Grading Rear blade options

[Camo]

Yeah, it is June, but snow will be here soon enough. I plowed my 200+ foot driveway last year with my ATV, and truthfull did not care for the cutting edge catching a certain few expansion joint on my concrete and chipping away at the edges. It had a trip blade but still no good.
I have an FEL on my Kubota B5200, and that is even worse for that situation of course, so I looked into snow pushers to go on the bucket with a rubber cutting edge and steel angled up wear shoes......Very nice, but a quoted price of $1500 made me a bit queezy. So I got to thinking of a plain ole rear blade with the bade being drug backwards to skip up over the raised expansion joints........And I also go to looking at rubber cutting edges, and even thinking of fabbing a wheel like on a mower/ brush hog to allow it to control the height of the blade........Yeah, you bet I'm confused......HELP!!!

 

[Reg]

Yeah, it is June, but snow will be here soon enough. I plowed my 200+ foot driveway last year with my ATV, and truthfull did not care for the cutting edge catching a certain few expansion joint on my concrete and chipping away at the edges. It had a trip blade but still no good.
I have an FEL on my Kubota B5200, and that is even worse for that situation of course, so I looked into snow pushers to go on the bucket with a rubber cutting edge and steel angled up wear shoes......Very nice, but a quoted price of $1500 made me a bit queezy. So I got to thinking of a plain ole rear blade with the bade being drug backwards to skip up over the raised expansion joints........And I also go to looking at rubber cutting edges, and even thinking of fabbing a wheel like on a mower/ brush hog to allow it to control the height of the blade........Yeah, you bet I'm confused......HELP!!!

I take the tooth bar off the loader for winter and back drag the snow off the "delicate" spots before putting the rear blade to it.
I tried the reversed blade thing, basically a bump can cause a momentary lift of the blade and that results in it riding over the snow mound that it dumps.
I cut up a rubber horse stall mat (3/4 inch thick) to the same dimensions as the blade's cutting edge one time, but never got to trying it.
The plan was to sandwich it between the blade and the cutting edge with an inch or two extra sticking out.

I have also thought of using the rake with a strip of stall mat in front of it to make a "soft" blade, a sacrificial 2 by 6 is another possibility.

Used conveyor belt in front of a rake is another possibility for a soft blade, I might try that this winter since my SIL seems to have a source, judging by the goofy full width mud flap that has just appeared on his "just for show, it never hauls a load or pulls a trailer 99% all chromed out" truck.

If you don't already HAVE a rear blade I suggest you get a rake first (or instead if funds are limited, aren't they always).
Most of them can take a drop down blade, so you get a two'fer implement.
Some can also take a row of scarifiers.

 

[Camo]

I take the tooth bar off the loader for winter and back drag the snow off the "delicate" spots before putting the rear blade to it.
I cut up a rubber horse stall mat (3/4 inch thick) to the same dimensions as the blade's cutting edge one time, but never got to trying it.
The plan was to sandwich it between the blade and the cutting edge with an inch or two extra sticking out.

I have also thought of using the rake with a strip of stall mat in front of it to make a "soft" blade, a sacrificial 2 by 6 is another possibility.

It is a steeper grade, so I'm not looking to stop or make direction changes until I get to the bottom.

 

[PA hayseed]

I used to use my rear blade for snow removal, but now I use my boxblade. I have the scarifiers all the way up, and kinda tilt the BB up. IT works in reverse as well as forwards, but I am always concerned about pushing too much in reverse.

 

[Camo]

I used to use my rear blade for snow removal, but now I use my boxblade. I have the scarifiers all the way up, and kinda tilt the BB up. IT works in reverse as well as forwards, but I am always concerned about pushing too much in reverse.

Do you use it on concrete or gravel? Got any pics? Are there wear shoes on the box blades that can be replaced?

 

[Johndeere3720]

Ive only used my grader blade to move snow. Ive tried it in reverse at an angle and it only compaceted the snow into the gravel and moved very little snow. I can see how a boxblade would work but you would stop a lot to empty it out. Maybe a rake, it will filter out the gravel but hold the sow and move it to the side. I dont know, but good luck.

 

[PA hayseed]

Do you use it on concrete or gravel? Got any pics? Are there wear shoes on the box blades that can be replaced?

I have a gravel driveway, sorry no pics. There are no "wear shoes", the BB has, for lack of the proper terminology, scarifiers on the front and a blade in the back (actually 2 blades in opposite directions). I use my position control on my 3pt to keep the blade about 1" above the gravel. Do I get gravel in my yard - yep, but not nearly as much as I did with my rear blade. Could you put a rubber strip on the BB to protect an asphalt drive - I would think so.

