Moldboard Plow Converted To Deep Ripper

Moldboard Plow Converted To Deep Ripper SUBSOILERS Subsoilers (58n) 20-5-8 A Wisconsin farmer says he's come up with an inexpensive way to make his own deep ripper. He turned his moldboard plow into a 3-pt. mounted, 30-in. wide ripper equipped with two 20-in. long steel shanks. Doug Gratz, who farms near Readstown, already had the old Deere 4-bottom semi-mount plow. It was equipped with trip standards that "kick back" whenever they hit a rock. He removed the moldboards and cut off the beam about two thirds of the way back. He cut off the second and fourth shanks and used sections of the shanks to make "shovels" that weld at an angle to the bottom of the remaining two shanks. "I saved a lot of money because a comparable deep ripper equipped with reset shanks sells for $2,000 to $3,000. I have a 110 hp tractor so I could only handle a two-shank model. I use it on 15 to 20 acres each fall on heavy, hard red clay. The ground works up nice the following spring. I had been using a single shank, 3-pt. commercial model but I had problems with rocks. Now when I hit a rock I just back up and go around it." Gratz cut apart the plow's lower lift arms, lowered them 6 in., and welded them back on to get a lower pull point. He cut off parts of the hitch and bolted them on vertically behind the lift arms. To reinforce the shanks he bolted a length of angle iron on top of plow's main beam up to the hitch. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Doug Gratz, Rt. 1, Readstown, Wis. 54652 (ph 608 624-3370 or 624-3373).

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