.
@@cabinman I maintain a quarter mile gravel road here where we live and I generally will go over it a couple of times with the box blade and then use a landscape rake to bring the sides in. I also do one side of the road at a time working from the crown in and the sides in. That way it keeps the same slope from the crown on each side.
THANK YOU!!! I've been looking through a ton of youtube vids trying to build something to level out my gravel driveway and didn't even realize I was trying to figure out whether I needed a box scraper or landplaner.
Once you get it level a section of chain link fence doubled up with a couple RR ties on top for weight works great for keeping it level and fill any holes. You can drag it with a small tractor but a 4-wheeler works best. Plus you’re allowing to drink beer on a quad even if you’re doing work with it.a😀 I had a driveway that was around 1200’ long and when I was leaving out I’d throw the chain over my trailer hitch and drag the road heading out and I’d pull over to the side at my gate and drop it. Then when I came back in I’d hook it back up and drag It back in the other direction. Works great for keeping it smooth and smoothing out the washboard lines
It is admirable for this young man to do the video after school in the afternoons for you, at 9:32 I want to say you could lift the box blade about 3/4 of an inch to re-spread the collective going the other way. from some one that owned both for 30+ years, the scraper spent 98% of its time on a shelf in the tool shed while the box blade was used almost exclusively. if ya can only buy one better make it the box blade. and so very many more uses such as but not limited to pulling gravel from a pile for spreading, ripping top soil for removal or loosening ground for tilling.. Now that is not what I know as a grading scraper. this here is a 3/4 box blade. for driveways only this is okay. but the full box blade will move hills of dirt and level the driveway in 2 passes.
IronCraft, formerly Titan IMPLEMENTS, is not the cheap Chinese company reseller Titan Attachments. IronCraft is in Athens, TN, and, I believe, Decatur, TN. It's not junk. I thinks the brand name change will go miles to distance themselves from the cheap import knockoffs. Also, level the land plane/grading scraper. It puts both diagonal blades to use and better does what it's designed to do: level out dips and humps with loose material.
On the box scraper you just have to very slowly lift it off the ground about 1 inch to 1 and 1/2 inches and that rock will dump out the bottom and be spread out.
Never having had a tractor, I have been researching tractors and implements. I have been watching videos and asking tractor people what I need to keep a gravel drive in good shape. With all the conflicting videos and answers, I had become frustrated. This video straightened all that out. Thanks you so much for posting such an simple and informative video on the subject.
The land plane is better for maintaining a drive, especially if it has scarifying shanks on it, and if you think about what you are doing, it will do far more than what this guy is showing. Run it properly and you can fill in big holes, level large piles of aggregate, build a crown, reduce a crown, pull in your shoulders, build your shoulders out, in addition to regular smoothing and maintenance of your road.
If you replace your top link with a chain, it will allow your box scraper to float when your front tire drops into a hole. I have an 8 foot box blade, and I have a 5 ft mesh roller on the rear. It floats on the roller, and does not dip and dive
I've been around skip loaders all my life and I've never seen one with a chain on the top link of the drag box. Skip loaders and farm tractors are almost 90% identical except for a few features. Skip loaders don't have draft control, PTOs or two stage clutches! But all skip loaders have grading/drag boxes, and top & tilt kits. And front loader buckets. For many years my dad had an agricultural Massey Ferguson that he used as a skip loader on many job sites. He also did a lot of weed abatement with it. Besides, if you leave the position control lever on float and angle the box correctly with top link then the front wheels dropping into a hole will not affect the grading angle or elevation of the box. Many people adjust the angle of the box with the hydraulic top link. Many skip loader operators learn to use a combination of the position control lever and the top link cylinder, and they can make adjustments on the fly. Being able to make adjustments on the fly saves a lot of time and headaches. I always do finish grading by using the top link cylinder. You can make fine adjustments with the top link cylinder much easier than with the position control lever. But if finances are a concern then do it the cheapest way you can, if you have the time. 😃
You missed the best part of the box blade. I put the outside teeth on backwards, and all the way down. Now they set a height for the blade to lay a perfect 2" of material like asphalt millings. People think I'm a pro. Lol
Thank you for this in depth demonstration of the TWO rear grading blades on the market. I'm just asking in my Humble opinion, for (Land Pride) put a storage bin, on front of support arms for the box blade to store the Ripper shanks. Just maybe add Wt. To blade. Just saying because you said just put it on the side of the Grading area. Why not store them in the bin, and add Wt. To blade, that way the Rippers are not just left where you might forget in your work day. Covered over, forgotten You have them stored right on the box blade, just a ADD ON idea the Manufacturer might think about, PLUS added storage for extra, PINS and security clips, have extra and repair tools.
