Hello Jay,
(sorry for the side track royl) I do have skids on the sickle bar, and I agree, they (sickle bars) do have to kind of chew through small trees. My skids are standard Gravely hardware. While I don't have pix, I'll describe them and figure you can do some visualization -
Made from steel, half round and turned up at both ends, much like a skate board.This allows movement forward and back without catching cut grass. In the middle there is a threaded stud sticking straight up, maybe 3" long. This replaces a bolt on the sickle bar.
rough design pic: \___ I ___/ The "I" is obviously longer and threaded it's entire length. A nut above and below the bar adjusts the height. They reach in front of the teeth and well behind the bar. The stud is centered, so there is no right end for the front/back.
The manual has the skids mounted out close to the ends. I mount mine much closer to the middle, pretty much dividing the bar into thirds. Mounted further out tends to bow the bar in my experience.
Sometimes while mowing the sickle bar will clog. I find that at the right ground speed it will frequently self clear. Being sharp certainly helps.
Royl - yes the sickle does need to move very, very slowly through small saplings. On the other hand the brush hog will keep moving and beat them into submission. Note too that you can mount TWO blade to the brush hog, one above the other. At some point they made blades to intentionally pair them this way (different bend offsets) and they cut in the same plane. For rough work this doesn't really matter - it's two extra edges cutting what you want cut. It's pretty unlikely that you will stall the machine with this set up (it is pretty unlikely that you will EVER stall the machine).
