What is heaviest material for ballast box?

[CMV]

Sadly I'm fresh out of both gold and depleted uranium

I agree swapping implements for a ballast box is wasted time. But one of my berms that i fill from the rear is a tight space. So the compact box is less worry than even a box blade. Big enough machine now that I could probably fix the limited space part - my little 25HP couldn't move some of what's behind that berm.

I get the Kioti tomorrow so will see how it fits, but since I was cramped with the LS, that is only going to get worse in that spot. Plus side is the extendable 3pt arms, no turnbuckels for stabilizers, and hyd toplink - I'm thinking swapping whatever is on the 3pt isn't going to be a big deal at all. And I always tended to leave the ballast box on. Box blade or bush hog went on if I needed to use them, but was hard with the low ground clearance machine getting in/out of shipping container with a low hanging implement on 3pt. Ballast box rode high enough it could just stay.

I hadn't thought about concrete being permanent as a bad thing. Would there be a reason to NOT want it permanently filled. I've never emptied mine now for any reason (other than accidentally tipping it once which luckily didn't create too big a mess).

I have this Titan box from Amazon. Specs say it weighs 132 lbs, has 800 lbs capacity, and holds 5.3 cu ft. Will be lifting heaping scoops of red clay fill dirt to max height, so appx ~1/2 yd. So I'm guessing I want that box as heavy as I can reasonably get it - without putting a fortune into material. Have a few scrap yards nearby so will ask around if any get a lot of metal slugs. We make insane amounts where I work punching copper - 3/8"-1/2" diameter, 1/4" thick discs. That would be perfect, but since we get a LOT of $ per lb for scrap copper (almost as much as we pay for new raw copper per lb) I'm sure they would frown on me helping myself to some

 

[EddieWalker]

Probably one of the easiest and cleanest looking weights that I've seen added to the rear of a tractor was lengths of rebar on top of a box blade. Just keep cutting and stacking them until you have enough.

I don't have a loader on my tractor, and I needed more weight up front, so I found a free big rig brake drum and bolted it to the front of my frame. I put some broken up concrete and rocks into it, and it's worked great.

 

[Eric102]

I've been collecting 42 lb tractor weights over the years and found that 13 of them fit perfectly in the bottom 1/2 of my Titan ballast box leaving the upper 1/2 open for tools, chains etc. Easy to remove when I need some on my garden tractor.

 

[bigtiller]

I read here on TBN that Portland Cement is heaver than premixed concrete, so that is what I used. I added some scrap steel I had laying around and filled it to within 10 inches of the top for about 600 pounds. I use that with the snowblower. When I have the pallet forks on I add another 300 pounds of wheel weights and flat bar steel.

 

[BHD]

I think gold is heavier than lead, even tungsten or depleted uranium

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Used to work with a guy, who would joke about dating fat girls in the winter, for better traction in the snow.....

 

[TerryR]

I think gold is heavier than lead, even tungsten or depleted uranium

Actually, gold and tungsten are the same, and uranium only fractionally less. They are all half again as heavy a lead, and over twice as heavy as iron. See below:

Element Density g/cm3

Osmium 22.59
Iridium 22.50
Platinum 21.50
Rhenium 20.80
Neptunium 20.20
Plutonium 19.70
Gold 19.30
Tungsten 19.30
Uranium 19.10
Tantalum 16.40
Protactinium 15.40
Mercury 13.53
Hafnium 13.30
Rhodium 12.40
Ruthenium 12.10
Palladium 12.00
Thallium 11.80
Thorium 11.70
Lead 11.30
Technetium 11.00
Silver 10.50
Molybdenum 10.20
Actinium 10.00
Lutetium 9.84
Bismuth 9.79
Thulium 9.32
Polonium 9.20
Erbium 9.07
Copper 8.96
Nickel 8.90
Cobalt 8.86
Holmium 8.80
Cadmium 8.69
Niobium 8.57
Dysprosium 8.55
Terbium 8.23
Gadolinium 7.90
Iron 7.87

 

[JerryK]

I don't think that any of you know what the heck you are talking about. And that if you pool your resources and ship me several tons on gold.... I will gladly look into the situation and make a professional final ruling on the subject. Do not forget to send me your return address so that I can try to return the materials at some point. When I get around to publishing my findings.

 

[lennyzx11]

For sure lead.

For a while I did SCUBA and made my own weight belts from collecting old lead pipe at yard sales etc.
As a result I have probably 125 lbs of lead that I add to my rear 3 point weight.

LOL, while it would also not tarnish, gold would make good ballast weight.

Gold is a little heavier. That's what I use.

 

[rockingclawhammer]

If there is a wire rope sling shop or a crane company near you, that's where you can get cheap steel. Old wire rope is hard to get rid of and most recyclers want it cut up in 3' pieces in order to scrap it. I work for a sling shop and the only way we can get a recycler to take it is if they get it for free. Recyclers bring containers and we dump it in at any length and they have guys cut it up at their yard Since we sell the wire rope we also take the old WR from customers such as crane co. and offer free disposal. You can use a chop saw , torch etc to cut it up. Stack wire rope in there and then pour concrete as you build it up.