My new neighbor bought a box blade and wanted to try it out on our shared road. He lowered the teeth down as far as they would go, about 8 inches, and headed off down the hill, tearing the road bed up, leaving big rocks on the road. I had a short conversation with him.
He was an idi..! For doing general smoothing you can set the box blade all the way down on float and tilt it slowly forward until the front blade of the box blade just barely touches and then drive back and forth. That will cut off the hot spots and fill in the low spots automatically. Just like the overpriced garbage landplane.
I use my box blade in conjunction w my bucket. The bucket smooths and feathers while the box blade pulls up the gravel and moves material. The bucket in reverse can move some surface stone, which is great to feather down the driveway. As others have said, angle adjustment on box blade is key.
Actually angle blades and box blades are two different devices. Angle blade is actually the best for pulling the sides in and grading the whole driveway. Box blade is second best. Land plan is number 10!!!! 😁😃👎🙄
Lots of comments on your lack of experience and such. Don't worry about that. I do believe the title was box blade vs grading scraper and I would say you covered the basics well enough. Maybe next time some of these "pros" will show up and do it for you.🙄🤣
He never covered many of the proper basics .He doesn't have a clue about grading .Showing people when you don't know the proper techniques is miss leading. The people you talk of the 'pros" some of them have some knowledge and tips ,this guy doesn't have a clue ,Any one can hook up an implement and drag it down a gravel driveway .This is not teaching the proper way to do grading or the proper use of these implements.His lack of experience and knowledge of equipment shows. There are way better videos that people can learn from.
@@user-sm1us1mw5d that reads as though you are one of those people who were mislead. Basics are exactly that. Basics. Anyone can watch videos about this but experience isn't gained by watching videos. That requires time in the seat.
@@TheBrushcutter I wasn't mislead at all I have forgotten more about grading than this guy will ever know. I hate when. people make these "basics" videos.He didn't talk about angles ,slope ,scarfing properly ,he doesn't even know where to position his bucket when operating.He wasn't teaching the proper techniques because he doesn't know them himself.Experience is gained in many ways not just seat time. Reading and being taught by experienced people and shown how to do these things properly and safely is how you learn .Seat time will will give you the skill required to do the task, and only if you know what needs to be done and how to do it.
Normally you do not use rippers and the box plate at the same time! You do all your ripping first then use the box blade to move the material and grade it.
I use my land pride box blade that was purchased from you as a "sod cutter" it works great for that purpose and saves huge amounts of time vs using a sod cutter.
It looks like you are not setting the depth of your 3pt. Are you just dropping it to the bottom and letting if float where it wants to for both the boxblad and scraper?
Just bought a brand new LX 4020 to move snow in mountain resort. dealership put howes diesel treatment in it and sold me a bottle to treat diesel because the temp i around 0 degrees F at 10000 feet elevation. I have 17.2 hours on the tractor and the thing won’t start. tried for 3 days finally put 911 in fuel filter and added a little to the tank as per specs. still won’t start. had to tow it through 4 feet of snow 150 yards as the kubota dealership in my area wanted to charge me 8 hours of labor just to drive out to and from my location because i didn’t buy it from them. took it to a kubota dealership in a different state but only 1.5 hours from me. They told me the DPF is completely clogged due to the fuel. SOOO no warranty and no insurance coverage. $12000.00 to fix. the tractor was only $39000.00 WTF! Kubota service and insurance and Sales all suck. They blame it on the other dealerships, no one is taking responsibility for taking care of tractor. Read your manual and warranty and insurance form. If it is fuel related. NO COVERAGE. DONT BUY Kubota! LIARS and Fraudsters. Does anyone have any insight or help here ? Just lost over $20000 on contracts for snow removal. and looks like i wont be getting this tractor back for at least 3 to 4 weeks, even if i pay the extortion money to fix it. and then im sure it will just gel up again and and wont start and will have to go through this all again in another 17 hours. only about 15 total gallons of fuel have gone through this engine 8 of which was put in by the dealer and i only put 12 oz. of howes in the 10 gallons of ulsd i bout from costco. teir one diesel.
