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Soil preperation equipment

C

Chuck one

New User
I just built a home, now the area around the home, approx 1 acre needs to be prepped for grass.
It is clay and black dirt mix, packed down pretty hard from construction equipment. I have a Kubota B2320 with 3 point.. What equipment and or attachments would be the best for working the dirt to get a good bed for planting grass.
Also some light landscaping..
 
There's a 3 point cultivator, put out by Dearborn many years ago, I think- still see them often at auctions. They have 7 or 9 tines that are spring-loaded, so they will skip over buried rocks or roots. Just scratch around with one of them, and you'll work up the ground as well as mixing the clay and dirt. I'm assuming your Kubota is about 23 HP- you won't be able to go too deep, but you get more "seat time" that way. Will be helpful, but not crucial, if your tractor has draft control.

Alternatively, an old spring tooth harrow or disc would work.
 
You need a Woods Gill Pulverizer. Trust me. I've worked with them and own one now. They come in two rollers and one roller. I've used both, not much difference. It's a 10" H Beam with several dozen spikes about 3/4" by 8 in two staggered rows on the H beam. That rips up the dirt and the H Beam levels it and the rollers crush it. Use it and you'll never use anything else. Google it.
woods_pulverizer_1.jpg
 
Same idea, just a little bit less expensive. I've used the Woods GILL pulverizer and I've got this one now. Both are equal in performance, and the Leinbach model is cheaper. For some of us that makes it BETTER.
Leinbach
 
You may think about sodding the area close to your home. Then seed the rest. My wife and I did ours and it was hot as blazes. I wasn't home when they delivered the sod and they placed it too close to the house. There was a back hoe sitting at the model home next door to me so I took a screwdriver over when I got home and shorted across the starter solenoid and it cranked, but didn't start so I pushed on the gas pedal and tried it again and it started. Pulled that pallet back with a cable and returned the back hoe. We sowed grass seed on about one half and covered it with straw. Had to keep the sod and grass seed watered until we got rainfall. This was in 1968 and it still looks good. Hal
 
800 + for their cheapest model? Wonder what a Gill costs. I didn't pay for mine...got it in exchange for some work I did. Put two bearings on the roller, paint and it was good to go.
I've seen them in Craig's list for couple hundred.
Yup...nearly a grand for a one time job....rent one. Get it all done on a week end and you won't have to store the beast.
They do work. Too much running around with the tractor, you'll wind up with dirt the consistancy of talc powder. You don't want that...1/2 -3/4" chunks is fine.
 
2 summers ago, the list price on a new 6' Gill single roller pulverizer was over $1500. We've had a couple big steel price increases since. A local dealer that handles Woods has a 5'er on his lot. He recently mentioned that he would "discount" it to $1500.

Bush Hog also sells one, theirs listed for just over $1200 2 years ago.

I got my Leinbach before a price increase. I paid less than $700 with free shipping.
 
Also worth mentioning, Woods/Gill had two models at the time I priced them. The difference was the material the spikes were made of. I priced the cheaper of the two.

And, these things are the best implement I've ever used to finish grade gravel.
 
Go and Rent a Harley. (pto rake that is) Drag boxes will do a + - job in heavy soil. The PTO powered harley digs out rocks, roots, grooms the surface leaving a layer of fine soil on top. You will most likely have to rent a bigger tractor also. If you only want to put a finish on your lawn for grass why buy. If you have money to spare buy lawn maintainance equipment to take care of the grass after it grows.
 
Rent a rotovator. Well worth the rental cost for a new seed bed,that is if your tractor can handle the PTO and 3PH work required.
 
One option is to do like my wife and I did when we built our present house 10 years ago. Also about an acre of lawn.

We hired a local garden center to put the lawn in. They came out with about a 40 hp tractor with a 4 foot rototiller on the back, worked the ground, seeded it, put straw on it, and were done by the middle of the afternoon. It rained that night, so it worked out great.

Can't remember exactly what it cost, but whatever it was it was worth not having to screw with it ourselves.
 
If you rent a rotovator I would also try and obtain about a 7' landscape rake to smooth things out. This is the time to get it right and remove the ridges and dips. You can go back and forth in different directions and also back up into the corners to get it nice and smooth. Be careful of ending up with low spots where the water does not drain right as this is sometimes hard to see in large areas. When you look at the finished job you will be glad that you spent the time to get it right.
 
I just built a house last year and am going through the same situation. We had bought a Woods Super Turf Renovator for overseeding & aerating our pastures & hay fields. It works great. It is similar to the pulverizer with the seed box mounted on it. The unit we bought was a 2 year old rental unit, so you might call around to some dealers and see what they will rent you.
 
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