I am digging a pond at my horse farm and I'm having trouble moving the spoils. My F-750 dump truck gets stuck whenever I load it even half full. I cant push it with the dozer because there are pastures surrounding the pond. I need to take it about 800 feet and pile it up. I only work here in my spare time so renting an ADT would end up costing me a fortune. I was hoping to find an off road dump trailer that I could pull with a medium sized farm tractor but cant find any for sale. Any body have any info on something like this? Thanks, Justin
Do what I did and find an old wrecked dump truck and Cut the cab off it. Notch the frame rails and pull them together and reweld into a tongue. Ive done this on a single and tandem axle truck. A fellow I worked for had a 14 yarder on a 9000 Ford frame. He used a D5 to pull the trailer 200 feet to the fill. THey also used an old JD and IHC artic tractors to pull them. One conversion I saw used a set of tractor tires on the truck axle for floatation.
put tire chains on it... if it still gets stuck wait for a drier time of year. Otherwise, buy a military m818 dump and chain it up too. Anthough it you sticking a single w/ chains, the 6x6 will stick soon as well.
http://www.holmeswelding.com/dumpwagons1.htm they are not cheap you could rent a artic for 4 months for what one of these cost but they work well.
We pull a tandem gravel pup with a FWA tractor to haul clay into the feedlot. It seems to be pretty good in the soft stuff. Around here everyone seems to be going to tri axel pups, so tandems go pretty cheep.
When you say "medium" farm tractor, what does that mean? Unless it is a pretty good size 4wd, pulling a trailer with it where a truck won't go is gonna be tough. My first spreader truck was an IH 1700 w/ a 446 gas engine. I set it up to carry 3 heavy lug 10.00-20 tires on each side of the drive axle, and it worked shockingly well. I also had 15-22.5 steer tires. You could set your truck up that way for much less than the cost of a trailer. Or, if you want to get happy, set your truck up like my current spreader: If you have a welder and drill press, or just a welder, you can put triples on your truck in an afternoon for $500. If you're interested I'll post again with instructions learned through a few tries. To set a truck up like my current one, you need very heavy axles, and $15,000. If you decide to use a trailer, your best bet is probably to buy an old dump truck, and convert it. It is easy to set the truck's pump up to run off the tractor's pto. Most tractor's hyd systems don't hold enough oil to tip a trailer. If you go with a trailer, I would definitely go w/ triples, or some sort of floatation tires. The triples make it wider and much harder to overturn.
From the sound of it I would be much better off setting my truck up better than to go buy a trailer. I would defiantly be interested in seeing how to put tripples on the truck. I like the look of your spreader truck. Where do you find those tires at?
I'm sorry it took me so long to get back, I'll try to do better next time. Just a few questions and I can give some pics and description of systems I've built. What kind of wheels and rims are on your truck? How often if ever do you put your truck on the road?
I can not think who makes it but I have seen pull type dump trailers before. they looked like they cut off the cab of a haul truck and put on a hitch to hook to a tractor. has a good idea but I do not know if they are still out there.
With those cut off dump beds, be careful. A light enough tractor can flip over if the load sticks in the bed, tandems would be much better.
Sorry Ive been so busy I havent had time to post up here. Mitch, My wheels are the two peice kind everybody seems to hate I dont have sizes but I think they are twenty or twenty two inches. The tires are highway tires with almost no tread on them. I do use the truck on the road from time to time and would hate to ruin its on road ability. Does adding the thrid wheel ruin that set of wheels for road use? I think going with a set of flotation tires would be a better option. Is doing that as simple as going out and buying a set of wheels and tires?
where is it getting stuck, just certain spots? stuck as in no traction, or stuck as in sinking down?
Its sort of a combination of the two. It gets stuck mostly in the area around the pond where it is wet and I have to drive back and forth ov er it a lot. It so sinks down about six inches or so and after that I don't try to gas it anymore I just tug it with the hoe. Im looking into getting a moderate set of flotation tires and some new rims and hopefully that will solve the problem.
have you possibly looked into some mats for the problem area? might be a cheap and quick alternative.....just another thought I have the same problem in certain areas, I kinda work in another area till that one dries out
I'll take some pics of the triple setup I used to run as soon as it stops raining. It only takes 5 bolts on each side to take the extra tire off. Make sure you are sitting down when you get the prices on flotation tires and rims. A set of the big ones like on my spreader now will set you back over $16,000. A set of the ones that are 15" wide will run you more than $5000, and the truck will not be road legal with them on, due to the overall width. In NC and SC, there are laws that exempt spreader trucks, but they do not appliy to dump trucks.
A local contractor here cut the cab off a articulating off road 6 wheel haul truck and put a hitch on them to pull behind a tractor, they were an off brand no longer made and he was having trouble finding parts for the engine and transmission so he just eliminated those problems and cut that half off. I think JJ Scheckle in eastern Iowa still has some used ones for sale, when his dad sold out this summer he had a few around there, can't remember the name of them though but they looked in pretty good shape, but again were high priced I though, around 50K plus if memory serves me right.
I don't know how practical it is for you, but cutting some slight ditches and crowning has worked for me. Also grading out holes when I am done for the day in case of overnight rain. My problem hasn't been with ground that is naturally soft, just more rain that mess things up. Oh, and we have poor topsoil so it's not a real big effort, but I do strip that off first. We have used coarse, single shred mulch at about 6"-12" thick and has bridged nicely, just be careful on turning. I was very surprised when we first used it. You maybe able to get it from a tree company or clearing contractor for free to dump and then it will decompose and fertilize the ground. My truck has really aggressive tires but chains would help too, especially if you have marginal tires. I think someone mentioned chains, I just sort of skimmed through the thread.
just came across this place. don't know if you are still looking. http://www.holmeswelding.com/dumpwagons1.htm
Those trailers look like what I had in mind but on a much smaller and cheaper scale. I have ended up using several of your suggestions. I have a properly crowned road out to the dirt mound now with a little bit of gravel on top in case it gets wet. Ive also got some matts I keep out there for when I need to get around somewhere the road doesn't go and I am looking in to a set of tire chains. I still want to do an off road conversion for the truck but it still needs to be able to go on the street legally so I am thinking about converting it to four wheel drive and just getting some more aggressive road tires. Thanks fo all of the help.