Great video. I'm learning on what I need for my field. Question... How does the tiller cope with last year's sticks, and small rocks, and maybe the odd big one. (They keep coming up each time my renter farmer does our land.). I'm hoping to purchase my own equipment in future. Thanks
If the ground you will be working is going to have a lot of debris in it, I recommend a Forward till tiller. That will allow it to kick the debris out the back, instead of pulling it into itself. Tillers normally do just fine with small rocks and twigs/roots but anything larger than an inch or so can get bound up in it, so just be cautious!
My favorite boxblade is a very old rollover type. Those old rollover box blades give you a box going forward and a box going backwards. No other box blade on the market does that! They have been manufactured by several different companies including Gannon. You simply pull the lever and let it flip over to a different side. 😃 Those have rippers you can stick down in the ground at least a foot deep.
I use both I use the box blade with rippers to loosen up the compacted gravel and fill the pit holes then swap over to road plane to level and put a good crown on the road
$1900?! I bought a Kubota brand box grader for 1750 and it had blades on both sides, and the sides were 3/8 plate, and the mounting bar for the blades was 1/2 plate. Those flimsy ones won't last if you hit anything with it.
Very well done video. Concise. Matter of fact. Pleasure to watch. Though I would add that I've been watching a few videos trying to decide what implement to obtain for our gravel drive. It seems that for that last pot hole it really should have been scarified first then filled in. Otherwise, just filling it will allow it to just come back later. I'm new at this, I could be wrong.
Appreciate the feedback! You are correct, it probably should have been dug out a little first and then smoothed back over. For the video I just did the basics, after the video my brother spent a few hours on the road getting it in tip top shape!
Blorph1 if your drive is already established get the grader scraper also known as a landplane. And get one with the scarifiers. Like you said potholes NEED to be ripped up or they WILL come back. I have the LandPride and it works fantastic. I find the box blade is good for moving a lot of material but not good for smoothing out surfaces as you could see how it bounced and undulating as he used it. They like to dig not resurface. And the grader scraper works best when both blades are level with the ground. You can also create a small crown with the scraper.
You are absolutely right! Scarify and mix thoroughly before smoothing and compacting. Far too many people push rock into holes and when it rains that rock gets washed out because there's not enough mixed material compacted in there.
@@hagen8745it is neither a grader or a scraper. A greater is a giant 6 wheel machine and is about 20 ft long with an 8 function blade designed to grade roads and giant parking lots. A scraper is a giant articulating machine with tires that are about 6 ft tall, scoops up truck loads of material in a single pass to move to another location on the job site. I really wish people would learn the correct names for things. 🙄 .
Rule number one: If you are not pulling a full box you are not grading. You only end up with a full box because you did not properly distribute the material. Adjust the top link to roll the blade back to make it less aggressive and to allow the back blade to work at packing. Or forward to make it more aggressive to move more material. Use your 3 point leveling crank to tilt the box left or right to distribute material for crowning the road etc. Lift the box a little to distribute the box BEFORE you stop. The only dummy attached to the land plane or the box blade was the operator.
Grading scraper is great at lawn leveling and top dressing a yard.. just did a Property we purchased this past summer.. the grading scrapper holds more material than this guy leads on about.. he honestly doesn't know how to use either of these very well. Neither of them where being used properly for a driveway resufacing ..The landpride ones have forward and reverse blades .. buying the one with adjustable skis is the trick
@@glenlohane-adayinthelife7361 there is an adjustable link on the 3point lifting arm. You shorten or lengthen it so that the implement is tilted in the direction you need to create the slope, or crown in the road.