 

[gonegreen]

I used a rear blade last winter for removing snow on a gravel driveway. Most of the time the blade was reversed. Yes, it did pack some of the snow down, but this keeps the gravel on the driveway. The only problem I had was room to pile the snow. Make sure that you make the path as wide as possible the first time out so the next three or four times it snows (and the weather hasn't got warm enough to melt any snow from your first time out) you have room to pile it.

I bought a box blade this summer and keep seeing posts about using it for snow removal but I still don't understand how that works. My driveway is about 600 feet long, wouldn't I have to stop every 15 feet and empty the box? This doesn't seem like it would work to well if you have a narrow driveway with trees on both sides of the driveway and no way to maneuver the tractor around very easily. Am I missing something?

 

[Camo]

I have about 240 feet of concrete driveway. Do you think that the rear blade reversed would clean the snow off good, yet roll up over a couple of high expansion joints?

 

[KennK]

I use my rear blade backwards to clear snow off of the lawn - to clear walking paths for horses. While doing that I've continued the push on to my blacktop driveway, and it does not leave a clean surface. It leaves a small scattered thickness of ice/snow on top (depending on the dips & hills of the blacktop surface).

I like the idea of bolting a length of used conveyor belt to the blade (I might try that) and then using it forward.

 

[PA hayseed]

I bought a box blade this summer and keep seeing posts about using it for snow removal but I still don't understand how that works. My driveway is about 600 feet long, wouldn't I have to stop every 15 feet and empty the box? This doesn't seem like it would work to well if you have a narrow driveway with trees on both sides of the driveway and no way to maneuver the tractor around very easily. Am I missing something?

When you use your BB in reverse on dirt what does it do?

I do use my BB going forward on the road by my house, and I do have to stop once in awhile to empty it, but not every 15'. Now, if we had a 1' of snow, possibly every 4-5'..

 

[gonegreen]

I have about 240 feet of concrete driveway. Do you think that the rear blade reversed would clean the snow off good, yet roll up over a couple of high expansion joints?

Concrete driveways are nice in the summer but kind of a pain in the winter if you don't keep the snow off. Black top driveways are a little more forgiving with a little help from the sun. I think the rear blade in reverse would still pack some snow down on a concete driveway, especially if you have expansion joints sticking up and the snow is wet. My experiences with packed down snow on concrete is that it wants to freeze tight and turn to ice.

 

[Camo]

Concrete driveways are nice in the summer but kind of a pain in the winter if you don't keep the snow off. Black top driveways are a little more forgiving with a little help from the sun. I think the rear blade in reverse would still pack some snow down on a concete driveway, especially if you have expansion joints sticking up and the snow is wet. My experiences with packed down snow on concrete is that it wants to freeze tight and turn to ice.

I need a power broom.......That would be sweet. Hmmmm.......

 

[J_J]

Camo,

One of the TBN guy's built this for his blade. Might work for you.

 

[J_J]

I need a power broom.......That would be sweet. Hmmmm.......

You want a power broom, here it is. I am guessing a sweeper and a broom is the same thing, right.

Used Power Tracs

T3405 hydraulic powered

 

[awl51]

Yeah, it is June, but snow will be here soon enough. I plowed my 200+ foot driveway last year with my ATV, and truthfull did not care for the cutting edge catching a certain few expansion joint on my concrete and chipping away at the edges. It had a trip blade but still no good.
.....HELP!!!

Camo - back to the original issue -- have you looked into urethane edges sold for ATV plows? Might ease some of the issue with the plow hitting concrete joints. For me, ATV plowing wins hands-down for fun.

 

[sld]

This has been talked about several times on this forum. People have used rubber, wood, plastic... you name it.

Last winter I used a piece of a composite decking board sandwiched between my cutting edge and the rear blade. The blade was turned around and I plowed the concrete in reverse. It would also work going forward to clean up against the garage door. It worked ok, but wore down faster than I thought. But it did glide over the concrete and sweep it clean.

What I want to use this year is a piece of UHMW polyethylene from Granger. It stands for ultra high molecular weight polyethylene. You can get it in various sizes to sandwich onto the rear blade. For my 5 foot blade, a 1 inch thick by 3 inches tall piece was around 80 bucks. Kinda high, but the stuff is very abrasion resistant and very slick on concrete.

I would hope to get several seasons out of it.

 

[alltoys]

On my rear blade I turn it at an angle so snow roles off to my right side. On the leading edges of the blade I grind them to they are rounded. Now the leading edge will ride over the high spot not impacting it.

 

[Camo]

On my rear blade I turn it at an angle so snow roles off to my right side. On the leading edges of the blade I grind them to they are rounded. Now the leading edge will ride over the high spot not impacting it.

Great idea!! I think that may do the trick.

 

[jnjpream]

Yup, plow at an angle and round the corners a bit. Works great. And a trick for dealing with a bit of uneven ground if you have any is to replace the fixed side link with a length of chain.

Jeff