Between the mini bike and the nearby woods, [HowToLou] has a lot for the rest of us to be envious of. Unfortunately, the terrain on the dirt path is too bumpy and uneven for a nice ride. But rather than spend hundreds to buy or rent an official grader box, [Lou] looked at his riding mower and said, I can do that myself (YouTube, embedded below).
This grader box is made from a heavy-duty oak pallet, plus a piece of particle board to complete the rocks box. [Lou] hooks up tow straps to the hooks and drags it behind the riding mower a few times to get the path nice and even. The line of lag bolts busts up the bumps, and the boards smooth out the surface under the weight of several large rocks. We think the result looks great, and doubt that [Lou] could have done any better with a fancy grader box. Check it out in action after the break.
Don’t have a riding mower? This is a pretty good excuse to buy one, but if that’s not in the cards, maybe you could build something suitable out of plywood and bike parts.
He didn’t ride the minibike over the same place of the trail in the “after” video, but about 2 feet to the side.
When I was a kid I lived on a quite steep hill with all dirt roads. The land developer had something similar to this, but in his case it was several 30cm deep I-beams on edge, welded together, that he’d pull with a tractor. It worked pretty well.
This is in some ways nicer because you can change the weight easily.
Hah, just built something similar the other day.
Piece of chainlink fence with a 4×4 header and weight on the fencing.
Worked ok, however making turns pulling on 2 ropes is tenuous as its possible to get a rope looped over one of the wheel axles.
I’m thinking of having the ropes run to a 2×4 running lengthwise to the back of my JD to resolve that.
Gotta find a way to cut out a bunch of teeth on some angle iron to affix to the leading edge 4×4. Bolts/screws aren’t cheap anymore….
Neither is angle iron…
Had me at minibike, been really fun tinkering with those lately for the gambler 500.
He reinvented the stone boat, an ancient technology going back to the earliest uses of oxen like 5500 years ago at least.
Those were mainly used for putting rocks on to carry them to the edges of the fields where they were piled into walls.
They were also an early form of Payscraper.
https://contractormag.co.nz/classic-machines/international-harvester-270-payscraper/
(My grandfather was hired along with a team of horses and a stone boat in building a dam (Lake Ilo) during the Depression)
https://www.fws.gov/refuge/lake_ilo/
I first thought it graded rock sizes (small only) and deposited them on the trail to fill in the lows. Rumbling along the rocks sift down thru the cracks. Sorts and spreads in one tool.
I love this hack. Simple to build, cheap, solves a real problem and explained in an under 2 minute video.
And that pallet oak is tough wood!
(not much good for woodworking).
I remember sitting on chain link fencing my dad dragged behind a tractor to smooth out our back yard prior to lawn seeding.
I guess that makes me as useful as a box of rocks.
Hopefully smarter, though!
B^)
When a tornado came thru and uprooted the trees in my year about 10 years back, I had to grade and resod the yard, I used a section of rohn 25 tower and a couple cider blocks, and dragged it behind “me”… worked good
I prefer railroad ties and a section of chain link fence on the bottom in addition to the weight box. Used that to smooth out my road towed behind a vehicle of sizeable weight and power
Simple, cheap and does what you want, sounds good to me.