@Glenlohane - A Day in the Life ... exsactly waht gregg said .. however a crown is not always required for drainage.. a crown will actually make 2 ditches to collect water as the vehicles compact the tire path.. vehiles make thier own crown vis compaction.. every driveway Is also differnt..... the land plane moves material right to left if you actually need a crown a dramatic one is not needed .. ... often a slight grade right or left is sufficient. Depending on the terain .. also.. often the grading along the driveway surface Is the culprit of poor drainage... you want the water to move but you also don't want it moving fast... that causes the washout.. .. easiest way to see what needs done is to go out in a nice rain storm and "read" what the waters movement is doing... it will show you everything you need to know
@@glenlohane-adayinthelife7361use the box blade or an angle blade. Angle blade is best for pulling material into the roadway to build a crown. I'm a 30-year Union heavy equipment operator.
Got that right! It's a nice boat anchor!!! Anybody who knows how to use a box blade like professionals on job sites would never touch a landplane! You will never ever see a land plane on any commercial or industrial job site. If there was one on a job site everybody would bust a gut laughing their heads off!!!!
10:28 take your thick pile of gravel and spread it back down the right side of the driveway where it’s mainly dirt, there’s always a use for the top scrapings
I know cabota tractors pretty well. In my opinion, that attachment was better scarifiers. Maybe smaller and twice as many scarifiers on the front of the trac, so remove the bucket. Because it's quick attached and attached the box blade on the front.That's where I prefer that to be
If you had a hydraulic top link, you could have pushed the box grader away from the machine, which then allows the material to spill out under the cutting blade, depending on how much you adjust the top link. Box grader and hydraulic top link go together like hand and glove.
Box blade is must, although a lot of adjustments along the way. Use land plane to finish up an hour or so sooner. I need a land plane. Well maybe not need but damn sure want.
@@gregdickerson2957definitely! Box blade with the top and tilt kit are by far the best setup for grading. That's what they use on almost every job site for grading driveways and parking lots before paving. They are very very versatile.
From a guy who used a box blade for years I'll throw in my two cents. If you are doing a lot of leveling or if you are maintaining a driveway the land plane is the way to go. If you set your top link correctly a child can maintain a driveway.
I sold my box blade right after I used my armstrong ag grader. I haven't found anything the box blade does better. I can move a lot of dirt with my grader. If you use the grader right it can drag as much as the box blade, maybe more. I can spin all 4 tires on my 50HP kubota with my 6 foot grader blade when it is digging hard and full of material.
It's recommended to have a hydraulic Top and Tilt Kit! Otherwise you will drive yourself crazy trying to readjust it! Having the hydraulic operated rippers is also a huge advantage!
I was going to say, the "Land Plane" is probably the single most requested service I get requested.... absolutely the best investment I ever made..... and my LP has the scarifiers as well
I am not at all surprised. Lots of people ask for certain things when they don't know any better. Land planes are practically useless and they are used by people who don't know how to use a box blade.
A box blade is not an easy thing to master. You can screw yourself up royally if you're not paying attention to the dips and rises as you drive over them.
Indeed. Whatever you drive over will be translated into the box, unless the box is "floating". Most people, myself included, use a solid top link, but a chain is better for some jobs. And then there are jobs that are best suited for a grader. (motor grader blade, aka "snow pusher".)
You dont want to just dump gravel in pot hole. You need to break up ground to below level of pot hole or it will be back in no time. Need to get rid of the hard surface dish or it will never be smooth road
Great comment Sir. Makes total sense and I never thought of the need to break up the bottom of the pot hole before filling it in and compacting it all back down. I am one of those complete novices watching these videos and reading all of your excellent comments so I don't look like a complete idiot. US Navy Iraq VET trying to earn his keep in retirement, helping three families maintain their driveways next spring. I'm looking to buy a KUBOTA BX to mow lawns, and get a box blade to maintain gravel driveways. Thx!
@InSnomadian04 have family in the US, thanks for your service 👏. Yes without breaking ground up around/below pot hole your just filling a hole which already has hard side (basically a memory) and it will just cause loose new gravel to come out of hole
There is no grader or scraper in this video! There's a drag box and a land plane. Lots of people call things by the wrong name, even machinery sales people, sometimes even factories, sometimes even professional heavy equipment operators.
Multiple names for the same item! A Grading scraper and a LandPlane are the exact same thing, just depends on who you talk to which name is used. Kind of like a bush hog is also a rotary cutter, brush hog and tough cut mower.
