Hello all! I had a great experience with other members when I asked about my backhoe timing issue . It turns out that my backhoe's engine is just worn out and needs rebuilding. So, I hope to find the same friendly and helpful advice here in this forum. I own 30 acres with my wife. We had decided to build a homestead and make it our life for life. Well, our driveway is maybe 1/4 mile long and sand, clay and silt...mostly clay. When it's dry it's great. When it's wet it's slippery. When it's really wet (in spring) it's impassible. I have about a month and a half that we have to leave the truck at the road and walk in and out. We (I) do not want to buy enough stone to cover our driveway when we have plenty of stone on our own property. All we need to do is separate it from the sand, clay and silt. I dug a test hole where we want a pond and found plenty of rock in the spoils. It is has too much clay and sand mixed in to use directly on the driveway so it needs to be screened and portions crushed. I will start a thread in Crushers in a day or two when I have the time. I'm hoping that in the spoils of a 3/4 acre pond I can find enough rock to finish our driveway. I also need stone for our new house foundation and under-floor fill and sand. I believe I have much of the material I need to make the grizzly and screening equipment. I would appreciate some guidance and advice. Materials: commercial shelving cross members (square tubular steel, not the C-channel type) 12'+ W 12 x 19 I-beams Steel flat trusses 1 Tennant 255 sweeper (Power plant and hydraulics) 1 Sander slide-in with chain and hydraulics 3 55 gallon barrels 1 5'x16' livestock panel with 4"x4" openings and 1/4" wire 1 3'x3' 1/2" rock screen (1/4" wire) 3 Electric pallet jacks for electric motors, controllers, batteries, small hydraulic cylinders and steel for gussets and plates 1 7,000 lb trailer to make the screener portable 1 75 ton 20' Cargo container top loader 1 solid steel bar 4"x9.5"x8' 1 Loader forks 12"x1" thick tubular steel (2) 9'x4' forks Equipment: Case 480C backhoe 35,000lb single axle dump MF35 tractor To make the homestead screener portable and keep it close to the work area, it will be mounted on a 7,000 lb tandem trailer. The slide-in sander will be mounted at the front of the trailer with the out-feed toward the rear. A grizzly with bars 7" apart will filter out larger rocks. For rocks that get stuck, the grizzly tips up with a lift from the loader bucket to drop the rocks off. The sander will feed the 7" and smaller media to a trammel. Three barrels welded together with openings cut into the side where the first 1 1/3 barrels have a screen is a 1 inch hardware cloth. The last 1 1/3 of the trammel is 4" square. Media filtered in the first section will fall to the left-rear of the trailer, media from the last section will fall to the right-rear of the trailer and the rock 4-7" will fall out the end of the trammel at the rear-end of the trailer. The trammel, sander slide-in conveyor and vibrators will be powered by the Tennant sweepers 35 HP engine and two hydraulic pumps up to nearly 30 gpm and 4,000 psi. There are jacks on the trailer heavy enough to hold the unit in place as the loader removes screened media. Please, view my vision of a portable plant on a homesteader budget and tell me what you think andd how I should improve.
I have started my Crusher thread HERE
I would think you could rent a screener for a few days, screen a bunch, rent again when you need it. I do understand the joy of fabricating and saving some money, looking forward to following along...
Tags, In our area there aren't any locations to rent a screener without bringing it in from 150+ miles away. The drop-off and pick-up fees would be in the range of $300+. I could do the driving myself, I would still incur the fuel costs and wear and tear to my equipment myself. With the exception of my pickup, my equipment is rather old and needs tender loving care to stay operational. It lived a full life in another era and it still does what I ask of it and ... it's paid for. There are a few large quarries and many small gravel pits that operate around me. The big guys have equipment that is way beyond the scope of what I need. The small guys, eek out a living with their equipment and do not loan nor rent it out. Occasionally, I do find old equipment up for auction. Still, we cannot afford the 50's era machines as they are sought after as parts machines by the gravel pit operators. There is one coming up for auction with a crusher but I still expect that to sell for about $5k needing about that much again in repairs. While being old, it is still a good buy but beyond the economical boundaries for me. Everything I have for materials to build with I have found for free or really good prices and have kept me from having a mortgage. I limit my need to give money to others. By being frugal I sometimes butt my head up against a wall, but I learn how to get through,over or under the wall. If time constraints force me to, I will go around the wall by paying others, but I have earned the respect of others and myself by doing for myself. I do have to say, I also have come to admire those who are involved with forums like this who come together to learn about their particular interest as well as share experiences...good and bad. Thank you for your input.
I don't know what it's like in your area.. But where I am from the people who supply aggregate for the cement plants have piles of unusable aggregate that they give away. They will even load it for you. Something to look into.
Hi Paul. I have never heard that about any place here. But there is one really large quarry operator that is part of a road contracting company. They have a few large quarries about the area. Two are within truck range for me. They may have some output that wasn't quite what was specified in contracts for highway use. That's a wonderful idea. I will check on Monday. Thank you!
