Mower operation

[John0829]

What I find very frustrating mowing with either one of these setups in this rugged hilly country is that I am constantly working the 3pt height to keep the implement from digging in or riding too high and keeping a fairly consistent cut height.

I know of what you speak, the only way I have managed to avoid the problem is to use pull type cutter, it will follow the ground contours where a 3 point will not.

 

[swreeder]

I also have a hilly property and found with my rotary I was constantly adjusting the height of the 3-point to keep the front of the mower from digging in when the rear tractor tires went into a dip. I think that's just the nature of the beast.

I then got a ditch and bank flail, and mostly run it fully offset so it's not cutting what the tractor tires just ran over. It seems to follow the rises and dips quite well in that position at least. I never have to adjust the 3-point with it.

Good info, this is one of the reasons I got my flail. It can by adjusted with the rear remotes in and out as well as the pitch.

Curious of the brand of flail you have and how you set it up.

 

[swreeder]

I know of what you speak, the only way I have managed to avoid the problem is to use pull type cutter, it will follow the ground contours where a 3 point will not.

Is this like a finish mower?

 

[scootr]

Is this like a finish mower?

Fail mowers can be either finish cut or rough cut depending upon the blades like Y knives for finish or hammers for rough. I use a HD cutter with 3" hammers to rough cut and mulch downed branches, cut sucker growth, and such.

 

[swreeder]

Fail mowers can be either finish cut or rough cut depending upon the blades like Y knives for finish or hammers for rough. I use a HD cutter with 3" hammers to rough cut and mulch downed branches, cut sucker growth, and such.

Understood and I have both types of cutters for mine but only use the hammers due to the rocky nature of this country. If you read John0829 response he is referring to a pull type cutter, which I’m not sure what he has.

 

[TerryR]

Curious of the brand of flail you have and how you set it up.

It is a Peruzzo 1600 ditch and bank mower.

I only mow twice a year, so I'm normally cutting stuff two to three feet tall. It doesn't like the stiff weeds, just pushes them over and leaves them uncut. Setting it close to the ground as some here recommended doesn't help. They just lay down until the mower passes. So I keep it up a couple inches to keep it out of the stones, and replaced the belt front guard with a chain one I made. See my post on this at Chain Guards for Flail Mower?

That helps quite a bit because the weeds aren't pushes so low to the ground and most get cut.

Even then it doesn't do well with stuff the tractor tires have smashed down, so I run it mostly at full offset so it cuts what hasn't been run over.

 

[John0829]

This is what I was referring to, I no longer have one but my neighbor does. Good if what you are cutting is thick, if you are looking to have it down like a lawn then a finish mower will follow the ground contours if it has casters on all four corners like the Landpride 2572 I sold to another neighbor before I realized the Mott SHD72 was NOT going to give the cut I thought it would.

 

[swreeder]

An update here on the flail mower. After doing a lot of searching on the web, I found someone else that had the exact same issues.

The Fix Is as follows:
1. After leveling the flail, set the top link to tilt the frame assembly back 15 degrees. This is the manufacturers recommendation.
2. On this flail, the back roller was fixed and after leveling and setting the tilt, the hammers were at a cutting height of 1.5”. The fix was to remove one of the two bolts on each end of the roller mount, pivot it down to a better height and drill a new mounting hole.

After doing these two things the flail sets up anywhere between 3 to 4.5” depending on where I set the stop point on the 3pt hitch.

I did a test run this evening setting up the 3pt stop for approximately 4”. I mowed along the edge of my driveway and a fairly rough woods area and it worked great.

 

[chim]

I've had one rotary cutter that chewed into the ground if I didn't babysit the 3PH lever. Never had a flail. I have lots of hours with rear finish mowers. All have been equipped with 4 wheels. With the 3PH set to allow the deck to float, scalping is rare. I do have a place where a small knob sticks up and the 7-1/2' deck is wide enough that the distance between the gauge wheels is sufficient to allow the blades to scrape the top of the knob. If I think of it the deck can be picked up a bit for that 3 feet of mowing.

 

[zzvyb6]

Put gauge wheels on them and let the attachment float independently of the tractor pitch angle.