Anybody who knows how to use a box blade like professionals on job sites would never touch a landplane! You will never ever see a land plane on any commercial or industrial job site. If there was one on a job site everybody would bust a gut laughing their heads off!!!! Box blades are very versatile!!! Land plans are for people who don't know anything about tractors or leveling!
If you need to refresh your road every year, you need to find the underlying problem. Eiter a larger rock in the base to spread weight out, adjust your grade so it rolls water off the road, raise the road or move water away from the side of the road. We get 30-90 inches of rain a year around here and roads can last 5 years+ if they are done right.
If you dont mind me asking what do your roads usually consist of? I know I did a long driveway with 1-1/2" to 2" stone base with a top layor of 57 Crusher run mixed with 3/8 pea gravel in a 2-1 mix. Been 3 years and still no potholes. I have heard adding stone dust to the top can make it really smooth almost like a road.
Large base rock will ruin road base. You can never keep it from working up and causing trouble. I've heard farmer roadbuilders suggest big rock for base and had a parking lot that I finally had to just haul off and replace with 1 in. Gravel so I could grade it smooth.
A rear blade is much like a box blade in the fact it can move material, but since it pours out of each side rear blades are almost only for smoothing material, or spreading it out. Also can be used for snow!
A box blade is supposed to have an hydraulic top link to be able to adjust the pitch of the blade on the fly. Without it the box blade is not going to perform as it was designed to.
As far as scraping you can do it with the front bucket also. Dislike those hst tractors, prefer the old stick shift. And why raise the bucket up so high when moving? Never understood that unless you're moving something long and flimsy, droops.
Either you have really cheap scarifiers or whoever welded the teeth on didn't know how to weld. I reverse often while back blading and have never damaged one of mine. But all my implements are made in America... Especially the one's I built such as a land plane with quick release ripper bar, grapple, v-blade brush cutting shear and stump pulling rig to name a few.
@@TheBrushcutter Whelp I bought a LANDPRIDE GS72 FROM THE LOCAL KUBOTA DEALER. The reason why they were ripped off they were dimpled on the shanks. We found 5 of the 6 and bought more. Now their welded on. I do agree with you if welded to begin with it wouldn't have been a issue.
@@gregoryhumphries8956 by dimpled I can only guess you mean spot welded? Yeah, that isn't the best method for attaching something that will be abused on the regular. I can see how they would easily be popped off.
@@TheBrushcutter they weren't spot welded either. They were pressed on to the shank. You can go to any LandPride Dealer and see this. They've been welded on and a couple replaced. Actually a shame I paid so much for such a britle piece of equipment. We grade 4.5 miles of gravel roadway with it. The road was bombed before that tool. What used to take a month with a grader blade was achieved in a few days. Also brought back years of gravel.
@@gregoryhumphries8956 that is a lot or road! 4.5 miles, minimum 2 passes -1 down, 1 back - if you're lucky. 9 miles at least. Yeah, I can see how you would want the fastest method for sure.
No offence.. but maybe you should watch some RU-vid videos on how to use those attachments properly before making a video..then also on how to renew a gravel driveway properly
I've been looking for this comment. We have a property with over a half mile of road to maintain. The angle blade is all we ever used until a few years ago. It is the best for all around, ditching, grading and crowning. The box blade and land plane are good for crown work. But when it comes to building swales or ditching for drainage, don't bother with those. The angle blade is the only way to go.
For the (Titan) they should put a storage bin on each side for Wt. That instead of storage of Ripper at your feet in the cab floor board. Getting in the way. It's stored on grader support sides. Just my Humble opinion, that manufacturing should think about. STORAGE of equipment that you remove to make the job easy. It's with the grader all the time, even when NOT used. I highly recommend Never just leave rippers on the side of the driveway. It's so easy to forget where you left them on LONG grading jobs. Just my thoughts on equipment storage.
All he had to do was raise that center one and pin it through the lowest hole. No need to flip it or remove it. It would have been plenty high to not cause a problem.
@@fruitfarmfords8243 yeah, I get that. But it wasn't titled "the pros guide to..." Or "how to use..." This was simply showing the differences between the two implements. And he covered that well enough for this video.
Blade scrapers are vastly superior to box scrapers. The blade has many uses. I recommend a tooth bar for the bucket. If you have a deep hole you need to fill it. Dumping stone on dirt does nothing. The stone will just mush down into the dirt. Our rear blade can tilt to crown driveways. I have never used it for that.
