More Rotovator talk

Last week i was rotavateing logging roads. I hit rocks as big or bigger than ever before. The rotavator junmped clean out of the ground several times!! I was at this place two partial days, and i broke 2 tines. No big deal, i brought home $477.00.

One time i rotavated a place that should have been called "the rock farm" !! Every hill was sand, and when you'd get to the bottom of the hill it was pure clay!!! Then there was the rocks, and more rocks!! The guy felt bad as it was tough going all day!!

When i was leaveing he and his buddy came over and said they had 10 acres of muck ground (peat beds) that they wanted rotavated. It was a ways away, and i said i really didn't want to drive that far. He said, he'd pay millage, and it was such "easy going" it would "make up for" all the rocks on his place. As i was loading, and they kept talking, i finally agreed to do go the following week.

When i got there, it was just as they described, so i unloaded and got going. All went well for about 10 mins., then i hit a big rock!! Next it was a huge picture window, the glass flew all over out behind!! A little further and i hit a 1-1/2" galv. 5' piece of pipe that locked the tines up!! I bitc*ed about that as i pulled it out, and got going again!! After about 100' i hit another that locked it again!!!

Before the day was over i found 5 pieces of pipe, and a huge piece of foundation!! There was a fair amount of rocks, and even some stumps!! Finally i got down to the last 2 or 3 rounds and a huge electrical storm came, and i just barely got off the field because of the down pouring rain!!

I ended up haveing to replace the drive line slip clutch plates after that job, but i don't remember breaking any tines???

Like i said, you just have to take them all in stride!! Robert

Flail mowers are fun to get into wire and twine as well. I cut roadsides for the county and got into both. The crappy thing about the twine is that you can wrap up about a mile of it before you even realize it. They use twine to guide the paver when they pave the road. They then leave it and put shoulder gravel over it. Well 3 years later it surfaces and gets into your mower. Spent a few hours cuttin twine.

When I hit the page wire I had to go back to the shop and get the torches goin.

Hindsight is 20-20. Regardless your troubles reminded me of a time when I was bushhoggin my property lines. I was told no fences ever exisisted on the place. I even walked the boundaries before running my rig thru there.

Murphy's law applies - bushhogged right down to the ground only to find the old, old, old fence. Those blades turning at 540 RPM "SNATCHED" that old hog wire from the posts and promptly wrapped it around my stump jumper and blades. About the time I recognized what the racket was in the brush behind me and the squealing I had nearly 100 ft. of wire wound up under the bush hog.

Drove home and spent the next few hrs. just as you did with torch, vice grips and cutoff wheel removing wire. For the balance of that field I called in Forest Service and had them burn it off. Once burned me and the boys cleaned up all the trash. We now have a clean field.

Still kicking myself in the arse about the tiller. . .