Landscape Rake?

[Grouse Feathers]

I have a grading scraper for grading about two miles of sand, rock and dirt driveway and shared road. All of the driveway and roads are in the woods and a good deal of vegetation, leaves, pine needles, and twigs can collect on the road especially in the fall and spring. The vegetation, leaves, pine needles and twigs all collect in the grading scraper and inhibit the flow of the road material though the grading scraper. I have been looking for a landscaping rake to clear the driveway and roads before grading. My first question; is a landscape rake the best implement for clearing the driveways and roads of the vegetation, leaves, pine needles, and twigs? Second question; since I don’t plan to do any serious landscaping with the landscaping rake will one of the cheaper rakes be sufficient?

 

[sheepfarmer]

A landscape rake will certainly gather up leaves etc very effectively but the question in my mind is will it push them off to the side nicely if that is what you want to do with them. I have a light weight inexpensive rake with gage wheels that I use to rake up manure in my pastures. Sometimes I pull the manure into a pile and then pick it up with the loader, and sometimes I try to spread it out in an area that I think could use a little fertilizing. It picks up leaves and grasses just fine. The hard part is getting vegetation to release from the rake in anything but a big bundle. I have been raking with the rake at 90 degrees, and I am not sure whether the kind of leaves and twigs you would have, would roll off the tines to the side of the road when the rake is angled. If you don't want them at the side and are willing to pick up the piles every so often with your loader, it should work for sure. I will be very interested in what others say since I'd like to clean up the leaves along the edge of my dirt road. The county plows catch them, and it kind of makes a mess.

 

[bcp]

I never had any luck moving leaves and twigs to the side with a rake. There are always too many twigs stuck between the teeth to let the rest go by.

I keep it straight until it is full, then lift the rake, leaving a pile. Then I circle back and pick up the pile with the FEL, or reverse and push it off the road with the rake.

The rake will move gravel about as good as a blade does. Angled to try to move leaves off the road may move more gravel than leaves.

If I wanted to move only leaves and twigs, I would try to find something like a pine straw rake, or build something using those round, coiled pickup teeth from a baler, rake, etc.

Bruce

 

[Grouse Feathers]

sheepfarmer & bcp

I would be more then happy to drag the piles off the side of the road with a rake or come back and move the piles off with the loader. When working on the roads I always have the fel on anyway. Dealing with the piles will be much easier than digging the stuff out of a full grader scraper by hand. I agree it would be best to drag the rake straight as I use a rear blade to crown the driveway and using the rake at an angle would tend to undo the crown.

I am not sure if a pine straw rake would pull up the vegetation on the edges and center of the driveway, but if I go that way it might also be useful dealing with the red oak leaves in the yard.

 

[bmblank]

Can you remove every other tine of your rake? Maybe a bigger opening in between will allow the dirt/gravel to flow through, but you'll still pick up the branches. Then after getting the crap out you can throw the tines back on and run over it again to finish up.

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[Grouse Feathers]

Can you remove every other tine of your rake? Maybe a bigger opening in between will allow the dirt/gravel to flow through, but you'll still pick up the branches. Then after getting the crap out you can throw the tines back on and run over it again to finish up.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

Thanks I will remember to try that if necessary. The pine needles and leaves are a bigger problem then twigs and branches as they just ball up and stay in the grader. I can pull branches out of the grader, but I have to dig out the balls of leaves and pine needles.

 

[bmblank]

Sounds like a pine rake is just what you need. If you can fluff up the needles and leaves maybe you could get a giant lawn sweeper or something similar.

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[sheepfarmer]

I think if you get the gauge wheels and set them so the tines just touch the ground you won't dig up much gravel. Helps to solve a lot of the uneven surface problems where the weight of the rake would cause it to dig in.

 

[BravoXray]

Larry,
I have a rake, but it's like everyone has said, it's not ideal for vegitation. Last fall, I bought a new Stihl BR600 backpack blower. It works great. Go right up the middle of the road blowing the right side, then drive in the opposite direction to get the other half of the road cleared. Fallen branches, leaves, etc. gone! Then you go back with your grader. Works great.

Jerry

 

[sheepfarmer]

I bet a blower would be perfect! Come to think of it, I abuse the Ingersol's mower deck in the fall by blowing leaves with it, or mowing them into piles, and I often run down my gravel drive with the deck hiked up to blow them off it, works great if they aren't too wet.

 

[Grouse Feathers]

I think a blower would work at least some of the time. A blower might even be the best solution when the leaves and pine needles are dry enough. The problem is the roadways are sunken and crowned so when the leaves and needles get wet they stay wet for a long time. Since I have a blower I will try it when conditions are right, but I expect I will still need a rake of some kind when conditions are not perfect.

Thanks to all for the input.