DIY roller/crimper

Lurch830

Lurch830

messin' with sasquatch
Joined
Mar 1, 2007
Location
Wilton, NC
Looking for ideas/suggestions to make a DIY roller crimper for my food plots that I'll be putting in this month. For those that don't know here is a roller/crimper:
Roller-crimper-resize.jpg

I have a roller that I made from a heating oil drum with some MH axle hubs welded to the ends and a scrap metal frame (in flatbed), but I want to upgrade it. Right now I'm planning to do something similar to the next picture with staggered angle iron or flat bar and either use sand or add a trailer axle as ballast. I've used water before, but the first rocks I hit made pinholes so it all leaked out.
17651.jpeg F2-crimper-turning-radius.jpg

Is there anything readily available for the spiral blades that I don't know of?
~Looking for 3" tall and 3/8" thick, but don't want to get anything custom/$$$
Anything I could add besides sand as ballast?
~I'd like to get the total weight at ~400# and I figure gravel would wear out the inside of the drum
Might be the wrong place, but if I add a trailer axle to it with lights, could I run a SMV triangle and tow it without a title/tag?
~Neither my C30 or F250 have a farm tag if that makes a difference.
 
It’s an implement so an SMV will work just fine for transportation.
I would recommend a very fine sand for filler, because the weight would be more than enough and it won’t leak out if there are small, pin holes.
Angle iron, welded in the pattern of the one picture you posted should work just fine however, I would devise a way to lift it. Otherwise it will make a mess if you need to transport it from location to location.

Just my random thoughts as I sit here on the couch Drinking beer.
 
I figure I'll more than likely have to add an axle. My plan was to add a brace on the rear and flip it from roller/crimper mode to trailer mode which would also give me a place to mount lights & SMV. If its too heavy or awkward to flip, I can always use a strap and whatever I'm driving.
 
Not a roller/crimper, but saw an old core plugger that had 2 "hitches"... one was a ball hitch and the wheels were braced/static with it facing correctly for road towing. The other was pintle style "loop" for working it...

1. Unhook from truck
2. Grab the a-frame/hitches, rotate upwards/backwards until the wheels dropped the drum section on the ground (wheels pointed up)
3. Attach to tractor and get busy
4. Reverse the process to tow it again
 
That's along the lines of what I'm thinking.
 
Looked up the weights of crimpers and 6' ones range from 1,200-1,600# so I've decided to get the weight closer to 1k#. This obviously complicates 'flipping' it 180* from trailer to implement so I'm back to the drawing board! Also going to leave it as a roller since I don't trust the thin wall of the drum with that much weight on it.
 
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