Home-Built Paddlewheel Plow Rebuilds Terraces With Ease

Home-Built Paddlewheel Plow Rebuilds Terraces With Ease TILLAGE EUIPMENT Terracers 26-1-25 Since most of Don TenHulzen's Firth, Nebraska, farm is terraced, he spends a lot of time in terrace maintenance. To make that job faster and easier, TenHulzen made what he calls a "paddle wheel terrace plow." His 3-point mounted plow has a 3-ft. share that loosens soil up to 10 in. deep. The share was cut from an old grader blade. Above that is a short moldboard that drops the soil onto a paddlewheel that throws the soil up onto the top of the terrace. TenHulzen shaped the moldboard in his farm shop press from a piece of 1/4-in. plate steel. Everything mounts on a frame made of 4 by 6 in. rectangular tube steel. The paddle wheel is about 6 ft. in diameter and has three 8-in. wide paddles cut from 1/4-in. steel. The original design had six paddles, but he found that was too many. They cut back to four, but three worked even better. The paddle wheel runs on a hub mounted on the plow frame. The hub is actually the bearing and mount from an Allis Chalmers disk. A hydraulic motor with 1-in. inlets chain drives the paddle wheel. A number 60 roller chain connects a 4-in. sprocket on the motor with a 2-ft. sprocket on the paddle wheel. "We tried to gear the wheel slower by putting a restricter in the hydraulic line, but it didn't work as well as putting the larger sprocket on the hub," he says. "The paddlewheel is geared so it doesn't turn fast, but it can throw soil as far as 20 ft.," he says. "I pull it with a 4020 John Deere." To rebuild terraces, TenHulzen makes one to three passes with the plow on the uphill side of the terrace. "I can rebuild a half mile of terrace in about 45 minutes," he says. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Don TenHulzen, 14303 Firth Road, Firth, Neb. 68358 (ph 402 791-5533).

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