After a long time thinking of how to put a ball on the front of my garden tractor, considering my lack of knowledge and skill in working with metal, I came up with this rube goldberg thing. It even works. I had an 8 inch piece of uni-strut and a piece of 3/16 steel with holes already drilled. I had to buy a new 1-7/8 inch ball for it all to come together. It lifts off very easy.
Nice job Erik B Only concern I have is the hitch plate trying to rotate since you don’t have 2 points of attachment at the Unistrut. If you know someone with a welder, have a bead placed under the hitch plate to the Unistrut or at the back edge of the plate to the back face of said strut. If ya can’t find anyone who welds, you could drill a hole in the plate just a smidge off the front face of the strut and add a bolt and nut to provide anti rotation of your hitch plate and ball hitch.
I wrenched on it pretty hard. I am going to use it to park my splitter in my pole barn. It should be easier driving forward than backwards. If I see it do any moving, I will find a way to fix it. Thanks Eric VW for pointing out an area of concern.
That should be plenty fine for a splitter. If you can stand on it and stays attached and doesn't fold down I'd call it good. Relocating the ball as close to the mower as possible would help too. Even 1/2" makes a big difference (that's what she s...nevermind).
Or just take 1 or 2 pieces of flat stock and drill holes in each end to mount under the ball and to a hole on the side of the unistrut to triangulate to stop any rotation.
My ATV had the same issue. Hitch only supported by one bolt. It would periodically come loose and move when I was backing up the log splitter, or the trailer full of firewood. Every month or two, I'd have to tighten it. A lock washer on bottom got me half way there. A lock washer top & bottom has held for better than a year now and was a pretty cheap fix.
what holds it onto the tractor besides gravity ? The weight of the splitter will probably roll it down off of the bumper guard or a bump will bounce it off. Seems like Danger Danger Will Robinson..........................
Splitters are definitely easier to push with the front end instead of backing, at least for me and my 4wheeler
ironpony If you look at the first picture, the black bracket on the tractor goes along the front of the uni-strut and it wedges itself between the nut and the front part of the uni-strut. When I put weight on the ball, nothing moves.
Asked a friend who is real handy if he had a welder. He did and invited me over this afternoon so he could work on it. He had a Harbor Freight wire feed welder. It only took him a few minutes to do the welding then grind off some of the excess and gave it a quick spray of paint. This should do the trick. Thanks Eric VW for the suggestion.
I told the guy that did the welding I want it to work and I don't care what it looks like. Makes it look like I did it myself
I have used it a couple times and it works great. Here are a couple pics of it in action. Had no troubles pushing it up the hill to the pole barn to park it.
Ought to be plenty good for the application. I have had one on the front of my 4 wheeler for many years and also on my side by side. I even had one on the front of an old Jeep, years ago. A ball on the front is so very handy, for putting a trailer or whatever right where you want it.
