#53 How to grade dirt with your front end loader and compact tractor

welcome back to the channel i am really glad you're here today i'm going to show you how to get great results spreading dirt with your front end loader welcome to my cluttered garage [Music] before we get started let me just say that i am not a professional i'm just going to share some things with you that i have learned using this kubota b2601 compact tractor that have worked really well and i've seen this used on other tractors it's kind of uh watching other professionals no not other professionals watching professionals use their equipment and i was able to emulate some of that on my compact tractor so let's do a little walk around first the first thing you need to know and i've shared this on several other videos is if you're going to use a front end loader you've got to have rear ballast or weight on the back of your tractor now my tractor has fluid filled tires which adds several hundred pounds but that's still not always enough especially if you're going to move something heavy like rocks or dirt if you're using mulch that's fine but rocks or dirt you need more weight than what's filled in these tires so i usually put my grater box on the back or some type of implement i happen to have my rototiller on the back now which is extremely heavy so i have no problem with balancing out the load so first and foremost make sure you have weight on the back of the tractor if you're going to use that front end loader now from the operator's platform here there's a few things i want to share with you first of all anytime i use the front end loader i use low gear the other thing i always use when using the front end loader is four wheel drive almost all the compact tractors today that i've seen have four wheel drive so any time you're using the loader use four wheel drive because you're going to be putting a lot of weight on the front of that tractor and if you're just using rear wheel drive that weight is going to come up off the back end a little bit and you won't have as much traction so by having the front wheels engaged with all that weight you're going to have a lot better traction so i say always use four-wheel drive the other thing for safety reasons keep your seatbelt on when you're using your loader i've talked about this also in other videos but when you're raising your bucket up you want to keep it as low as possible to keep your center of gravity low but sometimes you do have to raise your bucket up higher than the hood of the tractor and if you're raising your bucket and you're maneuvering the tractor you might hit a dip in the front end and that could shift the weight and the tractor could tip over you have to be really really careful about the terrain that you're driving on and the way you're operating your tractor so keep that seatbelt on you really should use it all the time when you're using your tractor but especially when you're using the front end loader as you know i also really like my deerskin leather gloves now let's get on with the demonstration the front end loader has basically four directions up and down curl and dump those are your four directions that your that your front end loader moves in there are a couple other functions in your stick here one of them is float we're going to use that then there's also a quick dump feature and a slower feature we're going to be using that quick dump to help us level the bucket it's really a handy thing to do so let's start it up so again the four directions are up and down curl and dump [Applause] one of the first things i do when i attack a pile of dirt like this is i mix it up i just go in and out break it up because i don't want to have clumpy dirt i want to have nice loose dirt so i run about 1500 rpm lower the bucket bring it in scoop it up dump it out pull the dirt back just mix it up so you have something nice to work with now when i attack the pile i lower my bucket and i level it and here's a great way to level it curl your bucket all the way back lower it all the way down and then use the quick dump feature and you can kind of feel when the bucket hits the ground level because it it stops you know it doesn't always pick the track drop like in this case it won't pick the front of the tractor up so i just dump until it stops and now i know that bucket's level then i take a little bit of pressure off the front wheel so they sit back down so now my bucket is level and i'm gonna plow right into this pile once you go into the pile as far as it'll go the tractor will start to bog down you'll know that it's pretty much reached its limit then you start to curl back and the dirt falls into the bucket i'm gonna run up to 2000 rpm now then i back up a little bit and pick up the bucket now here's where you can raise the bucket up a bit because you want that dirt to fall back into the bucket and use the hydraulics to your advantage see how you can kind of tap the stick it shifts the dirt once you have the dirt shifted into the bucket set it back down keep that center of gravity low i'll dump that out and we'll just do it in real time so now let's say we're gonna spread this dirt get our bucket full now let's pretend we're at the new location when you dump the bucket up now you dump it out you want to pour the dirt out and move backwards while you're doing it and that'll help initially spread some of the dirt and again use these hydraulics you can bump it to kind of knock the dirt out like that just quickly tapping your stick now that's not bad but it's bumpy so now we're going to spread it out and this is where your float function comes in so bring your bucket down to about a 45 degree angle maybe even less than that drop your bucket all the way down and push your stick all the way forward so you go into the float function and now that buckle will just kind of ride there and follow the dirt and as you pull back you level your bucket out and it spreads the dirt very evenly that's already much smoother you can do it several times though but it's all one motion as you're going back you're curling the bucket as well float function start to curl it back if you need to level something out you can leave it there longer got a little high spot here so i'll just push that forward a bit you can maneuver your dirt with the edge of the bucket too what's great about hydraulics is they're very precise you can move your loader so gently let's take a look at that well that looks really nice and again one key element is work your dirt before you start spreading it that way you don't have clumps you have nice smooth dirt to spread out so the other thing is don't roll out a little bit of manual labor get yourself a good hard rake and as you knock down the edges you can really spread that out pull out some of the debris might find some big rocks or something in there it doesn't take much just to use the rake fill in any low spots if you need to just lightly run the rake over top of it boy that's nice now what if you're removing soil from the surface of the ground let's talk about that so when i pick up dirt i use a similar function i level the bucket out take the pressure off the front wheels and keep that bucket level or maybe curled back just a degree or two so it's not digging into the ground i don't use the float function in this case i want to keep that frame solid so that it's digging into the dirt then i just drive in you may need to adjust the bucket a little bit as you go but for the most part it's just pushing in kind of like a dozer and when you get to the end curl your bucket back and look at that you've got yourself a nice full bucket of dirt i'll take another skim coat off the top of that you don't have to dig a lot you know you can just do it in steps and stages here i'm lifting up a little bit just to take the weight off the front curl it back nice big bucket pull and you can clean that up the way we did before put the bucket float on an angle curl it back as you back up and if you don't want to do that manual labor just clean up your edges the same way so quick side note as you're driving into the pile once your wheels start to break ground you pretty much want to stop you don't want to be digging in and making ruts because that's going to make it more difficult to get nice even loads of dirt so once you break ground just stop take the weight off and back up well thanks for watching today if you found that tip helpful i'd appreciate it if you hit that like button i invite you to subscribe to the channel and if you want to know when i'm putting out videos in the future just click that little bell icon and make it turn gray i look forward to chatting with you in the comments and i'll see you next time the bees are really active today i've been hearing a lot of buzzing and i wonder if we're getting ready to swarm not sure if you can hear that or see that but they are everywhere [Music] i grabbed my phone here and i found the swarm up there in that tree come here camera come here camera come on camera ah gotcha i got you i saved you camera i saved you

Channel: My Cluttered Garage

Views: 156,255

Keywords: kubota, kubota b2601, kubota b series, kubota lx series, kubota l series, kubota compact tractor, kubota subcompact, land pride grapple, outdoors channel, tractor maintenance, new tractor owner, homestead channel, beekeeping, how to keep bees, how to grade dirt with a tractor, how to back drag with a loader, how to back drag a driveway, front end loader tricks, tractor tips and tricks, font end loader technique, tractor video, grading with a tractor, kubota tractor 4x4

Id: wFYJTZlDl-A

Length: 15min 23sec (923 seconds)

Published: Fri May 21 2021