My Big Lawn Mower!

[Shawn T. W]

I "collect" rocks in the bucket when I mow with the Massey Ferguson (gotta come up with a way with the Kubota!) When I lift a big rock, I pick through the ones, or "pieces" of rocks I've busted up, and drop them in the hole left by the big one I snagged out ...

The 5' brush hog hanging off the back of a quick hitch is a tad heavy for the Massey Ferguson, as the steering is "light", so I usually start out with about half a bucket of rocks anyways ...

 

[Old Machinist]

I would say your property is not a good candidate for a regular finish mower. You might want to get that one with the swinging blades. Even at that those blades will take a beating on a rock.

 

[Shawn T. W]

Most blades take a beating on rocks!

While I like the idea of a flail and the ability to have it offset ... Inorder for it to miss most of the rocks it also needs to be quite high ... I'm leary if it will do a good job of cutting ... And the grass cutting blades aren't too heavy duty to take rocks, and be able to salvage them afterwards, and replacing them usually is a all or nothing project, and that gets expensive ... Popping off a couple of blades on a regular mower is easy to sharpen ...

To be truthful ... I probably only hit 2-3 rocks per mowing at most, and usually it's from scuffing them up with the skid shoes of the brush hog, that then gets rolled over under the deck ... With a finish mower having 4 wheels, it doesn't seem as likely to happen, plus I'd buy the optional center anti-scalp roller ...

The area I live in is locally called "Rocky Hollow" ... For good reason!

 

[Shawn T. W]

Home for lunch now, then I gotta get it unloaded ...

Hook it up and check the driveshaft length, and grease ... Then cut some grass!

 

[S-G-R]

Home for lunch now, then I gotta get it unloaded ...

View attachment 163449

Hook it up and check the driveshaft length, and grease ... Then cut some grass!

It looks like it's built like a tank. Looking forward to hearing what you think of it.

 

[Shawn T. W]

I got them to take $300 off, they said the guy had only used it once, then traded it for a brush hog, he had it on a JD 5055E, I looked at the blades and the baffles, they look OK, but is missing some paint under there, but supposedly it is a 2019 model?

It is definitely commercial grade, I spent the afternoon getting familiar with it, adjusting it, greasing it, had to go to town and get a PTO shaft extension, was surprised to see that not only was there a grease zerk fitting in the center of the yoke, but also on one of the end caps too, they are connected together. (You can see both here)

It was quite interesting getting it off the trailer, I used a come along ... I put my scale in-between to see how heavy it was, flyer says it weighs 930 Lbs, I forgot to switch over my scale from kilograms, and it was already tared out with the chains hanging, so I left it there, said 501 KG! Which is about 1102 Lbs! Scale is only rated for 500KG/ 1100 Lb ...

I then drove the trailer out from under it ...

Then I had to get it down on the ground. . . I got a step ladder but was hard to reach the come along ... So I took the forks on my SCUT and stuck them under to steady it from swinging, and stepped on it ... While cranking it down I heard a strange sound, and saw the carabineer was STRETCHING! I quickly grabbed a short chain and bypassed the whole scale ... Guess it didn't like me standing on it and trying to tell me to go on a diet!

After getting it on the ground, you can see how much it stretched until the chain stopped it, it is only aluminum!

All the grease fittings took a lot of grease, 14 zerks total, I readjusted the height to 5.5" ... I'll see how that works out tomorrow ...

Checked the gearbox oil level, and it was quite full on the dipstick, so I drained it out!

 

[S-G-R]

Nice save! The more I see of it I'm getting mower envy

 

[McMXi]

@Shawn T. W , very nice cutter. Those Land Pride models that begin with a 3 are beefed up for sure. I have an RC3712 and it's a beast at 4,000 lb.

 

[Shawn T. W]

Only real casualty was I got my hand pinched in the come along, fortunately I was wearing gloves leather gloves!

I'm sure it will look worse tomorrow ... And I'll need to pick up a STEEL carabineer for the scale ...

Being independent, alone, and stubborn ... Stuff happens, I did tuck my cell phone in my pocket before climbing on to winch it down ... I'm horrible about carrying it on me I leave it either in my truck, on the kitchen counter, or in the glove box on the tractors ...

 

[Russell King]

Don’t use snap carabiners for lifting. Get a screw together chain link at least. A lifting shackle would be better.

You could also put the come-along under the other lifting things instead of on top. Then it would be easier to reach.

 

[McMXi]

Only real casualty was I got my hand pinched in the come along, fortunately I was wearing gloves leather gloves!

View attachment 163463

I'm sure it will look worse tomorrow ... And I'll need to pick up a STEEL carabineer for the scale ...

Being independent, alone, and stubborn ... Stuff happens, I did tuck my cell phone in my pocket before climbing on to winch it down ... I'm horrible about carrying it on me I leave it either in my truck, on the kitchen counter, or in the glove box on the tractors ...

Looks like you're not a stranger to hurting your hands.

When I worked as a commercial diver and welder, an injury that occurred way too often with those just starting out, and even some more experienced, was hands getting pinched in the eye of a sling as the tension in the sling increases. One of the first things you learn, and quickly, is to keep your hands out of pinch points.

By the way, it's so easy to get pinched working under water, particularly in low visibility. Cutting sheet pile was particularly hazardous.

 

[Shawn T. W]

Yeah, I learn by "ouch!" Middle finger was lost in a "degloving" accident involving a printing press . . . Cut my fingernail trimming by 10%

I was just using the carabineer that came with the scale, figured it should work ... Probably would have if I hadn't added my 185 Lbs to it ... ?

Got the edge of the field mowed with the Z-turn, as I like to stick that deck under the barbwire fence . . . Just finished lunch, headed out to try out my new big lawnmower!

