Brush Hog mods

[2manyrocks]

Here is an hydraulic brush cutter I built for my backhoe a month or so ago. I suppose it fits the thread, since mostly about using chains. I do have a flail mower for the backhoe, which worked fairly well, but it's just an heavy attachment and I wanted something lighter.

Cutting width is about 50 cm or nearly 20". Using 3/8" grade 80 chains. Rotor speed is about 2000 RPM.

It has been painted since, I just haven't taken any pictures of it yet. Still need to test it properly but for that I need to haul the machine over to the remote propriety, however I still have digging work for the backhoe here at home.

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Every TBN member who either has or wants a 16hp or so chinese made mini-ex must be salivating at the sight of your cutter.

I wouldn't have expected a 17hp backhoe to have enough power to run a cutter?

Could you explain the way you've oriented the skid shoes perpendicular to the tractor? They also appear to be very wide compared to most brush cutters I've seen.

Your fabrication work is astounding.

 

[ptsg]

In my experience it recovers slower than cutting with a blade... which can be a good thing if you are simply mowing to reduce the fire fuel.

Exactly. These are truly brush cutters meant for brush cutting. I know a lot of people get by with using a rotary cutter to leave a decent finish, but this is not the tool for them, even though it won't actually leave that bad of finish either. Not as a good as blades but not far out.

 

[ptsg]

Every TBN member who either has or wants a 16hp or so chinese made mini-ex must be salivating at the sight of your cutter.

I wouldn't have expected a 17hp backhoe to have enough power to run a cutter?

Could you explain the way you've oriented the skid shoes perpendicular to the tractor? They also appear to be very wide compared to most brush cutters I've seen.

Your fabrication work is astounding.

Thank you!

So the reason I can get by with 17hp compared to a chinese mini-ex is because I have a dedicated pump for the auxiliary circuit and I match the attachments to this machine. This means I always have flow there regardless if I move my machine or use the arm.

In my case, 17hp is pretty much the bare minimum. Ideally I would need an engine with about 25hp to be comfortable for what I want to do with this machine. In this configuration, I do lower the pressure for the arm to leave more HP for the auxiliary circuit so the engine doesn't have to work that hard and mostly because I refuse to rev it to the near max RPM.

This has been working very well with a flail I had. All these months later and I haven't had the chance to test this new cutter I built.

Regarding the shoes or skids being mounted perpendicular to the machine is because when using the cutter, you move the arm left/right instead of moving the machine forward or backwards. This way, it also protects the operator from debris.

As far as the width, we run the brush cutters dragging on the ground, so the wide shoes let it float better and won't let it dig much.

Maybe this video leaves a better idea of one of these cutters:

 

[ptsg]

About time I took this cutter out for testing. I only have some pictures of it painted though.

As far as performance, I'm happy with it. I tested it on some overgrown brush. It took it just fine, no issues, no weird noises, no vibrations. Just smooth operation. I would like to test it on some thicker and dryer material as well.

One thing I could possibly change and may happen eventually, is to move the rotor down some. I left it a bit to close to the bottom of the deck. I would like to go a bit closer to the ground.

I did noticed an huge difference in hydraulic oil temp by running this cutter instead of the other flail cutter I have. With the flail, the temps would sit at around 60C. With this cutter, it sits at around 40C, which is the same as when just digging holes.

Eventually, I would like to upgrade the engine, preferably an air cooled 3 cylinder diesel in the 30 to 35hp range. This would allow me to run a bigger pump on the auxiliary circuit for more flow. Then, I could push the RPMs on the cutter from 2000 up to 2500 or 3000 RPM.

Unfortunately, no videos and no pictures of the before and after because I got carried away with it and forgot about. Once we finally get a break in the rain, I'll take some videos of it.

 

[2manyrocks]

Moving the rotor down would make it easier to find rocks?

 

[ptsg]

Moving the rotor down would make it easier to find rocks?

Possibly but that's what the chains instead of blades are for. Chains won't care about rocks.

 

[5030]

About time I took this cutter out for testing. I only have some pictures of it painted though.

As far as performance, I'm happy with it. I tested it on some overgrown brush. It took it just fine, no issues, no weird noises, no vibrations. Just smooth operation. I would like to test it on some thicker and dryer material as well.

One thing I could possibly change and may happen eventually, is to move the rotor down some. I left it a bit to close to the bottom of the deck. I would like to go a bit closer to the ground.

I did noticed an huge difference in hydraulic oil temp by running this cutter instead of the other flail cutter I have. With the flail, the temps would sit at around 60C. With this cutter, it sits at around 40C, which is the same as when just digging holes.

Eventually, I would like to upgrade the engine, preferably an air cooled 3 cylinder diesel in the 30 to 35hp range. This would allow me to run a bigger pump on the auxiliary circuit for more flow. Then, I could push the RPMs on the cutter from 2000 up to 2500 or 3000 RPM.

Unfortunately, no videos and no pictures of the before and after because I got carried away with it and forgot about. Once we finally get a break in the rain, I'll take some videos of it.

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Nice paint job. Wonder how long it will last.

 

[2manyrocks]

I'm only posting this question for discussion because I don't know the practical aspects of how it might work. But lets say you have a mini-x or backhoe that has a 14-17hp engine. Rather than try to change it out for a larger engine to power a cutter, could you add some kind of engine with a hydraulic pump as both a counterweight and power source instead? 13hp gas engines are relatively inexpensive here in the USA.

I'm guessing that having one 35 hp engine is the better option because the excavator is pretty much still while operating the brush cutter and the larger engine could provide more fluid flow than trying to use a separate dedicated 13hp engine?

 

[5030]

You can buy auxiliary power packs that mount on the back end of a tractor that are self powered if you don't have sufficient hydraulic flow to power the implement pump efficiently.

 

[ptsg]

Nice paint job. Wonder how long it will last.

Probably not much at all, that's for sure.