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Rear counterweight for snow plow


bakinfool

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I (a newbie)would like to use the rear hitch and a cable to the lift arm dog to balance the snowplow on my System 7010 3 speed. I have a few questions, the first about terminology: is the part that goes in the 1-1/4" and 3/4" holes and has a tube with holes for a locking pin called a "sleeve hitch"? Is the entire stationary support with various mounting holes on the back of my tractor the "three point hitch"? Now, let's assume I have the first part I refered to mounted in the second part (tractor frame), and a cable attached from the lift arm dog to the first part. How might I create a counterweight to mount in the tube of the moving part? Might there be a picture on this site (couldn't find one) that illustrates the counterweight? About how much weight should I use compared with the plow? I haven't weighed it, but it seems it is around 60lb. Was there only one moving hitch part as I described manufactured? Thanks for helping a newbie (I have been using the tractor for three years and I love it). Don
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Hi Don, Welcome to the group! They made rear counterweights that fit in the rear lift tube, (1st part you described), but they were for the older tractors "Foot dragger tractors" which were made before about 1971. These tractors had a counterbalanced lift system. The newer tractors such as your 7000 series are not counterbalanced so if you put a weight on the back, I think it won't help you to lift the blade. Some other members here have described a method of switiching the location or routing of the lift cable underneath the tractor so as to gain the counter action. Hopefully one of them can describe this better than I can. Good luck on your project. Chris
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Hi, welcome to the club, this is two weights I made. The top one was a trailer wheel seal installer filled with concrete, and a shaft welded to it. I don't remember how much it weighs but it perfect for a plow. The bottom one is a counter weight from an old satellite dish, I simply cut off the old square box and welded on two tabs. It's held up with a small piece of chain. I had about 10lbs in the rear tires before putting the weights on, after I had to refill the tires because with the weights, the looked like they were flat. lol [img]/club2/attach/ehertzfeld/img0970.jpg[/img] theses should give you a few ideas, hope it helps. Oh like it was said above, welcome to the club. Elon
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Hello: Can someone help me with swapping my T12 Homelite aka AC 3412 cable lift to work as a counterweight vs lifting the front & rear at the same time?
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I made a rear counter weight for my 7013s to counter my snowblower. I had to change the rocker shaft in order for the weight to counter act the blower. Got a shaft from one of the club members ( don't remember who ) and changed the shaft myself. The system works really well and hardly puts any strain on the electric lift.
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I recently bought another rock shaft to put in my AC716H, so that I could change the motion of the rear implement. I have installed a hydrolift and want the implement to move in the same direction as I am moving the lift lever. I think the rock shaft I bought was from a 7100 series Simplicity. Not sure what other tractors these shafts were used on. I haven't installed it yet. On my list of to-do's. These shafts allow the cable lift to be hooked up to move either same as front or opposite to the front implement, depending on where you attach the cable. These shafts came out about the same time as Simplicity started selling the Heavy Duty tillers. These weighed quite a bit more than the smaller tillers. By changing the cable you could apply more force by pushing the lift lever, and you could also use a front counterweight to help balance the extra tiller weight.
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Thanks for the responses and the pictures. I thought I had a foot dragger (it feels like it when my feet fall off the sides). I was hoping to use this upper hitch point (I measure 5-7/16" between the ears with the 1-1/4" and 3/4" holes on the back of the tractor): [url]http://www.simpletractors.com/do_it/rear_hitch.htm[/url] attached to a *cable* run through the frame tunnel just to the right (from the rear of the tractor) of the gear box selector shaft. There is a rectangular hole about 1" square there. It seems to line up with a double sided "dog" that juts upwards from the shaft of the lift lever (under the center of the tractor). This would provide the appropriate load to assist raising the plow. I have a 1690016 tractor. It sounds like something is wrong with my plan from the responses I have read. Thanks for any additional help. Don
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I used to have a rear counterweight on my 2110.All I used was a short piece of pipe,that would fit in the sleeve,with a cap on one end.I put 2 barbell weights on it,drilled a hole in the pipe so I could pin it to the sleeve. I'll get a picture later today.
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That upper hitch point that is on the right side of the shaft (relative to driving position), is the mount for the hydraulic cylinder for a hydrolift. I now have a hydrolift on my AC716H. Before I installed the hydrolift, I had fabricated a rod that went thru the small hole in the tunnel and hooked to the rear lift. I made a two piece rod, cause the hole was not big enough to accommodate the rod movement when the rock shaft was rotated. All I did was add a pivot joint about 6 inches from the rockshaft to let that end move up and down without binding the rod in the hole. Later on, when I mounted the hydrolift, I switched to the cable setup that the factory used on these tractors. The rod setup moved opposite the front attachment(front up-rear down). The cable setup (front up-rear up). This is why I got the rockshaft that had the two cable attachment points, so that I could reverse the rear motion. To answer your question: Yes you can hook it up as you said above, with a manual lift. One problem will be cable abrasion from rubbing on the edge of the hole as the shaft rotates. You may need to mount some type of roller idler to prevent this. You may also run into interference from parts of the transmission that may be in the way of the cable routing. When I used the solid rod, I had to bend a zigzag in the rod to clear part of the Sunstrand hydro tranny. You can also do this by running the cable around another idler. You should already have an idler that the mower lift cable goes over, that will show you what I mean by using an idler to move the cable routing to where you need it.
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Thanks Rod - from what you said, my tractor was not designed for this application, and it makes sense that the routing I suggested will have some friction points. The arm I was planning to attach to looks like it rises 2" off the shaft and then "L"'s forward about 3/4". I had better look closer to make sure it lines up with the hole, since you mentioned you had an up-up situation with yours. I may end up with some Rube Goldberg routing... I like the idea of using bar bell weights - that should be easy to do since I have some knocking around. You folks are great - thanks for the advice. Don
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Its been my experence with my blade (not a true Simpicity blade) mounted on a slightly different tractor (AC416) that even thought the blade is 50 or 60 pounds I at times need more weight down on the blade. If the blade is counter wights to much it will not clean of concreat very well, it will float over icy spots. Now if your was talking a snow blower it would be a different story.
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Try to find or make a spring loaded lift rod. You can give a little down pressure and still have the plow ride with the terrain. I highly recomend it. Elon
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thanks ehertzfeld, Ill look for a spring loaded lift rod. Most likely make my own. I have about 200' of rock drive and 65' of sidewalk at my home. With the rock i shure need the blade to float with the tarrain more, I usualy lower the skid feet about a inch. But the side walks in front of my house plus the 200 foot side walk and 150 foot back interence driveway to the businees next door i plow. I really prefer the blade to run on the concreat/pavment. This is where i need all the downward pressure I can get.
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It is a shame that you have both surfaces - complicates things a little. Like you, I keep my skids down about 1" for my 300' gravel driveway. I have a spring loaded arm, and I think that helps as another suggests when I go out and plow the main road. I don't get off and change my skids so it doesn't work as well as it could. I didn't consider how the counterweight would decrease down pressure - I may not want that. I may just put some weight on the back of the tractor to increase my traction.
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Short of putting a crank on the skids seems the best solution for blading rock and concrete in the same storm is too have two tractors with two blades set for the job:)
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Now there is a good ression for another tractor.. Well i guess i have plenty of tractors (so my wife said), just need another blade.
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