Loader-Mounted Concrete Mixer Dumps On Demand

Loader-Mounted Concrete Mixer Dumps On Demand TRACTORS Loaders 34-1-29 Mounting a concrete mixer on his tractor's front-end loader just made sense to David Montalbano. He needed a mixer to pour piers for a house he was building. He liked the idea of being able to mix in a prep area and bring the concrete to the spot it was needed with the same rig. "I looked for a mixer made to be mounted on a loader but couldn't find any," says Montalbano. "I had built a couple of other quick attachments for my loader and still had the wood patterns." He made the mixing drum out of a rusty 240-gal. well tank. "I cut down the tank and made a 14-in. long cone to reduce the opening," explains Montalbano. "The cone was made from 4-in. wide, 1/8-in. flat strip steel. I trimmed each piece on a taper and welded them together over a plywood jig." Once the cone was welded to the drum, he smoothed out the sharp edges by rolling a 5/8-in. steel rod to fit and welding it in place. Two fins welded inside the drum ensure a proper mixing action. "I still needed a drive, but was unable to find one at a decent price," says Montalbano. "A landscaper friend offered me an old hydraulic-powered, self-propelled mower. I used the wheel motor to make my drive." Montalbano welded a 10-in. trailer rim to the back of the mixing drum. He then bolted it to the four-bolt wheel hub on the motor. The base of the wheel motor was then mounted to the center of a 1/4-in. thick, 2-in. angle iron. Quick connect couplers for the loader were attached to either end. Montalbano built a cradle out of 2-in., 14-ga. square tubing to support the mixing drum when in use. The square frame was slightly larger than the tank with room for 3-in. caster wheels to be mounted on diagonal braces at each corner. The cradle square was in turn mounted on 1 1/4-in. steel tubing that ran back to the quick connect coupling angle iron. Hydraulic power was supplied by hoses from auxiliary ports on back of the tractor with quick connects to the wheel motor. Montalbano reports the mixer worked great once he installed a needle valve to slow the mixer down. "On the first test the drum spun at 200 rpm's at idle speed," he recalls. "I found 25 rpm's was about right and since then have mixed about 400 bags of concrete with no problem. With all the scavenging I did, the whole thing cost only about $400." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, David Montalbano, 481 Durant Rd., Pollok, Texas 75969 (ph 713 467-8937; cell 713 548-3624).

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