Towable driveway graders

jackpine savage · Mar 31, 2019

I have a 1/4 mile driveway to maintain. Right now I have a 3 point blade and have been planning on building a land plane. But, I was driving around the neighborhood last night and noticing how bad all the driveways looked. I have many Amish neighbors, and those narrow buggy wheels really cut up driveways. It occurred to me there might be an opportunity to provide a service and maybe pay for the equipment at least.

I started searching on Land Planes and ran across a couple that can be towed behind a truck. That would sure cut down on road time versus running my 7000 Allis around.

The two I found were from Domar and Eco Grader. The one from Eco Grader looked interesting in that the rear blade is adjustable to build up a crown.

Does anyone have experience with these or others like them? Anyone do custom driveway grading like this, and if so what are you charging?

Here's a couple pics:

TP Series Grader - Domor

6FT Grader | Chicago Road Graders, Towable Graders and Road Grader Sales

bcp · Mar 31, 2019

I've seen photos of a driveway grader mounted on the rear of a small dump truck and on a Jeep.

Bruce

bcp · Mar 31, 2019

How about a low-profile land plane hung under a second-hand boat trailer?

Bruce

jackpine savage · Mar 31, 2019

bcp said:
How about a low-profile land plane hung under a second-hand boat trailer?

Bruce

Thank you, that's a great idea! A boat trailer is real similar to that eco grader. They wanted almost $6k for that, out of my price range.

TractorGuy · Mar 31, 2019

I picked up a free boat trailer last year. I have considered putting my 5' grader blade on it but haven't gone beyond thinking. My grader is hung with a 1" stud so it would be fairly simple to bore a hole in the trailer tongue and weld in a 1" bushing and plate. I would still use my tractor and control height with the 3pt.

oosik · Mar 31, 2019

I have a Land Plane LPGS - GS2584. It's a very nice unit but has many limitations. It WILL smooth out the speed riffles, and generally smooth the driveway. It's an exceptionally easy implement to learn and use.

It WILL NOT - crown the driveway, move material either sideways or down the length of the driveway, clear the ditches, plow snow or gather and move material like a box blade.

I'm going to sell mine. I've had & used it for four years now. It's just not the implement I hoped it would be.

sandman2234 · Mar 31, 2019

oosik said:
I have a Land Plane LPGS - GS2584. It's a very nice unit but has many limitations. It WILL smooth out the speed riffles, and generally smooth the driveway. It's an exceptionally easy implement to learn and use.

It WILL NOT - crown the driveway, move material either sideways or down the length of the driveway, clear the ditches, plow snow or gather and move material like a box blade.

I'm going to sell mine. I've had & used it for four years now. It's just not the implement I hoped it would be.

I haven't used my box blade since I built my landplane grader. so this surprises me.
David from jax

fried1765 · Mar 31, 2019

oosik said:
I have a Land Plane LPGS - GS2584. It's a very nice unit but has many limitations. It WILL smooth out the speed riffles, and generally smooth the driveway. It's an exceptionally easy implement to learn and use.

It WILL NOT - crown the driveway, move material either sideways or down the length of the driveway, clear the ditches, plow snow or gather and move material like a box blade.

I'm going to sell mine. I've had & used it for four years now. It's just not the implement I hoped it would be.

Interesting!
Having been trained as as Civil engineer, I view the land plane as a homeowner gadget that SMOOTHS driveways, but does not GRADE them.
I have a box blade and a rear blade (EA Deluxe Scrape Blade).
The box blade sits in the barn.

The EA blade is excellent, and if it had a tail wheel,(longer wheelbase) it might even be superb.

RickB · Mar 31, 2019

Here ya go!

fried1765 · Mar 31, 2019

RickB said:
Here ya go!

The forerunner of the motor grader.
I'll bet it did a great job ..... in it's day.

TerryR · Mar 31, 2019

We had one on the farm when I was a kid. We used it to close irrigation ditches in the fall so the harvesting equipment could move though the fields. Worked great for that occasional use.

airbiscuit · Apr 1, 2019

I always thought this was a nice design, nut don't see anything current about it.

bcp · Apr 1, 2019

What I like about that Pull Grader is that the blade is a regular 3pt implement that could be replaced with a rake, box blade, etc.

Bruce

RickB · Apr 1, 2019

fried1765 said:
The forerunner of the motor grader.
I'll bet it did a great job ..... in it's day.

I know of several thoroughbred breeders that had similar units to dress their training tracks well into the 1990s

mcfarmall · Apr 1, 2019

These look pretty sweet! Hoelscher Commercial Products - GR Grader

jackpine savage · Apr 2, 2019

Thanks for the ideas guys. That Hoelscher is heavy duty! The video of the road maintainer is very interesting. I'm going to check out the price on the Dolmar.