Building a roller

mkirsch · Mar 6, 2009

The former owner of my place left me a nice 4-1/2' tall cylindrical water tank in the junk heap. Gonna make me a lawn roller.

I'd like to fill it with concrete. Calculations say it'll weigh around 1200lbs. That ought to give those moles a nice headache.

Reason for concrete and not water is that I don't think I can weld the axle to the tank well enough to hold water. There are also two bungs on the side that I will need to remove and patch over. I'll also need to install another bung in the end for a fill/drain. Lots of places for leaks. Maybe I'll try and if that fails I'll just fill it with concrete anyway...

Anyway, would anybody have any ideas about getting the concrete into the tank save for torching a big hole in the side/end? It's going to take a dozen 80lb bags of Sakrete to fill it up by my calculations.

Jerry/MT · Mar 6, 2009

Cut the end out and stand it up and fill it with concrete. Make something to center the axle and place that in after the concrete is in.

Anonymous-0 · Mar 6, 2009

That's how I made two rollers. I acquired 2 15 gal plastic drums, cut the ends out, drilled out a hole big enough for 2" pvc pipe to slide through then tied it in place that the open end to keep it centered. Poured concrete in, then ran a steel pipe greased up through the pvc insert for the axle. Worked great, and with the concrete it's always ready and if the steel rusts away, so what, you'll still have a rolling bolder.

Anonymous-0 · Mar 7, 2009

if your trying to kill moles let me know if you suceed. i'm thinking about taking a tiller that is tractor mounted and give the little bugers what for myself. i read that castol berries would kill them so i oredered 40 seeds for 14 bucks and then read they wouldn't eat them. i think the tiller followed by a stick of dynamite might get them. they can be down as deep as 15 - to 18 inches from what i read. i just felt like if i tilled the ground up i might catch one, but the main idea is to smooth the ground up real good after wards and watch for new tunnels and try to set a trap in that tunnel. apparently they can come up out of the ground an travel up to 100 feet and start all over. they are becoming a real problem in n al.

Kelly MT · Mar 7, 2009

I have a commercial made roller that uses water for ballast. It's 24"x10'. The end plated have stib axles and pillow block bearings. It would be easy to build plates and center the axles. The big advantage to water is if you have to move the roller to a distance field you don't have all that weight to load on the trailer. PK

Building a roller

mkirsch

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Jerry/MT

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Anonymous-0

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Anonymous-0

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Kelly MT

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