On 15 Jul 2003 09:37:09 -0700, (Craig Suslosky)
wrote:

Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
help would be great.
Thanks,
Craig
Greetings Craig,
I have a "Bush Hog". It even says that on the machine. It has a
gearbox on top that is a right angle drive. Max input speed is 540
rpm. The gearbox turns a large disc (about 2 feet dia.) that in turn
has blades affixed to it. These blade are mounted on piviots. I
believe they are 1" dia.. The blades are thrown out by the spinning
disc and will fold back when encountering immovable objects. If I was
you I'd get a used one and adapt your motor and wheels to it. You can
pick 'em up pretty cheap used. I beat the hell out of mine and it
keeps on cutting. So getting a used one, if the gearbox and bearings
are good, will provide you with a ready-made platform for all sorts of
weldments to bolt your motor and reduction gear to. And making blades
would be tough. Look at some and you can see why. Not saying it can't
be done but you may be able to spend your time better.
ERS

No plans, Just food for thought.
You could adapt parts from an old riding mower pretty cheap.
Also, the hubs on small trailers, like boat trailers look an awful lot like
those spindle housings on a mowing deck.
Old riding mowers are a goldmine of parts for tinkerers.

--

Ron Thompson
On the Beautiful Mississippi Gulf Coast
USA

Moderator of http://groups.yahoo.com/group/castinghobby/

http://www.plansandprojects.com

"A man who works with his mind, heart, and billfold is an Entrepreneur"
Joe Martin, owner of Sherline Products, Inc.
"Craig Suslosky" wrote in message
om...
Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
help would be great.
Thanks,
Craig

On 15 Jul 2003 09:37:09 -0700, (Craig Suslosky)
wrote:

Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
help would be great.
Thanks,
Craig
We put the belly mower from a Cub Cadet in front of my brothers Quad,
using the plow frame and a 16 HP Honda. Replaced the "skimmer rollers"
with real casters.

My friend and I are currently making such an item. Only thing its will
be pushed instead of pulled by the 4 wheeler. Made the deck from 14 ga
sheet steel, with reinforced lips, has three blades and is suspended
from a tubular steel frame which rides on pneumatic tired casters.
Power is a 14hp elect start B & S with a centrifugal clutch driving
the blades, which we made spindles for and I cast the aluminum
spindle housing for. Blades used are commonly available and basically
this unit was built around the cheaper and more readily avalable
blades as found in wal mart etc. We have no plans per se, but looked
around on the internet for various factory made units, and took the
best ideas we found and incorporated them into our design. It will be
a 60" cut. Nothing needs to be real fancy about the deck itself, and
IMHO the most important part is the ease to hook it up and also the
height adjust.

Just look at a basic lawnmower and scale it up.

Regards


On 15 Jul 2003 09:37:09 -0700, (Craig Suslosky)
wrote:

x-Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
x-four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
x-front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
x-16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
x-or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
x-mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
x-the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
x-help would be great.
x- Thanks,
x- Craig

--
Visit my website:
http://www.frugalmachinist.com
Contents: foundry and general metal working and lots of related projects.
Regards
Roy aka Chipmaker // Foxeye
Opinions are strictly those of my wife....I have had no input whatsoever.
Remove capital A from chipmAkr for correct email address

On 15 Jul 2003 09:37:09 -0700, (Craig Suslosky) wrote:
Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
help would be great.

If you want an eyeball look, wander over to your nearest Northern Hydraulics,
Northern Handyman, Northern Tool (whatever they're calling themselves this
week), and look at the *rough cut* mowers they have on display. Bring your
own tape measure, or buy one at the store.

Gary

I'll never forget the Iowa farmer mowing his front yard on a garden tractor
with 4 push mowers dragged behind, 2 off either flank.

