We have a little seating area by the pond. Nothing fancy at all, just a collection of stuff sitting on the dirt in a clear spot on the shore. Wife likes to move and rearrange stuff a LOT, so when she set this up I agreed to grade level it off after it had been stable long enough to be confirmed as a long term setup. After numerous iterations it has been unchanged for a while. She asked a few days ago if I was ever going to level out the area and clean up the exposed trip hazard roots where the chairs and table sit. The area is on a little hump so just a bit unlevel in all directions. Agreed no changes in past 6 months so I’d put it on the list.
This is kind of a piddly nothing of a project but it’s a good example of why I really love both the SSQA and the hydraulic top link/side link. The furniture is Amish made solid plastic-wood so it’s pretty heavy and cumbersome (forks). The footstool log that had to be moved weighs somewhere between two stout dudes can roll it uphill but can’t lift it and no problem for the loader (grapple because if it rolls off the forks it will be in the pond). Needed to move a little dirt and a couple yards of wood chips (bucket).
To level, started off with the tractor sitting at an angle and boxblade tilted to level. Next pass, tractor was a little closer to level so had to adjust tilt on boxblade. Could have done static adjustments between passes without the hydraulic sidelink but would have been much slower and wouldn’t have been able to adjust while moving, which is helpful maintaining level while the contour of the land the tractor is on changes. If I was better with the blade I could have gotten it done with fewer passes but I didn’t want to take out more roots than necessary or have to finish with backfill after over cutting so took it slow.
Need one more bucket of chips to finish. Got close, but was in a race against the rain and didn’t quite get it in before being rained out. At least got the bare dirt covered and the furniture back in place.
View attachment 123185
View attachment 123186
View attachment 123187