Glad to help. I admire your gumption for fabrication and saving a buck. I am the same way. Just now I priced out material to make my own wrought iron fence after being offended by the price of a way less quality faux iron fence from Lowe's. I came out pound for pound per panel and with a much greater quality than the junk Lowe's is offering. That's not including my labor to build, but it's weighing heavily on my mind to do it. The only thing stopping me right now is time
Can simplify life by rough screening the larger boulders out first. Are a number of Commercial screen sites that use either square steel or heavy angle iron some even using commercial floor walk grating as a primary screen then shift to a finer materials screener. I constructed a simple screen using woven wire mesh sheeting from a steel supplier, currently adding a angle iron Large Materials separator 'Screen' to my equipment to remove 4" and larger before drop to small screen (1" mesh). First screen is too narrow, set up for a Ag tractor bucket, should have made full 8' width, roughing screen will be 8' wide to handle a decent Loader bucket load. Both will utilize the same support framing.
Thank you for your suggestion DMiller. Actually, I did something very similar a couple weeks ago. I am lucky enough to have a forgiving wife who knows that I have uses for nearly every piece of "junk" I have in the bushes in our fence rows. I used some of this valuable material to create what I may say is quite a sight for something made of scrap this or that. There is a grizzly for removing the larger rock 6-7" and larger. It does lift up with help from the loader should rocks get stuck and impede the flow. Whatever makes its way through the grizzly, falls upon a shaker of 1/2" wire cloth that allows smaller matter through for later processing. 1/2" and larger is directed toward the side for picking up and use elsewhere. Atop of an old snowblower transmission a Kohler engine gives motion to our screener. It certainly took a few days longer to make this creation, but when you have to clean, cut, fit and weld used metal from other purposes, it's going to add some time.
Looks great
I love it! I was just discussing building a topsoil screen. I have a big pile of wire grating from pallet racks. Talk to me about the screening process in simplified terms. I was hoping to build a metal mesh (with the wire pallet racking) and mount that structure to a spring supported base. I was going to install a shaft with an eccentric to make it vibrate. Talk to me about the motor you installed. Does it shift the grating back n forth on an eccentric? Has anyone built one with just a vibration action?
I neglected to mention that under the shaker grate's 1/2" wire cloth is 4" x 4" livestock fencing for support. The small wire fabric would not have been nearly strong enough to hold the weight. I am sure I will have to replace the wire fabric soon, but I needed to separate 1/2" and under to later separate the 1/4" and above for gravel for my roof drain layer under filter fabric for my living roof on my new house...when that time comes. As mentioned, the snowblower transmission is a infinitely variable type so that the speed that the axles turn can be adjusted to just the right speed rock the screener back and forth. I wanted to be able to adjust the speed so as not to place undue stress on the hodgepodge of material we made it from. Enough shaking to move the material, but not so much that it would shake itself apart. The screener shaker has adjustable height on the output so that it can be assured to have proper slope to output rock. The whole screener is large enough to take a full-width bucket from my backhoe without spilling off the sides. The bucket also fits under the shaker and can curl without hitting the sideways moving shaker tray. I placed the unit on a couple old barn beams with chamfers on each end so not to dig into the earth when moving. On each end of the beams, I looped a bit of guy wire to attach a chain to pull by. If you need better pictures of what I have done, please ask for the part to be included at close range to get detail. I'm sure my design can be improved on, but I did what I could for what I had. I did splurge for a new engine though as the one I was trying to use had a bit of rust under the pin which opened and closed the points. I would adjust the points to the proper opening and the engine would operate fine for about 2 minuted. I check the points again only to find the gap had closed. This rust would quickly wear away at the pin that pushed the points open in such a short time and we (my wife and I....who loves to weld now...even bought her own helmet, cape and gloves) decided we would just get an engine we could not only use on this device, but others we plan to make. Perhaps ever a rock crusher. Our all-in expense was $375 for a Kohler 7HP engine, and $80 for various hardware cloth, hardware and chain, but if I wanted to have no cash outlay I could have done so with stuff we had here. I realize not everyone has what we have available to us, but much material can be found at various auctions for a fraction of new steel...especially at today's prices.
