Bush Hog blades hitting deck

[jb1390]

I believe the single biggest reason for the push to go with the supports on the underside is ease of cleaning off the top of the deck.

As to your situation....yea thats too close with them high-lifts. You might be able to source some generic blades that are the correct length and have a little more offset?

The sides are only 6 inches high so offset blades would hang below the sides - standard flat blades offer a little more clearance, but still nowhere close to what a woods or landpride mower has. The denting issue was there with the original blades, which had a slight bend at the tip - I think the blades would hit regardless of what I put on there provided I keep hitting rocks (unavoidable in CT). It's worse with the high lifts, but it's not like the problem is completely solved by changing to flat blades. Regardless, I would like to use the high lift blades for grass. The cut was really good, I did not have to overlap, I could move very fast while cutting, and the grass in the tire tracks was cut well. I just need to modify the mower so I can use it like I want to - I think adding some plate underneath is the easiest/cheapest way to do that.

The curved deck surface with subframe underneath is also easier to clean and does not collect water. There are multiple benefits to that design.

 

[jb1390]

For a lot less money, I would take those blades to a machine shop and have them bend them to give more offset in the blades. Cold bending should not affect the tempering although I doubt that hot bending in the existing bends would hurt the tempering either. It would take 2 bends per blade to do it right and keep the cutting edge level.
Of course this option would only be used if you cant find replacement blades with enough offset in them.

As mentioned above, the sides are too low as currently built. If I were to extend the blades down, by altering the blades (which I think is possibly a safety issue anyway), or by lowering the gearbox, I would also need to extend the sides. That seems like more effort to me than a couple hundred dollars and an afternoon of welding on the deck.

There is no question to me that the root cause of this is a poor cutter design. If they had installed the gear box lower, with 10" or 12" sides instead of 6" sides, this would not be an issue. But achieving that geometry now seems like a lot more time and money then reinforcing the area the blades hit.