Broken Bush Hog Blades

[billcleveland]

While cutting a field I managed to "find" a section of metal fence which someone pulled down and left in the field.

Both blades broke off the 5 foot Rollins bush hog but hopefully nothing else was damaged. Is Rollins still in business or can I use generic blades? Does anyone know of a Rollins web site or dealer in the North GA area?

Also the impact stopped the tractor engine. Does this indicate that I don't have a shear pin or clutch in the pto driveline on the bush hog?


Bill

 

[Bird]

I don't know anything about Rollins, and I don't know where you're located, but it appears from this web site that it's a Canadian company still in business.

 

[Soundguy]

If you hit something with enough force that it broke a brush cutter blade and stalled your engine.. you had better pray that was all it did.

Sounds like you either have no slip clutch, or it is frozen.. or the shear pin was replaced with a hardened bolt... which it should not have been.

good luck

Soundguy

 

[green4710]

Wow, something should have given that was supposed to give, (slip clutch, shear pin) before all this happened. Id really inspect these before I mowed again. I dont know how these diesel engines like going from PTO RPM to a complete stall, but that cant be good either. Let us know what you find out. Id really give that mower a good look and make sure that something isnt broken or not working.

 

[jinman]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Both blades broke off the 5 foot Rollins bush hog but hopefully nothing else was damaged. )</font>

Bill, I just find that statement incredible. /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif Not only did you break both blades, but you didn't damage anything else. My rotary cutter blades are made of some really "serious" steel. If I hit something hard enough to break the blades, I'd expect the whole cutter to be severly damaged. Can you take some pictures? Did your whole stump jumper come off with the blades attached? /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[Soundguy]

Jinman.. I agree... The blades on my 5' KK .. just eyeballing this am look to be 3/8 to 1/2 material... and as we all know.. those blades are good tool quality metal.. not cheapy soft stuff. If I broke 2 blades like that.. I would fully expect to be either replacing a cutter gearbox.. or putting a new pto shaft in my tractor.. to replace the old one missing the drive splines .

Wow.. I also didn't realize this was a diesel.. I just can't imagine stalling a diesel with a mower... think I would be draining/straining diffy oil in the field thru my hands looking for gear tips... just for piece of mind before I looked any further...

Sounds like his blades wre fixed rigid to the stump cutter and couldn't move?

On a slightly different not. I was at a dealers the other day.. and they had a bunch of howse 5 and 6' cutters standing up.. I noticed that some of them didn't have stump jumpers.. but merely had a blade 'carrier' that allowed the blades to bolt on a short flat stock.. and then another short flat stock whent on the bottom .. sandwhiching the blades.... looked odd.. looked dangerous.. anyone ever see anything like this before?

Soundguy

 

[em14]

Some people don't want the stump jumper. Your description sounds like many that I have see with out a stump jumper. Though most had only the blade bar for the blades to attach to. Even some with stump jumpers are made the same way and the stump jumper is placed over the blade bar. That is to say the stump jumper bolts to the blade bar. The blades still attach to the blade bar not the stump jumper and I would think this is much stronger than one might think. There is a spacer / washer added between the blade and the blade bar to provide the neccessary clearance.
Leo

 

[soarkrebel]

WOW i am surprised most have not ever sheared a blade.
I have had one shear in two on a stump . makes a heck of a racket and the tractor feels like it's gonna shake apart.
And this was no cheap cutter , a FMC sidewinder yeah with stump jumper and slip clutch behind a ford 3600.
My grandfather had broke a few and i know my uncle has broke a bunch!

Now i will admit we were not cutting the front lawn and put the thing through more than it was intended to do. my uncles motto is that if he can ride it down with the tractor it's getting chewed up that means some pretty good size trees.
I would not dare put my woods bb60 with it's little 3/8 blades what we did with those fmc's.

