Mostly scrap built (but still awesome) land plane

[ovrszd]

Ovrszd,OMG your serious about a rider? Have Collin find and fill out an application for a Darwin. That would be history to have the application filled out in advance.A man had his kids ride in the bucket of a Bobcat. They bounced out, he ran over them, and they are dead. Do you think he fells like an idiot now?What would be an indicator of even lower IQ is if people told him it could happen but he ignored them anyhow. I think this post must be a plant to see you gullible people can be. Joke must be on us!

JRP, although you pointed your finger at me, I'm guessing you were talking to the OP. Go be Safety Police somewhere else. It's not needed here. The OP has more intelligence in his little finger than you.So, I guess you are right, the joke is definitely on you.

 

[ovrszd]

Should I hold off on the sand?... not that it'll make that much of a difference... but if it's questionable if the wheeler can pull it...

For something like this I like "add-on" weight. Can be added or removed as need arises. And as you said, the sand won't make much difference anyway in comparison to the total weight of the plane.

 

[NS Gearhead]

I haven't really been following your thread, but one thought occurs to me.
You might want to drill an extra set of holes on the back side of the angle so that you could install the blade reversed. That should allow you to "backblade" for leveling softer soil or gravel.

Good idea, but I can't think of an instance that I'd need it... but I'll keep that in mind!

 

[NS Gearhead]

Looking good, you've got me inspired to build one. You might consider bracing that hitch on the ATV. I can't see yours, but on my Grizzly it was simply bolted to the differential casting, had no strength to resist the higher torque that a 2" receiver hitch adds. For example if someone stepped on the tongue of that 'trailer' what resists the bending on the ATV hitch?

I followed ya until that last sentence. If someone steps on the tongue of the plane... nothing would bend... I can jump on my atv's hitch with a ball in and nothing happens... although I did bend it... that was my own fault. I'd made a "ripper tooth" and it put crazy stress in an upward motion and opened up the square hitch opening to look more like a rectangle. I'll see what the dealership can do when I go for my first service... but i could just beat it back with a mini maul. Maybe weld some key stock around the end like 2" receivers have.

 

[NS Gearhead]

Thanks Chad & ovrszd!

 

[NS Gearhead]

Made some gussets for the tongue... compound angles with an offset radius... fun! LOL Should've used flat plate.


Tiny gusset underneath


... and semi welded in.


If my tank can last I'll be able to take this for a test tow next time I work on it!... but I'm showing 0psi on the tank... still 25psi at the regulator... she's almost done.

 

[jenkinsph]

Looks real good so far. Pipe is a good material but for my minimal skill level box tubing is an easy choice.

 

[NS Gearhead]

I did run out of gas, but was able to burn the tongue in enough to give it a test tow minus blade.

She did ok. The rear seemed to be up in the air most of the time... I may have gotten the tongue on wrong. I'm thinking a relief cut, bend slightly, then re-weld. That or put a hinge so that it can float better. It would need some kind of lock for transport. The good news is that I have enough room at the end of my driveway to turn around! I also noticed that it did bounce around a bit... but it was picking out some fair sized rocks that were just sticking up a bit. I went around and picked them up afterwards. Later passes should fill in the holes left behind.

 

[bcp]

Have you looked at some of the commercial tongue-pulled graders for ideas?

TP Series Grader - DoMor Equipment

Mini Tongue Pull - YouTube

Tongue Pulled Grader

Bruce

 

[Sodo]

I'm thinking a relief cut, bend slightly, then re-weld. That or put a hinge so that it can float better. It would need some kind of lock for transport.

The plane needs a hinge, needs to float on its own, and the only thing it wants from the ATV is pulling power. You don't want the ATV crossing a ditch, to lift the blade off the surface. Just illustrative, I don't believe this would happen, but I think you want the blade to be completely ignorant of what the ATV wheels encounter.

Aside from that issue, you're pulling from the center of the ball, (up a foot or so high) while the landplane is resisting this pull by its ground contact. Which creates a 'moment' (or another word used is torque) rotating the landplane forward, and tends to dig the front in, and raise the back of the plane. As you reported. You can add weight to the rear to resist this moment but that will add difficulty to the pull.

A detail to pay attention to is the ball height to ground contact dimension. You could lower that a little by going to a clevis type arrengement, or maybe lower it further by inverting the ball in its receiver and flipping the trailer hitch upside down on the landplane.

On the landplane, consider changeing that drawbar to hinge very near to the ground. I can't type without armwaving too, so if you don't understand what I typed, unhook the ball hitch from the ATV and tack a couple chains right at ground level on the skids, and pull it around, and you'll understand what I am trying to type. A hinge will work if its near ground level, and perhaps a longer drawbar will help too. You can experiment with chain length. Longer will tow better but length needs to be balanced against maneuverability.

