Gravel Driveway

[Egon]

The bucket on the fel will have a cutting edge attached. It is either welded on or bolted on large machines and is intended to be replaced when it gets worn out. It is made from harder material than the rest of the bucket.

Egon

 

[dlabrie]

Paul,
I have a similar driveway, hard packed, crushed run. It is about 1500 feet long and hilly in some places. Right now it has pot holes and ruts. It hasn't been worked on in many years. I would like to fix it up but can't decided which tool to buy for my B2910. A rake w/ wheels, a blade or a box scraper. my budget will only allow one of the above. My thought was to get a rake, have crushed run tailgait spred and then work it with a rake. What do you and the others think?
David

 

[WVBill]

Last year I worked the roads in our development. Just like yours, they are packed crusher run and had developed potholes, ruts and washboard. The year before,(before I had the tractor) we just had new crusher run truck-spread and it looked great - but those potholes, ruts and washboard came right back within 3 months. So last year I went over the whole road with my box blade scarifiers down and scratched it up down to the depth of the lowest pothole. Then I put on my rake and raked it smooth. We didn't need to add any new gravel and it still looks fine this year.

Bottom line is that you'll need at least the box blade/scarifiers. You might get by leaving it at that but it will look a lot better if you also have the rake to go over it.

 

[jphipps]

WVBill,

Do you know what a good price would be on a box blade? I have checked my local dealer, and it was about $620 for a landpride 48". I have a BX2200 and he said that a 48" was as big as that tractor could handle. Do you have any suggestions...

 

[Charliebrn]

I paid about 350 for my Woods/Gill GB48 and am VERY happy with that....

 

[rf33]

I think that the general guideline for a well built box blade is around $100 per foot of width. The addition of hydraulic scarifiers will up the price substantially though.

 

[Wood_Butcher_Dav]

That seems a little high. I paid $400.00 for my Land Pride box scraper with 4 shanks. The model # I believe is 1548. This was part of the deal when I bought my tractor, which may be why it was cheaper then the $620 you were quoted.

Dave

 

[jphipps]

I just got a quote from TSC for a 60" King Kutter box blade for $299.99, which seems like a good price, but I am not sure if the BX has enough power. The Kubota dealer told me that a 48" was the largest that it could handle. Does anyone have a 60" box blade with a BX2200?

 

[Trev]

I have a JD4300 with the 74 front blade and a rear dirt scoop. I also am the proud owner of a large hole in our dirt driveway. Not quite sure what to do about it. Keep adding more dirt from other areas until it stops compressing? Bite the bullet and have gravel brought in (we are having a driveway put in in another location [we're at the corner of two roads] but can't really afford to do both right at the moment.)

Now that the ground is dryer, I could just level out the hole with the front blade, and dump some dirt in it, over it, and flatten it a bit with my buddie's roller.

Sound reasonable?

Thanks,
Bob

 

[Knight9]

Bob,

What happened to your old id??? Figured you'd start over or what???

Kevin

 

[TonyC]

<font color=blue>Now that the ground is dryer, I could just level out the hole with the front blade, and dump some dirt in it, over it, and flatten it a bit with my buddie's roller.</font color=blue>

Sound good to me Trev. If the hole's large enough you could drop some big rocks in there. That will help stabilze and pack it. Since you're moving to a new driveway, I wouldn't bother doing much more.

Good luck!/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[rockyridgefarm]

I found this on another great TBN thread

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.state.me.us/dep/blwq/docwatershed/camproad.pdf>Camp Road Maintenance</A>

It is a comprehensive manual with lots of pictures. Oh, they like that rake...

I have about a mile of roads, and never dreamed I could maintain them, but I am starting and am having success...

 

[PaulT]

If I could own only one tool for driveway maintenance, it would be a boxblade, no question.

 

[yakima]

Paul,
How big a job is it to switch from BH to box scraper and vice versa on the B2710?

 

[ColorMeGreen]

My dad-in-law lives 2 miles up a county road outside of Bozeman Mt. The road grader never seems to come by frequently enough and the road gets some terrible pot-holes and washboard. Dad-in-law has about an 8' length of railroad steel that he drags behind his massey. He'll go up and down the road at a fairly quick clip (2 miles each way) and the weight of that steel really does a remarkable job. We keep the rail angled a bit, about like the grader would and we try to pull gravel first from the sides to the center then back from the center to the sides. We have fairly good success in knocking off washboard and placing loose fill in depressions.

Jeanne

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Saw my neighbr out on his 4-wheeler the other day working his driveway. He was pulling a heavy piece of I-beam that he had welded a couple chain hooks on. Pulled it at a slight angle, and was heavy enough that it was working the surface and filling in the ruts. I was going to offer my flex-tine harrow, but his homemade blade was doing pretty good. He is down to a layer of packed fines - has gravel coming this week. Puts down new gravel evry 3-4 yrs to make up for what is plowed in winter.

 

[duanet]

I bought a KK 60" box scraper a couple of weeks ago for my JD 4100, which is a 20 HP HST with R-4 tires. I haven't used it a lot and am still getting used to it, but it will peel up a boxfull of dirt and move it around fine. For dirt digging and leveling as in driveway maintenance, I'd say your 22 HP Kubota should do fine with a 5 footer. And from what others have said about the King Kutter, you won't go wrong for the money.

<font color=green>Duane</font color=green>

 

[Anonymous Poster]

2 more cents. I've had good results with the boxblade teeth down on first pass to break the surface 3" or so. Next drag blade teeth up in float position with the three-point at a bit of tilt to produce a crown. Works for me. Also an operator I've used over the years suggested once that when using the fel to work as a grader or leveler use the bucket with a load in it and in the float position blade slightly tilted back to keep from dumping load. Works for me too. It must be a wounderful thing to have a drive so long to give a bumper of space between you and the passers by.
As for purchasing impliments-- In the area I live in auctions are frequent and as long as one doesn't get carried away with the bidding a good place to pick up equipment and have fun at the same time. Best to y-all

 

[PaulT]

The backhoe takes about 10-15 minutes to put on, (assuming you left it on hard level ground). The fussiest part is aligning the toplink bracket with the backhoe toplink bar. It takes just a little less time to take off.
The boxblade goes on in less than 5 minutes (not including setting ripper height), and off in less than 2 minutes.

 

[knucklehead]

Don't know about the rest of you, but I'm getting an education here. I was going to get a rake, then a box scraper, then a rake, etc, etc, and this thread is helping a lot. I talked to a dealer today, and he showed me something else. It seems to be a middle ground/all purpose answer to beenthere's comments on penetration, and retain the grading ability of a rake.

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.landpride.com/lp/products/sf25_specs.html>Land Pride</A> has a scarifier that has provision for mounting another 3-pt implement behind it. I'm quite interested; I'd like comments on quality of this manufacturer. I'll probably post a similar comment over on Attachments and call it LandPride.