I have to say, I found a couple weak spots in my screener. Also, the 1/2" wire cloth screen should be a little larger as I am not finding the desired 1/2" stones in my fines. 3/8" but no larger, unless they are falling around the screen into the finish soil. In my case, I don't think the 1" wire cloth would be heavy enough to withstand the weight of the rock falling on it even with the 4" x 4" fencing support beneath. The 1/2" wire cloth, with the fence support, seems to be holding up quite well. The connecting rods I used were just 1/2" pipe welded to 1/2" pipe sleeves. They should be made from something less prone to fatigue as they broke close to the welds. Originally, I suspected there to be a lot of stress at the welds and they would fail, but the welds were fine. Each rod broke at a different location, but perhaps to the same reason. I think the heat from the weld changed the structure of the metal in the pipe enough that it became brittle. I will machine new sleeves from cold rolled rod and make the rod solid cold rolled as well. Also, while the snowblower transmission is working, I can tell from the heat being produced that it may not last as long as I would like. There is no method of lubrication like an oil bath, just bare gear to gear and the rubber wheel to steel disc to provide the variable speed. But now that I think I know what cadence I need for lateral motion I can devise a pulley system to obtain that speed. Or perhaps, I may find a suitable lawn mower transmission that can supply the rpm desired plus have the benefit of gearing in an oil bath. Other thoughts on the design. The whole unit should be maybe 50% wider than the bucket of the loader as rocks being screened at the high end of the screener push unscreened soil into the spoils. leading me to re-screen if I need clean spoil. The screener should be closer to the grizzly since rocks that fall directly on the wire cloth do dent the wire fabric when they fall onto it from any distance without a soil cushion. The grizzly should be a bit steeper. Most rocks to slide off, but those that are nearer the filter size tend to get caught, but perhaps that is just the nature of the device. Oh, the guy cable loops I attached to the beams either side of the fines cleanout had to be removed. The bucket consistently caught the wire and would move the unit. All in all, I'm pleased with it. I have not had the opportunity to use such a device or even to look at something like this up close. There are a few other minor changes like extending partitions and adding one at the rear of the screening tray to guide soil away from the edge of the tray so smaller rocks don't get between the tray and the partition behind it and fall though or get caught in between. For me, it's a light-ish unit that needs care not to drop a lot of soil in at once, but in an hour I was able to screen out as much rock as I had paid $200 for 7 weeks ago, plus, I have a heavy rock pile and a pile of dirt with no stones over 3/8" diameter. About 3 hours more work in the shop and I'll be back up and running! Thank you for reading. I will try to keep you posted.
Check with those small gravel operators they will have piles of wore out screens that dont even make good scrap metal
This is the Manure screen in fabrication. Got the angle cut to length and beat thru a day of cooking heat high humidity to get this far. Will finish legs tomorrow and front to back brace to keep sturdy. Just separating 4-18" rock from old building foundations from the feed lot manure. Free fertilizer and NOT gonna waste it.
I seen a simple home made screen for home use the other day that attached to the top of a loader bucket. It was made from pipe and gravel screen. It was hinged at the back of the bucket and pivoted up when dumping. When laying on the bucket the front edge was 8" or so back from the cutting edge. This allowed the bucket to load the screen without undue stress on it. The screened material fell into the bucket thru the screen with a bit of rolling the bucket, the larger stuff rolled off. He said it worked quite well for small quantities for home projects. He did say he was going to add a hydraulic cylinder to it so he could tip it up out of the way to use the bucket in a conventual manner without having to remove the screen.
Flat Thunder Channel ,,,Sorry I didn't reply to your questions earlier. I read them but as i types I got distracted. First I thought about the vibrating tray. I saw a lot of videos on them but there is one thing I didn't see. No one loaded their screen as fast as I wanted to dump my bucket. I feared that I would dump so much soil that it would just stop vibrating then I would have to clean the screen off to the point where it would become operational. Of course, the amount of weight you are spinning would make a difference as to the amount of material you could vibrate out. Then, my tray is not light. At maybe 100 lb or so before soil it would be a lot of weight to vibrate enough to get the desired results. Wire pallet racking is nice and strong support for a screening tray. But it is also not light when it comes to vibrating. Also, the size of the screening tray makes a difference. Mine is 90 x 42 with pallet racking beams as a frame. My machine has a tray frame made of pallet racking beams. I welded a piece of welded cattle panel with 4x4 opening to the bottom. On top of this, I place my screening material. The screening tray hangs from the frame on chains. I didn't know the proper slope so each corner is adjustable by changing the the link connection point. The tray is moved horizontally side to side via two connecting rods. The joints are pin connections not bearings. They are cheaper for me to make and repair. All points have grease fittings. My motor is a Kohler 7HP gasoline engine. I think it has a maximum of 10 ft lb of torque at 3000 rpm and I try to operate the engine at that rpm for maximum shaking force. Most of the time, it runs nice and easy, but if I dump too much weight at once it will bog down and work through the load. The engine is vertical shafted connected to a snowblower transmission that is variable speed because i didn't know how many cycles the tray should move per minute. Now that I know a good speed for this machine, I want to change to a complete belt an pulley system to eliminate the weak point of the transmission...a rubber wheel on a