Garden tractor pulling sled

Davecr · Oct 18, 2014

Looking for plans and specs on how to build a lawn mower pulling sled. I can figure out the structure, but the mechanical and the size is a question. It going to be use for myself and a group of mine.

Tom Arnold · Oct 18, 2014

I have seen GT sized sleds that were made with channel frames. The weight box rides on large ball bearing races that roll upward to the front of the sled inside the channel frame.

Roller chain is used to pull the weight box along the carriageway. The transaxle from a 4 speed garden tractor provides a selection of gear ratios that change how quickly the weight box reaches the front. Depending upon the length of the track, different sprockets can be installed and a dog style clutch can be triggered by the weight box reaching the front of the sled to prevent the rear wheels from locking up.... unless you want them too.

I have seen posts similar to yours in the past but I have not witnessed anyone coming forward with a set of plans for one. But who knows? Maybe someone has finally come up with a design. Good luck with this project.

ShadetreeRet · Oct 21, 2014

Do you know any pullers of pulling groups? If so maybe you could look at their sled and get some ideas.

dmiller · Oct 25, 2014

I don't have plans but could send pictures and some of the specs. on Monday. We (my students and myself with help from one of my advisory board members) made a small sled that works with riding mowers. The pictures are on my computer at school so will send them on Monday.

Davecr · Oct 25, 2014

Thanks the picture would be helpful.

dmiller · Oct 27, 2014

Here are the pic. we have. Email for more help.
I haven't had time to take measurements yet. But here's what we did.
We made a rail system out of 3 inch channel, the rail is 8 or 9 ft. long. We made the rail 3 ft. wide.
The whole thing is built on a 1/2 ton pickup axle with a 3sp car transmission (donated by a former student who now runs one of the local Mech. Shops) and a 1 ton (doesn't need to be that big, but one of the kids found it in the bone yard at grandpa's farm) axle on the top end. We used CV joints to connect the transmission to the drive axle since things didn't line up as well as we had planned.
The box is full of scrap iron and concrete. Estimate is there is 1400lbs of weight for a total sled weight of around 2200lbs. For the larger mowers with good traction tires this is not quite enough and we have to add weights (tractor weights) to the box. For the smaller mowers it is almost too much.

Garden tractor pulling sled

Davecr

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Tom Arnold

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ShadetreeRet

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dmiller

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Davecr

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dmiller

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