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He Built A Loader For His Roper Garden Tractor
"It works amazingly well - I don't know what I'd do without it," says Russell Wright, Hays, Alberta, who converted an old Roper garden tractor into a dandy loader tractor.
The tractor is equipped with a 42-in. wide bucket on front. He also built a set of log forks that bolt inside the bucket. The loader will lif
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He Built A Loader For His Roper Garden Tractor TRACTORS Loaders 33-3-26 "It works amazingly well - I don't know what I'd do without it," says Russell Wright, Hays, Alberta, who converted an old Roper garden tractor into a dandy loader tractor.
The tractor is equipped with a 42-in. wide bucket on front. He also built a set of log forks that bolt inside the bucket. The loader will lift 6 1/2 ft. high.
"Except for having a machine shop break the iron for the 42 by 12 by 12-in. bucket, I did all the fabricating in my shop," says Wright.
He started with an old Roper lawn tractor that he got free from a neighbor. The Briggs & Stratton 11 hp gas engine was worn out so he replaced it with a Honda 13 hp engine. To make the engine fit he had to lengthen the tractor by 6 in.
He used rectangular tubing to build the loader arms and 1/8-in. thick steel to build the bucket. The detachable arms are held in place by four bolts. The cutting blade on the bucket was made from 1/4-in. thick by 3-in. wide flat plate iron sharpened to an edge.
A belt-driven 28 gpm hydraulic pump on one side of the tractor is used to raise and lower the bucket and also to tilt it.
A 2-spool hydraulic control valve is used to operate the lift and tilt the bucket.
"I use it to remove snow from my driveway, to haul logs for firewood, and to do landscaping work. It's fun to operate and easy to handle," says Wright. "The tractor is small enough that I can easily get into tight areas.
"The loader has a lift capacity of 300 lbs., but I've lifted logs weighing 400 to 500 lbs. I'm amazed at how much it can lift. I have to be careful that I don't bend the tractor's front axle. The hydraulic pump has an electric clutch, so whenever I'm not using it I switch the pump off to keep from overworking the engine."
Wright built the loader last fall and says the entire project took a little more than two months to complete. "It cost a little more than I thought it would," he says. "My total cost was about $2,200. I don't live close to a scrap yard so I had to buy all the iron required for the project. I also had to buy the three hydraulic cylinders, hoses and fittings. I already had the hydraulic pump and controls."
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Russell K. Wright, P. O. Box 42, Hays, Alberta, Canada T0K 1B0 (ph 403 725-3799; arent@telus.net).
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