Idea for a lawn roller

[PHPaul]

I have a roller I made out of a 100# propane tank. It's...okay. However, even full of water there just isn't much weight there.

I ripped out two Blue Spruce trees and of course there's not enough dirt to go back in the hole where the stumps were. I ran the tractor back and forth over it multiple times and packed it as well as I could but the Ag tires leave a really rough surface and even being careful to overlap the tracks, the dirt squishes out on the sides of the tires and leaves ridges.

Back-dragging it with the bucket leaves it smooth, but pulls a bunch of dirt out of the hole.

So what I'm thinking is, attach the roller to a QA plate in such a way that when I tilt the bucket arms all the way forward the QA plate is parallel to the ground and the roller is 90° to the plate. Then I can use the power down of the loader arms to pick the front of the tractor up, putting 1/2 the weight of the tractor on the roller. Steering would be non-existent but if things get too far off course I can pick the roller up make corrections and set it back down.

See any flaws in this idea?

 

[PHPaul]

Bear in mind that's a rough sketch. I'd shorten the arms and gusset them.

Another question is, should I position the roller near the bottom of the plate, or in the middle?

 

[RCW]

Sounds like a good idea.

The only flaw I can think of is you’d be running loader curl cylinders fully extended. They are more apt to bend the rods in that fashion.

Your B has two curl cylinders which helps, but it’s something to be mindful of.

Could you design it such that it would work without fully-extended curl cylinders? Just a thought….

 

[PHPaul]

Good point. If I mount the roller towards the bottom of the QA plate, I wouldn't have extend the cylinders all the way.

 

[JimmyJazz]

I would step on the area with my boots on. Problem solved.

 

[GreensvilleJay]

drain the water out of the 'roller' onto the dirt in the holes.....
fill 'roller' with concrete, it'll be weighty then

FYI you add 12" of dirt, water it well, then repeat as required. dumping 3' of dirt and packing it once never works.

 

[armylifer]

Instead of filling the roller with concrete, fill it with sand and then add water. It will be plenty heavy then.

 

[D2Cat]

By your description it sounds like you need more dirt, then just keep using the heel of you bucket to level it and pack it a bit..

 

[GreensvilleJay]

or fill then drive front wheels onto it.keep adding buckets to fill the tire tracks
that's what I did today once I got a Black walnut stump out. no water,no roller
I know it'll settle down maybe 4-5 inches but client was happy.

 

[North Idaho Wolfman]

Rent a vibrating roller if you really want it packed.
A roller on the loader will really put almost no force on the Roller.

I assume that the roller is either three point or tow behind.
I would be more apt to put a weight box on it.

 

[wally2q]

I have a roller I made out of a 100# propane tank. It's...okay. However, even full of water there just isn't much weight there.

I ripped out two Blue Spruce trees and of course there's not enough dirt to go back in the hole where the stumps were. I ran the tractor back and forth over it multiple times and packed it as well as I could but the Ag tires leave a really rough surface and even being careful to overlap the tracks, the dirt squishes out on the sides of the tires and leaves ridges.

Back-dragging it with the bucket leaves it smooth, but pulls a bunch of dirt out of the hole.

So what I'm thinking is, attach the roller to a QA plate in such a way that when I tilt the bucket arms all the way forward the QA plate is parallel to the ground and the roller is 90° to the plate. Then I can use the power down of the loader arms to pick the front of the tractor up, putting 1/2 the weight of the tractor on the roller. Steering would be non-existent but if things get too far off course I can pick the roller up make corrections and set it back down.

See any flaws in this idea?

View attachment 139502

you could fill your propane tank full of sand. it will make it quite a bit heavier....

 

[Bugzilla46310]

I use an old conveyor pulley. It’s not water tight so I welded a platform above the roller to put ballast on. A second benefit is the design allows the tongue to set vertical when not in use.

 

[chim]

Rent a vibrating roller if you really want it packed.
A roller on the loader will really put almost no force on the Roller.

I assume that the roller is either three point or tow behind.
I would be more apt to put a weight box on it.

Yep. We built the roller below from pieces of 24" SCH 40 steel pipe filled with concrete. It was a touch over 5-1/2 feet wide. It did some good but when we had to compact asphalt millings we rented a vibratory roller.