Joel. phx

"Craig Suslosky" wrote in message
om...
Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
help would be great.
Thanks,
Craig

We had this discussion at work not too long ago... One of our
inspectors was complaining about how long it took him to cut his lawn
with the lawn tractor. IIRC, they came up with two solutions. One was
to haul a few run-of-the-mill push mowers behind, and the other was to
haul some of those man-powered old-fashioned mowers behind. (He
http://cleanairgardening.com/reelmowers.html?br38) Not that he would
have spent $200 a pop for them, more like scrounged them from flea
markets, auction sales, etc. They figured that less could go wrong with
the manual ones, and they wouldn't have to gas up four push-mowers plus
the lawn tractor. Don't know if he's actually started working it or not.

chem

Joel Corwith wrote:
I'll never forget the Iowa farmer mowing his front yard on a garden tractor
with 4 push mowers dragged behind, 2 off either flank.

Joel. phx

"Craig Suslosky" wrote in message
om...

Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
help would be great.
Thanks,
Craig

IIRC, they came up with two solutions. One was
to haul a few run-of-the-mill push mowers behind,

Thinking about it, I realize I must have liked mowing a lot less
than building mowers...

I have had two sets of pull-behind reel mowers on my homemade
tractor (another long story...) I made one from 3 conventional
powered reel mowers. They had a ratchet clutch so that powering the
reel (original setup) powered the wheels. I needed to go back to
having the wheels power the reels, and I found that reversing
the two ratchet clutches right-to-left reversed the action.

So: THAT one can be done...

Later I traded an engine for three commercial golf-course pull
behind reel mowers. Ran that for 10 years.

Got a new house with a lot of rough grass-weeds that didn't mow
with reel mowers. Put 3 typical person-pushed rotary mowers
ganged behind the old tractor. Cut most stuff fine. The 3 mower
engines plus the tractor gave it a sort of Ford TriMotor
(Another long story ending up in the Smithsonian) acoustic
signature.

You can do it if you're willing to weld and hack a little.

Jeez.. I hadn't remembered some of this stuff for years...
--
Regards, Terry King ...In The Woods In Vermont

The one who Dies With The Most Parts LOSES!! What do you need?

I have a friend that built a side mower, from an old cub cadet L & G
tractor. Made a deck about 60", and uses the motor from th original
cub cadet, (still mountyed in the tractor itself to set on top of the
deck he made. Tractor is complete wioth just the wheels removed.
Deck looks just like any L & G garden tractor deck would look like.
THis entire assembly is then mounted with sway braces, and pulled
alongside a larger tractor with a belly mower. Cuts approx 11 feet
wide at a clip. The original Cub Cadet can be readly removed and
converted back to its original configuration without spending a lot of
time doing it.

On Wed, 16 Jul 2003 14:43:51 GMT, (Gary Coffman)
wrote:

x-On 15 Jul 2003 09:37:09 -0700, (Craig Suslosky) wrote:
x-Does anybody have plans for a brush hog type mower to pull behind a
x-four wheeler? I wouldnt be cutting brush, just rough grass, not my
x-front lawn. I have seen a few in catalogs but not in person. I have a
x-16HP B&S motor to use, some wheels for the back. I would have to buy
x-or make blade spindle housings, and blades. I was looking at a Ferris
x-mower at work the other day. It looks pretty rugged, but I couldnt see
x-the spindle housings. Does anyone have any advice on this subject? Any
x-help would be great.
x-
x-If you want an eyeball look, wander over to your nearest Northern Hydraulics,
x-Northern Handyman, Northern Tool (whatever they're calling themselves this
x-week), and look at the *rough cut* mowers they have on display. Bring your
x-own tape measure, or buy one at the store.
x-
x-Gary

--
Visit my website:
http://www.frugalmachinist.com
Contents: foundry and general metal working and lots of related projects.
Regards
Roy aka Chipmaker // Foxeye
Opinions are strictly those of my wife....I have had no input whatsoever.
Remove capital A from chipmAkr for correct email address