 

[Shawn T. W]

WOW! Time flies by fast, I started out on my front field which use to be a hayfield, about 6 acres, I was mowing it with my commercial Z-turn with a 31 HP engine and 60" deck, which takes me between 2 - 2.25 hours to mow at usually 10 mph ...

The grass was kinda thin today, and most of it was only about 8" tall, with some seed head stalks sticking up over 12" ... I cut it down to 5" , GREAT clippings dispersal! (Couldn't see them!)

After the first couple of laps, I bumped up the speed to maximum in medium range, which is 7.2 mph ...after about a quarter of it was cut, I noticed I had some pop-ups, I slowed down to 6 mph, that took care of that problem, I figure the stems had a tiny bit more time to both pop back up from the tires, but also had more "dwell" time under the deck ... I was done in 1.7 hours!

All done with the front!

Then I went out to the old bumpy rock filled pasture ...

Because this is wider than my tires, I can get a little more of the edge along the creek ...

Even with some of the taller and thicker grass, still no visible clippings ... I mowed at 5-5.5 mph because of the bumpy ground.

All done!

This is looking back the other way, from up on the hill behind the clump of trees behind the tractor ... The first " line" is the creek, the second "line" is my west perimeter fence ...

Total of 4.8 hours to mow 14 acres!

To think back after I bought this place, and brush hogged the over grown neglected back pasture, I originally had a 4' brush hog for my SCUT, it cut 44", minus any overlap ... It was a day and a half project to mow just the pasture! No more bugs, poison ivy, dust and chaff in my eyes and down my shirt, in the very hot and humid months I use to mow for 1.5 - 2 hours at most with a wet towel wrapped around my neck, then come inside and take a COLD Shower, then sit in front of a fan to dry off in the a/c in the house ... Not doing that anymore, the heat/humidity would suck the energy completely out of me!

Overall I'm very happy with it, there does seem to be some sideways sway to the mower, as it shifts around in the quick hitch, plus has its own floppy upper and lower connections ... Mowing on a side hill it will pretty much line up with my tire on the uphill side ...

If I'm going down hill, and make a sharp turn over 4.5 mph, it seems to me that it's pushing the tractors rear tires side ways, kinda like I'm power sliding!

I may decide to fill the tires, there were a few times I actually needed 4X4, which really surprised me, as I have mowed this twice with my 5' brush hog on it in just 2 wheel drive! I'll wait until after the spring rains and see how it does in softer ground with rutting ...

 

[Shawn T. W]

I got to thinking last night just before falling asleep ... While I didn't spend nearly $20K on this "Big Lawnmower" to "save" money ... It does burn less fuel ...

I took a picture of my dash before I started mowing yesterday, and after, as my memory isn't the greatest to keep track of the hours ... But I thought, it also would show the fuel tank level ... Which I was purposely letting get "low" as when I bought the tractor it came with a full tank of fuel, and I added HotShots Diesel Extreme which is a fuel system cleaner, beside the regular dose of there EDT and a half dose of the LX4 ... I wanted to get that tank completely through, before adding more fuel ... Part way through the back pasture the fuel light came on, it was down to one bar, I made a couple more passes, then went up to the garage and added 5 gallons of fuel ...

The fuel tank holds 11.4 gallons, and each bar is an 1/8th of a tank, while I don't know how accurate it is, I didn't run out! (When visibly full, gauge reads "full")

Each bar, if accurate is equal to almost 1.5 gallons ... So I burned roughly 6.5 gallons to mow the whole 14 acres ... Pretty good for a 2.4 liter 4 cylinder 52 HP engine ... Considering the Kawasaki FX921V 31 HP at 999 cc in my Z-turn burns roughly 6 gallons of premium 91 octane 100% gas just to do the front 6 acres! The premium is higher cost per gallon than the off road red died diesel too!

Start.

Finished.

 

[Fastball714]

I had my big lawnmower out yesterday. I'm hoping this will be my last cutting this year.

 

[chim]

Shawn, that's a really nice setup you have there. Your mowing time is similar to mine. My 7-1/2' deck can do 18 minutes/acre if I want to beat the snot out of it and cut a pattern to "git 'er done" or 25 minutes/acre going diagonal making it purty. The 5 footer took 33 minutes/acre.

 

[S-G-R]

I had my big lawnmower out yesterday. I'm hoping this will be my last cutting this year. View attachment 163534

That's awesome! What model AFM are you using?

 

[McMXi]

That's awesome! What model AFM are you using?

Looks like an AFM4211 to me. Must be nice to mow a lawn with that thing, even with the 9 blades (18 cutting edges) to sharpen.

 

[Fastball714]

That's awesome! What model AFM are you using?

It's a AMF4211. I didn't think I had enough tractor for the 14'. I cut about 28 acres with it. I save a lot of time and fuel. My 6' finishing mower would take all day and part of another.

The blades are easy to sharpen, but 6 are left handed. You are stuck buying blades from the dealer. The 3 right are available from other places.

 

[McMXi]

It's a AMF4211. I didn't think I had enough tractor for the 14'. I cut about 28 acres with it. I save a lot of time and fuel. My 6' finishing mower would take all day and part of another.

The blades are easy to sharpen, but 6 are left handed. You are stuck buying blades from the dealer. The 3 right are available from other places.

The fact that the outer mower decks fold up for transport makes sharpening a lot easier right.

I have a Land Pride RC3712 folding cutter and I swear that sharpening the six blades on that beast is a lot easier than sharpening the two on the RCR1884. I can use the hydraulics to raise the center deck to gain easy access to the two blades in the middle, and with the outer decks folded up it couldn't be any easier to service those blades.