Yes and it shows ,very inexperienced and very misleading, and people are saying he's doing a good job. Unreal ..There are much better videos that will actually teach grading and equipment set ups and how to operate ,and this guy needs to check them out.
Professionally speaking it takes more skill to use a boxblade than it does the other, because you can do so many more things with a boxblade than you can with the other. That's why boxblades are used on so many construction sites!
One needs to operate a box blade long enough to at least wear off the paint. It requires skill to generate flat surfaces and practice is the key to good work. It needs to be set up properly as well.
Sorry, but your not utilizing the top link appropriately for the box blade. Hence making it not a useful tool for your needs. It’s a hard implement to know how to use appropriately
The ripper boots on those box blades are absolutely shite. Made from soft steel. I graded 2 driveways and wore them out already. Going to fabricate some new ones from bizalloy plate soon.
BOY -- you guys really needed someone with a lot more of on the farm experience - both pieces were being used in a wrong way for best results - I have some xperiences from back to 1980 - and learning the hard way - and learning from mistakes and practices -- is my wheelhorse - some will of course disagree - as always --- box blades - never remove the teeth - or Scarifiers as some may call them - it helps with the balance and finish results - even if they are only kept even - even if you are only moving large amounts of dirt - but especially on gravel - each and every pass it makes it easier to move gravel along the way - that way you never take too much at one time - everybody is always in a hurry to finish - but thats Not the way - repetition is the Key - and moving small amounts is the only way at one time - even with the leveler - repetition is the key - and the teeth will make it more so for moving small amounts in the right places - and with each pass it will loosen just a little more substance to be leveled - the more gravel that becomes loose - the smoother it will become - especially with pot holes or rain ruts - they will be completely removed so that they will take much much longer to reappear - sometime completely removing them all together - all ruts need at least 2 foot of material around them to be conditioned to really be fixed right so that the rocks have some place to equal themselves out and pack correctly so that reappearance does not accrue so easily - some of mine never come back - rain ruts are not so easy to conquer - - A box blade will remove far more material at one time that a leveler - such as large quantities of dirt when leveling yards - -and if used correctly - will make a smooth surface as good as a leveler if used correctly and slowly enough - people are always looking for a quicker and easier way to do anything - even if it doesn't work as good in the long run - Such is Life !
Neither can ever be more than mediocre as they are rear mounted. it's just simple mechanics. There is good reason road graders have mid mounted blades and dozers have front mount. It's possible to make one with its own trailing gauge wheels and just use the tractor for pulling (no top link), but I haven't seen any designed like that other than a really big beast for the double-dually tractors, and it needed aux hydraulics to raise and lower.(basically a simple road grader frame minus the engine.) By the way that thing you (or the manufacturer) is calling a grading scraper is not a grading scaper. it is actually a land-plane which is meant just for smoothing the micro-grade (potholes, burms, mole-hills) stuff generally less than ten feet Though they use big landplanes before planting orchards to make mowing pruning and harvest easier. A grader is used mainly for setting macro-grade, getting things level or smoothing transitions over tens to hundreds of feet (the radius of dip through a valley or rise over a hill) and pretty much requires wheels in front and behind the blade. Dump trucks, dozers, belly scrapers, excavators, and loader buckets for moving bulk material. then a real grader to set the final few inches of grade, then a land plane is a cheap and easy smoothing without disturbing the existing grade too much.
Thank you for bringing up a good point. Where I live it snows and a box blade has very limited use to me . A rear blade is a lot more useful to me in that it works great for snow removal ,a land plane or box blade is useless for that . I have equipped my scraper blade with a set of york rake gauge wheels and for me for gravel ,sand or top soil it works better than anything else . It's also very effective for when it snows and the ground isn't frozen ,much better than snow plow skids.
Fresh gravel at the end might make it better, but what we have found is that the next time it rains it actually rinses the dirt off the gravel and leaves it in very good condition.
Don't dig too deep. If you just loosen the packed surface, then there won't be much dirt lifted and mixed in with it. When we had some work done at our shop years back, they were real pros digging only as deep as they had to. After the first rain, it was back to like concrete. (this used to be a well boring company yard, so there's been decades of very heavy gear packing it all down.)
