Box Scraper Ground Plane or Box Scraper?

[Stormtruck2]

I have two gravel driveways that I need to maintain. One is level and the other is rather steep and rutted with a high center ridge. Which would be better for maintaining the driveways. I also want to be able to scrape some of the gravel loose on the inclined driveway during the winter. I will be pulling them with a JD 4600. I look forward to your advice.

 

[greg_g]

You're going to get varied opinions on this, many from those who've owned one but not the other. I initially thought a rear scraper blade was the way to go for my farm driveways, but I was very quickly disappointed. I traded that sucker against a boxblade and a landscape rake, and have never regretted the decision.

//greg//

 

[digger2]

Boxblade.....the scraper blade would take forever especially when it comes to straightening out the ruts.It will probably just skip over the bad spots you are trying to straighten out.The boxblade will rip it up (if you leave the teeth down),then you can go back over it with the teeth up to smooth and level.They work great for just what you are describing........digger2

 

[/pine]

The key to re-working and smoothing gravel is scarifying the packed material before grading and leveling...you won't be able to do this with just a plane blade...

...IMO, once you learn to use the multiple aspects of a box blade (a hydraulic toplink will greatly enhance the efficiency) you should be able to do almost everything you can do with a plane and a whole lot more...

 

[Ford tractor]

This

Land Pride Grading Scrapers

 

[jlsmith]

This

Land Pride Grading Scrapers

I agree with Ford tractor ive have used one of these several times and it works great. The only diff is I used one made by another company but the set up was the same.:thumbsup:

 

[jenkinsph]

The Landpride grading scraper is a good compromise from the looks of it. I would prefer longer skids that they have, Preferably 60" to 72" skid lengths this enables you to have a smoother grade.

If I build another landplane next year it will have a hydraulic scarifier on it similar to my boxblade.

Still think you need a good rearblade for crowning and ditching and pulling back materials migrating towards the edges.

 

[jlsmith]

The skids on the one I use are 72"

 

[Happyman]

This

Land Pride Grading Scrapers

I agree. Bought one for our 1/2 mile gravel drive and it beats the heck out of the box blade.

 

[MtnViewRanch]

I maintain 2 1/4 miles of roads. One mile of that is shared with 5 other properties. You mentioned road maintenance. For road maintenance I prefer my road grading scraper. It simply does the best job overall of the 4 commonly used implements.

Now my rear blade is great for making new roads, for ditching along the road and for creating a good crown on the road. It can work well for taking care of the roads, just a little more work than with the road grader blade.

There have been times when I have used my rollover box blade to get rises out of the road and fill in low spots, but once the road is how you want it, not much of a reason to use it after the road is established.

When I use my landscape rake, it is usually just to dress up the road, maybe pull some leaves off or just a raking to make it look good. Some people like to use a rake to grade with and you can, just not a reason to if you have other implements.

Something to keep in mind is that the heavier the implement, the better it is going to grade. If I could only have one of the four types of implements that I have for working on my roads, it would be the road grading blade, hands down.

 

[TripleR]

I maintain 2 1/4 miles of roads. One mile of that is shared with 5 other properties. You mentioned road maintenance. For road maintenance I prefer my road grading scraper. It simply does the best job overall of the 4 commonly used implements.

Now my rear blade is great for making new roads, for ditching along the road and for creating a good crown on the road. It can work well for taking care of the roads, just a little more work than with the road grader blade.

There have been times when I have used my rollover box blade to get rises out of the road and fill in low spots, but once the road is how you want it, not much of a reason to use it after the road is established.

When I use my landscape rake, it is usually just to dress up the road, maybe pull some leaves off or just a raking to make it look good. Some people like to use a rake to grade with and you can, just not a reason to if you have other implements.

Something to keep in mind is that the heavier the implement, the better it is going to grade. If I could only have one of the four types of implements that I have for working on my roads, it would be the road grading blade, hands down.

Very nice assortment of equipment.:thumbsup:

 

[wedge40]

Very nice assortment of equipment.:thumbsup:

I agree, but looks like $$$$$$ and all the pictures show DIRT. My driveway is packed gravel.