Anyway i was just kind of shocked that not more folks had sheared a bush hog blade. /forums/images/graemlins/ooo.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[KiotiJohn]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Anyway i was just kind of shocked that not more folks had sheared a bush hog blade. )</font>
I would say the reason is that most shear pins break first and keep the blades from breaking. I certainly hope that if I ever hit anything that would break blades that the shear pin would go first and stop the mower from turning. John

 

[soarkrebel]

Kiotijohn that one time it happened to me was enough. i wonder if maybe the blade was defective or a series of blades. i don't know i just know it is a waking experience. /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

 

[jinman]

Can you imagine what the sound would have been to cause both blades to break? YEOW!

I tend to agree that there might have been a defective blade, but two of them is what I find incredible. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif I'm wondering if the center nut off the stump jumper came loose and both blades dropped off. That is a real possibility.

 

[KiotiJohn]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I'm wondering if the center nut off the stump jumper came loose and both blades dropped off. That is a real possibility. )</font>
That certainly sounds plausible. I can see the nut getting loose and eventual wear, or just falling off.

 

[EddieWalker]

I busted the blades on my 6ft landpride. $40 for a new set. You can also try Tractor supply, they carry allot of different sizes.

If you use it, you'll break it. When my blades broke, there was one huge bang and then eveything kind of went quite. Sheer pin is fine, engine never died, and I have no idea what I hit.

If I was to guess, I'd say the damage was done some other day and the day they broke was when the metal finally gave out.

Make sure you have a the socket. That was the hardest part, finding an impact socket 1 11/16. I had to call Landpride and they told me the size, which I had to special order from my high end tool store.

Good luck,
Eddie

 

[Phred]

$40 sounds like a deal to me.
The bolts and nuts plus the blades were $80 for my bush hog 286.
But then again I cut 3" trees with this thing and run it off a 70 hp tractor.
Three years and no broken blades so maybe its worth the money since they really hold up.
The only reason I replaced them is beacuse I think they finally bent up a bit since It developed a lot of vibration in the mower at 540 rpm.

Fred

 

[joes_427_vette]

Yes those swinging pieces of steel can be very dangerous. Read in the paper several years ago where a tractor / brush hog machine was being used to cut weeds on a divided highway. One of the blades broke. As the unit was at an angle it flew out of the steel enclosure and struck a passing vehicle. Everytime I find a large rock on a new weed patch I am glad my sickle mower just bounces around and doesn't try to grind it up. Something about all the mass and speed that gives me the willies. Glad to hear no one was hurt. Gears and blades can be replaced without complications. Please use caution when operating these machines.

 

[djradz]

Although I didn't break any blades, twice now, with two different tractors, I've stalled the tractor by getting the brush hog wrapped up, once in a large steel cable and the other time in a mess of old fencing. Fortuneately, I THINK and HOPE, nothing was seriously damaged. I always felt that since the hog didn't hit with a huge impact, it was just the big load on the drive that stalled the tractors. Should I be concerned? I figured the sheer-pin didn't snap because the load wasn't abrupt. Maybe I should replace it anyway before I really do end up damaging something.

 

[slowrev]

Djradj,
I think you might have something there with the gradual load thing when wrapping up the wire. I would however check/replace my shearpin bolt and make sure the driveline is not rusted to the gearbox shaft, If so a shearpin might not help.

Maybe the blades twisted up and broke because of the wire, not from a frontal impact , so to speak.

Ben

 

[EddieWalker]

I probably aproach this differently than most.

I'me extremely rough on my tools and equipment. I expect to break it and when I do, I repair or replace what I destroy.

For me, time and finishing the job is my primary concern.

When I'm shredding, I'm out to get everything, and that means pushing it way beyound what is recomended and planned on when it was built.

I've broke both blades, dozens of sheere pins, the gear box and now the drive shaft. None of these things cost much to repair and I keep running it until it falls apart.

Wear and tear on the tractor is just part of the equation of buying new and expecting it to last a certain number of years.

The reason I bought Land Pride was the availability of parts. I just went to Lowes the other day because I've lost half my bolts that hold on the rear wheel.

I've done this in less than a year of owning it.