After completing my land plane attachment, I take it out into the wild to do some testing!!! The more attachments for your tractor the better!!! BUILD ONE!!!
I am no professional but, I would have to say the issue with the rocks is that a land planer is a finishing tool. You are dragging into a surface that isn't a finished product. The size of rocks popping up are ones you would have a foot down. The top layer should be a gravel consistency for the plane to work as advertised. An easier way to look at it. A plane is a butter knife, meant for smoothing and leveling smooth aggregate.
Think of it operating as a wood plane the high spots will cause a lot of drag and you only want to take a little at a time setting the top link to help control pressure on the front and back, and the side rails may need to be a little wider to help them to float so that you are only working the area inside the box, the length of the box helps to smooth the high and lows verses just a blade thay you have to keep feathering the 3 point up and down to get things smooth, all in all I thought it was working pretty good after watching some of the other videos of land plane that were commercial built.
Teeth on the front blade (railroad spike works good). Angle the middle blade more to let more material flow over. Also attach an expanded metal to the top/behind the middle blade to catch rocks. More weight in the back and adjust the top center link.
oh the expanded metal is a good idea. I have a problem with waves in my airstrip, not ruts. Ive only been using a drag harrow. Need to make a long narrow drag box i think or use an old axle assembly for some rear wheels back on a pole, I would thing something 12-16' feet long is required to really get the bumps out, Ill be pulling it with a 4-wheeler.
I know your post is old but this is a great idea. Thinking maybe some 6" angle iron on top of the expanded at an angle to vibrate the rocks to one side. Thank you for that tip.
Road needs a crown for sure. Need to drag a little off the side of the road to bring material back into the tracks. That material will displace the water. Wet roads are tough to grade as the next vehicle is going to leave ruts. I would add some 3/8” flat bar to the bottom of the sides as skids
Hi :) Some weight for the last Blade could help a little. It would also be super interesting to see what happens when you turn it around so that 2 Blades are flattening the surface.
I used a land plane years ago to level a new hay field. The one I used was about 20 feet long, with a single blade in the middle. It needs to be long to bridge the low spots and shave off the high spots. The dirt would collect quite a bit in front of the blade, but drop out to fill in low spots. It needed to flex to follow the ground contors and shave off the high spots. I think yours would work better if it was dry, but I think it's attatced too solid on those forks and can't flex? Just my guess. Try just dragging it with a chain.
Hi I'm not a farmer but I only have suggestions 1 suspend the drag unit below the forks by brackets or chains or brackets front with chains at the rear 2 Add a platform at the rear for adding weights or cinder blocks so the leveler blade is no lifted up as the scraper blades ride up and over the big rocks 3 Plus as an addition; what if you integrated something designed similar to a Front End Loader ROCK BUCKET that collected the large rocks as You go along. Then dump them between passes. Those rocks will add down forces at the rear leveler blade These are only suggestions since watching your video I saw the whole assembly lifting off the ground in a parallel motion instead of allowing the leveler blade to remain on the ground Ken in Florida
Your designed basically worked very well, it appears too Me that it is too dependent on the fork assembly and it rises & falls as a unit Flexibility of the front portion too the rear might help it be more efficient
Definitely needs some form of ground breaking at the front of the plane and a flattening blade at the rear to smooth things rather than "scrape" them. I'm saying this for two reasons (each to their respective problem). 1. the plane lacks the operational weight to pull the job in one pass, neither can the machine take the abuse, so simpler to tooth it. 2. i saw a lot of the ground that was scraped go over, and then just fall flat. If you'd add a flat surface that "sucks" up the scraped ground, it would work a lot nice. If it were my project, and only then, i'd probably do something like this instead of point 2: weld 3 chain lengths, one center, two at the ends, and add a piece of scrap tubing (square, preferably) filled with concrete to them. The tubing would float independently up and down over the uprooted ground and the weight of the concrete would make it sit on the ground. But that's just me, i'd understand if others would be reticent in doing something like that since it's a considerable investment.
I have some experience running a road grader and in building my own implements. You have a good idea, but I think that it is a little wet. Also, if you could figure out a way of setting the digging angle of the blades and turn them up a little higher, it might not bring as many rocks up. Maybe make them bolt on and have a couple different holes to change the angle. I built my own box scraper and I prefer it to a land plane, but that's just my personal opinion.
Ok what you need is some side tilt to dig into edges about 15 degrees make passes each side bringing road base to center of drive way forming a crown the drains water to both sides help maintain surface shape those 3 point rear hitch can be tilted ajusted its not to wet its better once the side drainage is formed once you have got both sides to depth make a few passes with blade at level position if your tyresxare leaving wheel indentations trails get off it let it dry out if its holding weight keep driving to compact the surface when it drys out it will be like concrete hard
I am thinking of making one. I think you need some play in the top link so it will let the back follow the ground. Like what a bush hog has it lets the mower move to the contours. With yours maybe if the back cross angles were just a couple inches higher it would still lift with the forks but let it drop some in use?
I agree. The top link should be chain or have a section of chain instead of traditional threaded fixed top link. The chain link should be loose when setting it up on level ground but still short enough to lift the rear of the land plane with the 3pt lift. This will allow the land leveler to stay in contact with the ground when the tractor rides over a high spot. This is a relatively inexpensive change. You should also consider a method to add some weight to you land leveler. Otherwise, well done.
Take some excavator tracks and pull that no hassle no cutting teeth it will end up snotty and you will pay a month down the line the trick is conformity in hardness ...and for the smart ases not compaction just get old tracks and no more hassle believe me I've tried it all timing after rain is also a thing to consider
My experience from using a pasture harrow behind a tractor to groom driveways is that, if the implement is heavy enough, it is better to drag it behind me with a chain so it floats over the surface e and finds its own level, rather than having it rigidly attached to a 3 point linkage
Drive is too packed, land planes are for a more loose substrate, like gravel. You would be better off to rip that driveway up with a cultivator or finish tool then plane it down. I suggest putting a drag skid along the bottom and make the sides taller than the blades so it dont spill out the sides.