Wedge

 

[djradz]

I have two gravel driveways that I need to maintain. One is level and the other is rather steep and rutted with a high center ridge. Which would be better for maintaining the driveways. I also want to be able to scrape some of the gravel loose on the inclined driveway during the winter. I will be pulling them with a JD 4600. I look forward to your advice.

IMHO
Heavy initial work - Grader (w/ scarifiers) or box blade. Rear blade will also work but requires more passes and maybe a good rain to soften soil.
Average maintenance once road is established - Rear blade or landscape rake
Light maintenance to simply keep the gravel on the surface and fill in developing problems - landschape rake.

As others have said, lots of slightly differing opinions. Note though that to move earth to create a crown or to bring in gravel from the sides or beyond, only the rear blade will work really well and the landscape rake a little less, due to their ability to be angled.

 

[jenkinsph]

I reread the thread and noted that the people with heavy duty implements such as Mt View Ranch and myself seem to be in agreement. I think it is hard to get the results you need for initial building of a road with lightweight tools, but you can get by with maintenance if careful.


Wedge40,
Packed gravel is easy to work with if you have a good heavy landplane/grader such as Brian's or mine. I think we both have all the tools mentioned in heavy duty models and can vouch for each of the implements usefulness and best application. Sorry if this sounds sarcastic but I know that having all of these to use means I can pick the best tool for the job.

 

[Gordon Gould]

I use a rear blade and a heavy grader blade on my mile long packed gravel road.
I agree MtnViews statements. But if I only had one road impliment it would be a rear blade with tilt. They are more universal than any other single simple impliment.

gg

 

[TripleR]

I agree, but looks like $$$$$$ and all the pictures show DIRT. My driveway is packed gravel.

Wedge

Me too, but sure looks nice.

 

[Gordon Gould]

Rereading this thread; the key point being made by Brian and Steve that impliment weight is the most important factor cannot be over stressed. Try adding some weight to your impliment on a hard packed surface. Get it up to 100 or 125 lbs per foot of blade and see what happens. You will be amazed.

 

[MtnViewRanch]

I agree, but looks like $$$$$$ and all the pictures show DIRT. My driveway is packed gravel.

Wedge

That dirt on the road is DG and supports my brothers 80,000lb semi when soaking wet with no problems or damage to the road. We have had our property for a little over 10 years now and the only real maintenance that I have done to it is to increase the crown a little bit and that was not really needed.

Yes those implements are all heavy duty, higher dollar implements. Something that I learned a long time ago is that pretty much no job is difficult to do if you have the right tool to accomplish that job. Sometimes it even takes more than one tool and often that tool or tools cost some money.

Don't want to sound rude, but a lot of people don't seem to get the idea that it is best to have the correct implement for a certain job and then complain when their light duty stuff doesn't work. Nothing wrong with the light duty stuff either, it has it's place and purpose. It just isn't heavy duty work.

 

[TripleR]

That dirt on the road is DG and supports my brothers 80,000lb semi when soaking wet with no problems or damage to the road. We have had our property for a little over 10 years now and the only real maintenance that I have done to it is to increase the crown a little bit and that was not really needed.

Yes those implements are all heavy duty, higher dollar implements. Something that I learned a long time ago is that pretty much no job is difficult to do if you have the right tool to accomplish that job. Sometimes it even takes more than one tool and often that tool or tools cost some money.

Don't want to sound rude, but a lot of people don't seem to get the idea that it is best to have the correct implement for a certain job and then complain when their light duty stuff doesn't work. Nothing wrong with the light duty stuff either, it has it's place and purpose. It just isn't heavy duty work.

No doubt the heavy duty/expensive equipment works better or more efficiently than lighter/less expensive stuff in many if not most applications. For many of us though, the expense is just not worth it.

It is really hard not to sound rude by prefacing a comment with, "Don't want to sound rude" or "With all due respect".

Like I said before, very nice equipment.:thumbsup:

 

[djradz]

I have two gravel driveways that I need to maintain. One is level and the other is rather steep and rutted with a high center ridge. Which would be better for maintaining the driveways. I also want to be able to scrape some of the gravel loose on the inclined driveway during the winter. I will be pulling them with a JD 4600. I look forward to your advice.

Pictures of the drives might help all in making a more educated suggestion.