Hello, just purchased a Woods grader scraper. Have 3,00ft long gravel driveway that I have been using a regular blade and back blading it with but over the years its developed some pretty good wash boarding in places that the regulars blade just wouldnt take out. I was looking at the grader scraper and how much better they made the roads look after using them so i went and bought one. Does anyone have one that they use? Trying to get some tips/tricks on using and setting one up and adjusting the blade heights. I used mine today for about an hour and it kept leaving drag marks from the side shoes in the driveway if i had it all the way down. I had to just barely have it down to not leave the marks, but then it didnt seem to cut the grade that much. DO i need to do it in steps like lower the blades past the shoes then cut it, then go back and raise then to smooth it out?
Woods GSS60P
- Thread starter Ironheadchop
- Start date
BigG
Well-known member
Equipment
l2501, FEL, BB, Rotary cutter, rake,spreader, roller, etc. New Holland TL80 A
Are you calling the rip teeth the "blades" ? Set the rip teeth down and make several passes to loosen up the gravel. After that raise the teeth and use the plane to smooth out the gravel. Tractor Time is using a box blade but the job your land plane will do is the same idea.
BigG
Well-known member
Equipment
l2501, FEL, BB, Rotary cutter, rake,spreader, roller, etc. New Holland TL80 A
BigG
Well-known member
Equipment
l2501, FEL, BB, Rotary cutter, rake,spreader, roller, etc. New Holland TL80 A
The land plane you bought doesn't move a lot of gravel like a box blade does. It is more of a finish tool. Loosen up the gravel with the rip teeth first then retract them and smooth with your lane plane. At first it will be a lot of work but once you get it fixed you will be able to keep up with it pretty easily.
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Ive found that I get the best results if I have very little weight on the front of the plane. So you'll want to lengthen the top link to get some weight off the front. As you use it, it will want to load up the front and everything will level out. If all the weight is on the front of the plane, the front corners will dig in and leave gouges.
Blades should be JUST below the shoes for finish work.
Blades should be JUST below the shoes for finish work.
Do you float it just till the blades touch or do you drop the whole scraper down and drag it?
Drop it and drag. You want the shoes to ride on the ground but not have the front corners gouge in.
Also, depending on the condition of your driveway, you may need to adjust the cutting edges for a deeper cut until you get some of the larger aggregate worked up. Once you have decent material to work with, raise the cutting edges up so you're just fluffing the loosened material.
I just put my parking area back together today and took a couple passes down the drive before applying some dust control
Another thing you need if you want the land plane to work well is material. If you dont have material spilling over the blade, you are wasting time and simply moving material from one place to another.
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Depends on the size of aggregate in your drive. Conservatively, 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch for finish work. You want to be able to feather out your last pass otherwise you'll end up with a pile. If you have a hydraulic top link this is easy to do. If you dont, youll have to accomplish that feathering by slowly raising the 3 point.
When the drive was put in 10 years ago it was done in a base layer of big stone the stepped up to have 57's as a top. Been using 57s for quite a few years now. Overall its still in good shape just starting to get some washboarding and a high spot in the center that the old single back blade wouldnt take out. I have the blades set about 1/4 " below the shoes. Seems like that was to much? When i made a few passes the other day it was really cutting and bringing up some dirt. No hyd top link but i can feather it out. Used to doing that with the old single blade.
As you can see i got a pretty good size hill on the front part of the driveway. Feel like i got most of the washboard cut out of it. Made 6 or 7 passes up with the blades below the sides shoes then set it back down level with the sides to try and finish it. Is it better to start at the bottom and pull up both side as to try to bring material up the hill rather than pull it all down? Also as you can see, will there always be side shoe marks in it when finishing. I tried adjusting the top link to where it tilted the box back but it still was leaving the marks when it was all the way down. If i floated it up a little bit they went away.
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My first thought is its because you're running down the center of your drive. There is normally a crown there and the plane will build a crown simply by the nature of the angle of the blades.
Looks like what happening is material is building up in front of the first blade faster than it can spill over and its spilling out the sides. My suggestion would be to run either side of the drive and dont run down the center.
You can also lengthen the top link a little more so material isn't building up in front of the first blade so fast.
Looks like what happening is material is building up in front of the first blade faster than it can spill over and its spilling out the sides. My suggestion would be to run either side of the drive and dont run down the center.
You can also lengthen the top link a little more so material isn't building up in front of the first blade so fast.