Lawn mowers on slopes and hills

I ride my mower across the steep slope around my pond with my hanging off the uphill side as ballast. No sissy kill switches on my mower...

I've believe that's called "hiking out", especially if you get too close to the pond...

Y'know, I could do that with a riding mower. I've done it once on my tractor, but even though it's a _small_ tractor it's a _real_ tractor, and that was one scary experience.

--There's a very wide, very steep embankment, maybe 8ft height change top to bottom that gets mowed on the Delta, at the resort where we go steamboating every year. The groundskeeper's lawnmower has a long rope with a wooden handle on the end so that it can be 'lowered' over the berm and retrieved. Works really well.

I had a friend with a setup like that 30 years ago. it was about a 40 degree slope with a 20 foot drop. He used the rope on the mower handle too.

CarlBoyd

Is there an anchor of some sort, or does he depend on his shoes not slipping?

Thanks, Rich

Nope, get too close to the pond it's called "time to change my shorts"

Nope, it's called time to get the tractor and a chain to pull the mower out of the muck again...

Yes, on the riding mower it's not a big deal, but I wouldn't try it on my little Kubota B7100DT, and my fat but wouldn't be much of a counterweight for the tractor anyway.

The roads / highways around me have some quite steep embankments and it's pretty scary watching the mowing crews with the full sized tractors and triple mower decks operating at what must be a 30+ degree angle. I haven't seen one on it's side yet though.

They can come mow my place...

I could reverse the rear wheels on my tractor, which spaces them out a few inches. Much of my problem is just not knowing how much tilt is too much -- it's not like you can fall over half way then stop and back out.

Weld up a set of training wheels...

or outriggers, like on bondurant cars.

why can't you go part way and then back out? i routinely sail my catamaran on a single hull. swmbo gets really annoyed when it flips, so i try to avoid that :)

With your catamaran, the farther over you go the less sail is presented to the wind, so it balances. Except for the force of the wind on the hull in the air.

Lift the wheels on one side of a tractor and it wants to keep going over.

John Martin

Get some goats, and use GPS to keep track of them. ;-)

But you would have still have to figure out how much tilt is too much. Maybe jack up one side with chains limiting the amount of tilt to just a bit more than how much the jack has tilted it.

Dan

But you would have still have to figure out how much tilt is too much. Maybe jack up one side with chains limiting the amount of tilt to just a bit more than how much the jack has tilted it.

Dan

i'd imagine if you're pushing it right to the edge of what your mower can handle, it would be a simple thing to exceed it, for example if you run over a woodchuck hole, or a unexpected high spot. my compact farm tractor says in the operators manual how much of an angle is safe to operate it at. still seems scary even at taht angle.

my story, there's a bank on one side of my pond, used to be grass, would have to mow down the hill, stop, reverse back up the hill, etc. one time i was mowing down the hill, the front wheel fell into a muskrat hole/den, collapsed it and then the weight of the tractor fell on the mower deck, the mower deck doesn't have brakes (front wheels don't have brakes either), i rolled forward towards the water ON the mower deck what seemed a LONG way, (but was probably only 2 feet? 3 feet max?) seemed like a LONG way though to be out of control and heading for the water. i was imagining when i hit the water/mud i wouldn't be able to stop at all, tractor going INTO the pond, engine injesting water, etc. NEVER mowed that patch of grass again with teh compact tractor. planted bamboo.

b.w.

HI,

My father worked for state highway. Highway mowing crews do flip tractors on occasions, but the state guys get the equipment flipped back pretty quick. They also usually work in pairs so there is help available quickly.

On his way home on evening, he spotted the township tractor flipped and stopped to look. The driver was pinned, but not crushed. My dad could move/rock the tractor enough to get the guy free. He was wet and it was getting chilly, so he might have suffered from exposure if Dad had not gotten him free.

Thanks Roger

========================================================================== Pete C. wrote:

Around here there are typically 6-8 tractors working together mowing an area, that puts plenty of help nearby.