steel disc that transfers force perpendicular to the engines crankshaft rotation. Also, there are non-lubricated gearing to the final drive that gets warm and is loud. The final drive shaft is a bit undersized as well...it is long flexes under heavy loads. When I do change the drive system, I plan to obtain a 17:1 engine to final drive output rpm. 3000 rpm would get me about 3 cycles per second. My travel is currently just over 1 1/2" and mechanical force is about 272 lb. If my tray weighs about 100 lb, then I can sift up to 172 lb of material at any moment. Fines fall through pretty quickly unless there screen is blocked with a lot of organic material. At operating speed, I would estimate that 1/3 of the material I drop onto the screen falls straight through within 1/2 second. DMILLER ...That's what I really wanted to put on the top of mine. But, I'm a cheap son of a gun who uses what I have laying around when I can until I find that it doesn't work well. I could use the fertilizer as well! Ready my fields for crops once my building adventures are well underway. old-iron-habit ...that screen would be nice for loose dirt, right? If you had to dig out undisturbed soil it would do some mighty damage? It would be a fairly quick way to do some sorting. I have seen other sifters that replace buckets that are a spiral-like frame design with replaceable screens of differing sizes. You scoop up loose material and a hydraulic motor spins the unit like a trammel until no more material falls through. The direction is reversed to dump the large material into a pile/crusher/what have you. My jaw dropped when I saw that. It would be for sifting loose material only as I don't believe it would stand up to undisturbed earth. I have replaced the 1/2" black iron pipe connecting rods with much stronger solid 3/4" rods with 7/8" ends bored to accept 5/8" pins. The 1/2" wire cloth wears out fairly quickly in my use. I would say I get about 3-4 hours use before it had holes in it large enough for 1" rock to fall through. I upgraded the screening tray to 3/4 x #9 expanded metal. After installing the expanded metal, I wish I had done it in the beginning. The openings are larger, but not so much that I find the results undesirable. Well worth the $90 expense. The local steel supplier even cut it to size (2 cuts to 90" x 42") no charge. The snow blower variabl e speed transmission seems to stand up fairly well considering it was definitely not designed for such heavy use. I am keeping it installed for now because it would take time and a few dollars to replace. Neither of which I have right now. So far, mine works well except for a couple things. I still need a guide to force soil away from the back of the shaker tray after it falls though the grizzly to keep smaller stones from falling between the shaker tray and the back wall into my fine material. A similar guide over the output of the shaker. If I dump too much dirt too quickly, there is not enough time to sift out the fines before it is forced off the end. Soil should be deposited a reasonable distance from the output so as to give time to sift out the fines. I should have supported the screening tray material better with cross braces to keep the tray bottom flat. It has sagged a bit under the weight of the soil being umped atop it from a distance of three feet. I'm surprised it has held up this well, but it appears to want to work much longer. My screened material access should be at least 18" wider than my bucket. Right now, it is perhaps only 12" wider and I have caught the bucket on the supports and pulled the unit from it's resting place. A few extra inches would make retrieval less taxing. The angle of the grizzly should be greater to allow for faster sliding of stones. Currently, as mine has many contours, stones that are nearer the size of the opening get caught. Perhaps this is normal for all grizzlies, I don't know, I have no experience with them except for my machine. I can dump a 2/3 - 3/4 bucket of a Case 480C 3/4 yd bucket. It will allow me to empty my bucket slowly in about 15 seconds with moist soil without taxing the screener when it is clear of organic matter and about 10-15% stone. Considering a bucket refill, travel, screen and return time of 3 minutes, I can screen about 10 yd an hour. At 10% rock between 1/2"-6 or 7" where I am digging my foundation, That's 1 yd an hour and at $22/yd or $11/ton delivered that's $22/hr for stone plus $20/yd + $5/ton delivery x 9 yd + tax = $260. That's $282/hour if I need to place a value on what I'm doing. I broke even on my screener just over the 2 hour point because I used mostly from scrap I had laying around. But I didn't include my time to build the machine. If doing it again, I could do it in a week so even if I claim $20 labor, that's still less than another 4 hours of use. If I didn't need a lot of stone or sifted soil, it wouldn't make financial sense to do this. But I need stone for 1/4 mile of driveway, stone and sifted soil for rubble trench foundation, fill, earthen flooring and compressed earth bricks for a house, utilities building, greenhouse, workshop and barn. I have a source for rock and soil in my building site and I am also digging a half acre pond with a great source of gravel. My backhoe operating costs are negligible. I can operate for maybe $20 in fuel. Before building such a machine, determine if you have a need for the material and determine how much material you need to be sure you need your own screener. Then determine the cost of building vs renting. For me...I don't know of a place to rent one near me as we live in a pretty rural area and don't have much for rental opportunities. I am fortunate that I have many materials already which mitigates the costs. All in, I have maybe $500 in materials including the new engine. I also owned the tools used to make the machine...welders and saws. Best wishes to you all and thank you!
Screen mesh will not hold up, by the time you replace it to get what you need the lost time and added materials adds up to more than just buying heavy One Time. Steel framing instead of wood, welded or bolted is far better than screws and nails, lumber also rots as well draws moisture shrinks and swells. I build heavy to have it available any time needed and sitting when not as well not being worked on taking valuable time away from more important or urgent work.