Maybe it doesn't need a hinge if the hitch (and ball) are invert-able (downward), then maybe the ball rotates upward (in the receiver) for transport, down to grade. Which will also add down-force to the front of the ATV in a hard pull. You don't need ground clearance while grading, only while transporting.

Anyway, this is all typing across the continent - you will figure out what to do I'm sure. As I said before I'm inspired by your project to build one and very much appreciate your work reporting the weights and the assessment of what an ATV will pull.

 

[NS Gearhead]

I noticed that those commercial tongue-pulled graders are hinged, but are made rigid with an adjustable link in operation.

I think I'll take 1/2" out the the "riser" in the tongue and see how it works then. Not much to loose... it'll take me 15min max.

After looking at it again, I think I had it set up perfectly on the garage floor, but my weight on the bike made the rear settle a little causing it to lower, pulling the tongue down, lifting the back. I suppose I could just set my rear shocks to max stiffness and try that first....

 

[Mendonsy]

I suspect you will find it does need to be somewhat adjustable. The tongue will push down more on your ATV as the load increases. You'll probably have to adjust it a bit depending on the soil conditions to get the results you want.

 

[jenkinsph]

I suspect you will find it does need to be somewhat adjustable. The tongue will push down more on your ATV as the load increases. You'll probably have to adjust it a bit depending on the soil conditions to get the results you want.

I agree with Mendonsy.

 

[NS Gearhead]

Hmm, well I could do something. No biggie.

Married the jacks to the casters


Dug out and blew off 1" of grinding dust off my bender. LOL


Made some terrible bends... though getting better with each one. I use shims to keep them from squishing. I had 1" down pat, but 1.5" is all new.


and after lots of measuring, cutting, grinding and welding came up with this




Here is is with a piece of 1" square tubing under the tire


Here it is with the tubing removed


I either have to weld the "socket" into the jack, or somehow tighten up the pin... maybe drill and go to the next size up with tighter clearances.

 

[NS Gearhead]

Hmm, after looking the pictures over I see that I welded the socket on wrong. I made it so the pin goes in side to side and it may have been better up and down.... but then the slop would be front to back instead of side to side.

 

[jenkinsph]

Nice work and a good effort but I think you are working on adjusting the wrong end. What you need is an adjustable link to adjust the tongue height. A heavy duty electric actuator would be good if you can't use a hydraulic cylinder.

 

[NS Gearhead]

Oh I know... this was in the original plan. I'll use a turnbuckle style link to adjust the front.

 

[jwmorris]

Looks like you need a longer round pipe welded to the jack that has a better fit from its ID to the OD of the part you made or you could cut another set of holes at 12 and 6 o'clock and weld some nuts to the tube so you can lock it in with bolts.

Either way doesn't look right to me, generally you want to mount a jack as close to the bottom as you can because it is stronger that way. They mounted it that way so you would have maximum height change from "up" to "down" with little consideration for strength because jacks like that are designed for applications with very little toungue weight.

If it were me I would:

A. Weld it on there, never going to need to swivel it.
B. Add an identical part about 10-12" below so it is supported at the top and bottom.
C. Both of the above
D. Tear up the sheet of paper I wrote the idea on.

Trailer jacks are ok for keeping something held up but are not designed for the side load. Also the part that keeps the center tube from rotating in the outer is not much stronger that what it takes to keep the tube from spinning as you crank on the screw to change height. They are also "sloppy" so you are always going to have toe in or out and likely both as they rattle around.

Your machine doesn't look like it will see "industral" use so you may be fine but would have been a better design if you mounted the wheels on a swing arm and raised and lowered the swing arm with a jack. Think 4 wheeler but put a jack where the shock goes.

Or like Jenkins said mount them solid and make a Clevis out of your toung where the "Z" meets the "V" and add the jack there to raise and lower from that end.

 

[jwmorris]

If you mounted the tires to a section of material like you used for the sides and made it pivot from the front, you would have something much more solid, no need to make so many bends, and only need one jack.

Along the lines of this concept but on a larger scale.

So, if you have the pivot at the front of (guessing) an 8" wide section of material, weld a lever that goes straight up (you could add gussets for strength) come off the front with something similar. Now you can mount the jack horizontal connecting the two. At this point just extend the jack handle and you can adjust it from seated position on your 4 wheeler.

 

[NS Gearhead]

Yeah, I agree that mounting it up high on the jack wasn't a good idea... creates too much neg leverage. I guess I just had it stuck in my head that I wanted to use the factory mount. However, I'm not going to scrap it all and go a different route. I'll make it better. I've got some ideas. Your way doesn't allow for building a crown in the driveway I wanted them independent.

Trying to make something that works and looks good isn't easy, but I like to challenge myself. My buddies make fun of me for being "fancy". LOL