Productive Manure Spreader

[Deadwood]

No, I haven't lost it quite yet, but as I was towing this guy around today I thought some of you might like to see this invention. I guess it is a poor mans firewood processor! While I would like to take credit for it, my father was the one that came up with it. It certainly would not win any beauty prizes, but it does work. Here is how.

Well he started with a manure spreader. First he took the tines off the back and left it open. He then kept the live bed chains, but unhooked them from the wheels. He then hooked up a bar to the live bed so he could move the bed chains by hand.

Next he mounted a home made wood splitter on the tongue. It is driven by a PTO pump hooked to the tractor. While fabricating this, we (I did all the welding) placed a mounting spot for a chainsaw. Now that is the design, this is how it works.

We used to block all the firewood up into firewood length pieces. Then pick the wood up and split it, then pick it up again and load it onto a trailer, then throw it into the shed, and then finally stack it. Now we just block the wood into fire wood length pieces, then pick it up and place it onto the wood splitter, as it is split it gets thrown into the manure spreader. From there we back it into the shed. As the wood is unloaded, we crank the handle and bring the whole load ahead. It certainly saves on picking up and handling the same wood so many times.

We don't have any patent rights on this thing, so if you have a munure spreader kicking around, feel free to take our design and run with it. The only thing is though, don't try and dump gravel in the bacl. You will be in for a lot of shoveling.

A picture is worth a thousand words so here is the ugly duckling.


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[SwampDonkey]

Corley5, didn't you rig up something with an old manure spreader? Hmm I gotta go back and dig through his firewood posts. ;D

[SwampDonkey]

  Corley snags the firewood spreader at the Auction







  Fill'n the Woodshed

8) 8)

[Corley5]

Works good too 8)  I like the splitter mounted on the spreader.  Can you take it off if the wood you're hauling in doesn't need splitting

[Deadwood]

No we can't, but Dad came up with a good idea for cutting up slabs (we used to burn them in his outside wood boiler before the outside wood boiler burned his home down).

He would put the forks on the tractor and scoop up a bunch of slabs. Hoovering over the trailer, he would let the blocked up wood fall right into the trailer. No picking up the small pieces.

[ohsoloco]

Alright, I gotta ask...how did the outside wood boiler burn the house down  :-\

[Ernie]

Alright, I gotta ask...how did the outside wood boiler burn the house down  :-\

Me too, this has gotta be a good one ;D ;D

[sawguy21]

That was my first question too. ;D When I saw the title of this thread I was expecting to see another discussion about dealing with bureaucracy.

[Burlkraft]

Hey Deadwood,

You got to tell us........The suspense is just killin' me.........

Haven't seen you on the Wood forum lately. I know they miss you there. You must be out ridin' the machines or loggin'...huh?

[Engineer]

What kinda weight will one o' them old pOOp shooters carry?  Might make a good self-unloading utility trailer for my tractor.

[Woodcarver]

I have a trailer I made from an old ground driven spreader.  It's smaller than the newer pto driven spreaders, but it will handle a half-cord of oak firewood without any problem.  I've also filled it with sand a time or two with out breaking anything.

I like it for hauling firewood.  With the axle set back the way it is the drawbar of the tractor carries a lot of the weight.  Gives the tractor a little more traction in the snow. 

[wiam]

I have a JD spreader trailer.  Paid $17.50 for it at an auction.  The JD jack was worth that.  It had an almost new bed chain in it.  Beater was gone.  50 inches wide about 10 feet long.  I have rounded it with 2' long split hardwood and unloaded it with the pto.  It will unload about a yard of 1 1/2" stone but it can bind on the rear sprockets when the stone gets under the chains.

Will