DMiller...I completely understand and agree. Many times it's a case of I don't know what I don't know. That's why I'm here. And maybe other are here to reduce the amount of information they don't know. I don't mind sharing my experiences and hope others may find my experiences useful. I know I find other's experiences valuable references. Time is perhaps one of the most valuable resource we have. Thank you
I've never visited this section of the forum, but I'm continually amazed at the ingenuity of you guys. I don't have nearly the needs you guys are talking about but I don't think I'd even come close to knowing where to start. This is a neat project and I hope you are proud of yourself for making it happen!
I like reading your postings of course lots of us have or can think of different ways to accomplish the goal I just love out of the box thinking and trying out what you have to work with
aidhead...Thank you. But even if you don't have need for something of this size, smaller versions can be made on the cheap. I'm working on a garage now that the neighbor is using the soil removed from making the concrete pad to fill low spots in the yard. My machine is too big for the smaller yard tractor. Scaling my design down would be easy for smaller loaders than I have. Mine is a Case 480C. Mine is small compared for many other machines I have seen since I built mine. I tried to give examples of design changes I would make if I made one again and think they could also be scaled down...even to a shovel load motorized sifter, though a single screen would most likely be needed only. I plan to build a rock crusher in the not so distant future...I have a thread started, I just need to be able to free up enough time to work on it. I'm thinking maybe a 12 x 6 jaw opening and a 1-1/2" final size. I mostly need it for rubble trench, drain and driveway. Fines will be sifted for topping the driveway.
Well, a neighbor, as noted in a different thread, has turned about 30 acres of trees and brush into an enormous pile of trees and brush and has flipped the field over in what appears to be an effort to farm it eventually. The wife and I have nosed around a bit and found there to be a ton (figuratively) of rocks in the soil. Probably plenty for my pond project. I really can't imagine I'll go to these lengths to make a screener but it's lovely to know you've provided some insight to how it could be done. I have a 2 acre field in the back that I could likely talk someone into plowing, just to flip up some rock to harvest, and then I'd let it grow over again, but it seems unlikely I'll do that.
I had a 2 1/2 acre lot before buying this property. There was a pile of soil someone left where it didn't belong. I assume there was about 3 yard of material. While living there I was confronted with several seemingly small rocks poking out of the ground. I was bored one day and being a person who was tired of hitting rocks with new mower blades and also wanted a nice lawn for others to enjoy looking at. Boy was I naive! Anyway, I grabbed a shovel, 6 foot piece of drilling rod for a pry bar and proceeded to dig up the offending stones. I tell ya, after the tenth stone, I wish I hadn't started the project. Not a one of them were under 20 lb and a couple were 50 lb or so. They left large holes in the yard. I began filling the yard trailer behind the lawn mower with dirt from the old pile. I quickly found that I would be filling the rock holes with more rock! I wasn't exactly thrilled. While the rocks were smaller, I knew the frost would be bringing them to the surface to be struck by the mower. NOT ON MY WATCH!!! I made a 4 legged frame large enough that I could place near the pile and back my little trailer under with my mower. I got pretty good at backing that short little thing! I made a 2x4 frame just a bit smaller than my trailer. I wrapped 1/4" hardware cloth across the bottom and up the outside where they were fastened to the 2x4s with screws. I then hung the sifting tray from the 4 legged frame. I could fill the tray with a shovel and manually shake the tray. In no time at all I could sift out all rocks and vegetation in a matter of 10 seconds. It would take several cycles to fill my little trailer, but I was busy and outside in the fresh air doing my lawnly man tasks! Use medium sized open hooks and chain large enough to accommodate them in hanging your sifter so that you can easily remove the sifter tray to dump the waste rock and debris and return the tray to the frame for another load of soil for sifting. I would say that this small sifter can get heavy with stones and other debris so depending on the rock to soil ratio, plan your load to make it easy to lift your tray to unload your rocks. I remember very well the amount of work I did to make my lawn presentable and to not hit large rocks with my mower. But my new project is much larger and I needed something on a sub-commercial scale to help me get the work done. While not as fast as having rock delivered, it certainly has been more fun and economical. Plus, my wife and I built it together! Please play safely!
Hmm... I'll have to consider this. Even in a small 10'x10' space I imagine there is more dirt than I want to move via a shovel, but I may be able to find a compromise. Free or close to free with some manual labor may be worth it for an endless supply of rocks.
There are regular AG Rock Harvesters out there, some ag shops have them for rent. SOME can be REALLY Expensive. https://www.fastline.com/farm-equip...-pickers/results?category=Rock+Pickers&page=1
Unfortunately, we are in an area that is depressed. Such machinery is held by private farms and contractors. As far as i know, there are no rental companies that carry rock harvesters. A neighbor who grows vegetables had one for sale when we bought our property, but I didn't know I would have a need for it. It was the first such device I had seen so there are not many near us. If I were to find a rental, it surely would be in excess of 3 hours from us and delivery and pickup would be cost prohibitive. I like making stuff anyway, though materials and time are coming harder to come by as I get older. Compromises must be made sometimes. Uh oh! I sound like my elders...
Another alternative is a Skeleton bucket for a tractor loader, run at slow speeds thru a plot to pick as many as possible then move to another plot.
Bringing back a topic from the discussion of another thread, here, where it probably should have gone instead of Boulder Hunt ... I didn't know what a skeleton bucket was until I saw one someone made on the ForestryForum. It's a neat little contraption. That being said I bought the beefy clamp-on forks for my backhoe, could I add a skeleton to that or am I just asking to wreck the forks? That sounds easier and cheaper than making a big screener like I'm planning. If I can just run gently through my piles and give a little shake to separate that'd be lovely.
So, I just bought some pallet racking to turn into a rock screener. It should be here in a week or so and I'm excited to get started with it. Here my work in progress drawing in autocad. I already messed up though because I have these uprights at 10 feet long but they are 15. While I don't expect to use that full height I do need to raise the low part of the screener deck up a bit. I'll have to carefully consider my cuts. I have two 15 foot tall uprights, which will be chopped up to give me my 4 upright poles, then eight 10 foot long rack beams, which should provide the screen deck, supports near the bottom of the frame (not pictured yet) and a rail that I can add some plywood to to shove the loader into to pick up rocks, and 6 wire decks (also not pictured yet), to use as the screen. I'll also not keep the sticking up beams on the front like it's showing. It wouldn't surprise me to find that I'll need some more robust screening, probably some angle iron like DMiller shows above. All in all, I think this will be a neat project and should be a fun build. I've never gotten into something like this but I'm really looking forward to it. It brings up another question... It seems silly to dig a hole with the hoe, then turn around and use the loader to dump the dirt on the screener, when I can just park the screener next to the hole and dump straight from the hoe to the screener, right? Then, I can move the screener out of the way and shove all the dirt back in the hole. Am I missing something?
I'll post a picture of my little bedding screen. I made it light enough to move by hand, and it straddles a 2' wide trench. you dump the material very carefully over it, and the rocks roll away from the pipe and the suitable bedding filters through. It has no other purpose but has been used for years in jobs where we could not easily get bedding to the pipe.
I made the mistake of not drawing this thing up prior to ordering metal. So, once I started drawing I'm finding some stuff that I may have messed up. First, was I didn't order enough of the wire decks, so I got back in touch and doubled my order to 12 of them, maybe I'll have some spares if I need them. Second, I'll also have to contemplate the real measurements of everything. In the picture below I have to pretend that there aren't big gaps around the wire decking. I'm undecided if I should just shrink some of the dimensions (specifically the width) to match the screen? It's drawn to about 10 to 10.5 feet wide, but maybe I'll need to shrink it a foot or so. I was thinking of bolting a piece of plywood to the front over the three beams to shove into upon getting the sorted rocks but I don't think that will be sufficient and I'll end up either moving the whole thing or bending the crap out of it... Still thinking for a solution there. I've worked on the drawing a bit:
1/8" steel will work, is what have on mine.
My supplies! Unfortunately, it's supposed to rain for the rest of the week, so likely there it will sit.
I built mine from channel I bought at a good price. My 6" channels are set at 6" on center spacing, I'll estimate 100% pitch. I believe i have 2' tall vertical wall at bottom. If you are interested, I'll get the exact. If I did it again, I'd have NOTHING horizontal!!!!!!!!! The face MUST be parallel, or even wider spacing at bottom. Some of the $20,000. commercial screens have a secondary rack fits over the primary. This rack is movable & has a bump rail to hit with your loader bucket to free stuck rocks.
I'm not sure what you mean there, Willie? I'd love to see a picture of yours, have you posted it anywhere? (it's entirely possible you have and I replied to it then forgot, sorry, if so!) Thanks for the note about horizontal pieces, I'm contemplating some extra structure going under the screen, just to take some of the abuse, but I'm not exactly sure what I'll do there. I would think the only horizontal piece would be used to pick the whole thing up but maybe I can do that just from the top of the frame. I was also considering making the whole deck screen hinged to I could lift it and let it slam back down to unstick stuff, but then I figured that'd likely take some of the sturdiness out...
I deal much of the time with mineral earth, not a lot of organic component. When I can I get some material from other places, that MAY include organic (sticky) soil. My screen, or grizzly began as 14' 6" by 2" C channels. with plates welded to each end. Each plate has 2 bolt holes. They came from some sort of carpet racking in a warehouse. A customer closed his Long Island carpet business, brought all this with him to VT. An ugly divorce ensued, & he had to empty a barn. I arranged the channels in a heavier channel frame & bolted them in place. It had two legs held to the roughly square frame so I could easily alter the pitch as needed. It worked OK, but staying at the same angle all the way to the ground wasn't ideal. It needed a vertical wall at bottom. After the violent flood of 2011, the whole thing was lost for months. I eventually spotted a small corner 2" tall sticking out of the rocks, otherwise it was buried. It then got a major overhaul. The ribs were cut at 2' & welded back together at 45 degree angle to create a vertical wall dirt could pile against one side, rocks on the other. If I had it to do over, spacing would be 4" at top, 5" at bottom. Rocks tend to wedge between, & i have to use a sledge hammer to free them. I have a cross brace of angle welded to each rib mid span. Junk, tree roots, rocks & occasionally sod collect on it & have to be removed by hand. I've tried chain link fence as a screen over the whole thing. It ABSOLUTELY does NOT work! I pick bushel sized rocks out before screening. the screen separates gravel from 5" & larger rocks. I would like a secondary screen to fit over it all to get rid of 5 thru 2" rocks. Each size has its application.
My main screen to separate smaller rock from soil or trash is woven wire screen, 1" squares, does OK but vibratory style would work better and should have built wider. Did end up placing 1/8" sheet on both sides to keep materials on the screen.
Looks great DMiller! I was wondering about adding some sides, I'd probably just do 2x6s or something. I'm expecting mine to be about 9 and a half feet wide. I want it substantially wider than the loader bucket, so that should do I think. I'll be interested to see how my grating or screen works out. I think the holes are like 1.5" or so by 2-3" but if I need to I can stack another layer on and offset it a bit. This decking, I'll have to get a picture of, has some ribbing on the underside of it to give it some support on a racking system, just a u shaped piece (I think there are 3 per deck) to stabilize things a bit. I'm wondering if it'd be a good idea to have the u's on the top side and maybe weld in some rebar to give them some strength and grizzly bar ability...
All towns here have grizzlies to screen winter sand. The material is already screened in million dollar screen plants to 3/8" minus, then mixed with salt. The grizzlies only separate frozen clumps in very cold weather. They have all screen members arranged 2" apart at perhaps a 45 degree angle. They too get clumps stuck, but a less frigid day, the salt content melts it & it falls through. I do not believe you will be happy with a passive screen with any horizontal component. Look at Rock Tough, or their competitors, nothing horizontal.
Thanks Willie. I'm using Rock Tough screens as examples to look at as I'm building mine. We'll see how it goes, theirs are WAY beefier than mine will be. Yesterday, I started tearing down my pallet rack uprights. I cut off the supports that hold the 2 vertical beams, then cut the two 15' uprights down to two 11' high beams and two 4' high beams. I also welded a couple feet onto the 11 footers. Unfortunately, the feet are much to weak, I'm not sure how much that matters once the whole frame is together and I assume, at that point the feet will just keep the whole thing from sinking in the dirt (I could double or triple the thickness of the feet too, to beef them up a bit). My welding is still sloppy. I just have a small MIG welder that's running off 110v and while it worked to attach the feet I'm not sure I've got good penetration, though I'm also not positive I've got my setting correct on the welder, I've got a bit of learning to do. I did wail away on the feet a bit, with a hammer, and they stayed attached. Then, I stood up the 11' tall beams. They are too tall. I'm not smart enough to do the math on having a 45 degree screen and how tall my uprights need to be, so I've left that to autoCAD, but I probably need to go back in and check that again. Realistically, as long as I have the 45 degrees about right the height of the uprights and their distance horizontally, from each other, doesn't really matter does it? My guess is that I'll have to bring the 11' down to 10' or maybe less. It's also hard to determine how high the loader bucket can really clear. I don't want to be at risk of hitting the screener but I also want to make it high enough to be able to make a good pile of rock before needing to clean out. We'll see. So far it isn't making me feel too dumb yet, but there's plenty of time for that!
OK, so I started lining stuff up for the screen and quickly came to the conclusion that I don't want to cut metal unless I really understand what I'm doing. Thusly, I'm building a 1/32nd scale model of the screener. My lovely wife had these sticks handy, and 1/32nd is the size I could accommodate. Some of the trial measurements are very close so it may be too small but I hope to get a decent idea of how I need to cut everything so it fits properly. Here's the progress so far... Converting picture one into picture two.
More model pictures. I've got all the pieces scaled out, with a bit of variation to see how that goes, except the screen itself. They are glued up now and I'll start arranging things next.
I had my model parts all glued up and ready to start constructing. I touched the pieces and they all fell apart. I guess I'll just be trying it out on the real thing.
I had an area 70' X 30' graveled & smooth. I wanted a bit more length & less steep. I dug through the processed gravel to expose boulders & broke one too big to move with fire. After I had grade down to where I wanted it& everything bigger than a basketball hauled away, I wanted to remove more rock. I got two dirt trays cut from 275 gallon fuel tanks & set up the screen. Mine isn't perfect, the bars are 5" apart. An hour after set up I had screened 25 cubic yards of the top layer. I filled two dirt trays with rocks ranging from basketball size to 5" smallest dimension. I can pick the rest with a rake.
I've finally gotten back into my screener project and spent hours and hours on the welder over the past 2 days. I've got 6 wire decks welded together for the screen and one racking beam welded up to one side of the screen deck. I think I made the mistake of over welding and did every single wire for half of the run seen below, after several hours and my back hurting I decided that only welding every 3rd or 4th wire would be sufficient. I hope that's true. I plan to add another 3 beams around the edge of the screen then some vertical pieces to stabilize the screen a bit. It'll be an adventure figuring how to pick it up and move it.
Key words, Tractor Loader.
What do you mean DMiller? My assumption is that I'll get the whole frame made and stiffened up with the additional beams, then maybe add some hooks, or add the legs with it turned sideways on the ground and lift the whole thing at once...?
I believe the horizontal wires in your mesh will defeat your invention. A guy nearby did make a somewhat successful unit with a Briggs engine, a gearbox to reduce speed & a consumable 6" hex each side of the screen. He hinged it at top of screen & the bottom lay on this. It gave a bump, bump, bump to the screen. Still, roots would accumulate on it. My friends have a Reed Screen All. I'd say it's 35 years old. The whole screen assembly is mounted on coil springs. A heavy shaft is suspended from the screen assembly It is eccentric so when it rotates, it shakes the Hell out of the screen. The shaft is powered by a hydraulic motor. The wear components are bearings & hydraulic hoses. Rigid rules; Grease the bearings with 1 pump per hour use. They use grease provided by Reed. Probably nothing special about the grease, but they take no chances. A bearing siezed once, spun on the bare shaft. I recall that repair cost $14000. There is a company 50 miles from here rents a similar screen machine.
I believe the horizontal wires in your mesh will defeat your invention. A guy nearby did make a somewhat successful unit with a Briggs engine, a gearbox to reduce speed & a consumable 6" hex each side of the screen. He hinged it at top of screen & the bottom lay on this. It gave a bump, bump, bump to the screen. Still, roots would accumulate on it. My friends have a Reed Screen All. I'd say it's 35 years old. The whole screen assembly is mounted on coil springs. A heavy shaft is suspended from the screen assembly It is eccentric so when it rotates, it shakes the Hell out of the screen. The shaft is powered by a hydraulic motor. The wear components are bearings & hydraulic hoses. Rigid rules; Grease the bearings with 1 pump per hour use. They use grease provided by Reed. Probably nothing special about the grease, but they take no chances. A bearing seized once, spun on the bare shaft. I recall that repair cost $14000. There is a company 50 miles from here rents a similar screen machine.
I hope not, Willie, but I guess we'll see. The majority of material I'll be screening should be from under a field that has been hay'd for who knows how long, so I don't expect a whole lot of organics in it. I'm assuming it'll get beat up a fair amount but depending on how it works and my needs would tell me if I want to invest more in the project. As it stands now I'm not entirely convinced I'll ever get to my pond project, which is what the majority of the rock would be for.
My separator and final screens still work OK, vibration would benefit GREATLY but are what they are for what time and finances I had. Welded frames with the head pieces welded structure so are relatively solid with materials sling across to separate as does so. A number of times have recycled the materials several repeats to get down to just rock or just manure or just dirt, that is where the vibra screen eliminates repeat runs. ran a few old school home built creek rock screens separate the huge stuff first then down thru varied dimension screens and belt transports to get just sand or dirt or manageable rock sizes, often would have a blower set up to reduce light organic materials as grass or leaves or finer twigs. The old screens would literally shake themselves apart needed maintenance every few hour but dis a reasonable process.
We see industrial bins that tend to stick use a shaker. It's a 1HP electric motor with a shaft sticking out both ends. An out of balance flywheel on each end makes it shake.
The other aspect I forgot to note is to move my screens I take my farm tractor with loader on it, get under the head piece from the high side with a brace across the bucket or forks and lift the entire frame with screen up and drive away with it.
Making progress. I was nervous to cut this beam on the right but the cut was the perfect length!
I have seen a couple of these around, but always in an industrial operation, never a gravel pit. I have seen them hanging from chains, and it looks like easier to build for a DIY operation. Gyratory Screening Equipment | High Speed Gyratory Screener (bmandm.com) I don't know if they don't work well for gravel or just what, but it look's like it would be easier to build. Gyratory equipment - Wikipedia Near the bottom the math get's pretty thick (beyond me) but there is a very informative chart dealing with screen angle & efficiency. As well as recommended speeds.
Interesting dd, thanks! Yeah, that math is beyond me too! Other people have mentioned making the screen bumpable, to loosen stuck stuff or whatever, and it seems like a chained up version would be more reasonable for that. I'll have to consider it. For as long as this project is taking me I expect to build the version I have in my mind, find that it doesn't work the way I want and learn the hard way the alterations I need. My volume will likely be very low and I expect it's usage to be minimal. If I stick with it I think I may be able to get the screen deck done this week, then I'll have to figure out how to add the legs and hope they don't collapse on me. It's almost to big to move by hand now, so that'll add some other interesting complications. Maybe I'll try to build it upside-down.
And maybe the vibration could be from a simple 3.5 hp vertical shaft briggs lawnmower engine. I didn't think of the "Hanging from chains" aspect to be used to "bang" it for clearing, that is a plus.