Hay spear on a loader bucket

[Jeff Oliver]

Anyone have a piture of one of these or know a good way to make one that won"t bend up the bucket? I have a JD 3020 with a 148 loader on it and if I can figure out a good way to make this I won"t have to build a spear to take on and off.

 

[Anonymous-0]

remove the bucket. Attach the bale spear directly to the loader arms at the bottom and to the hydrualic rams at the top. You cannot bend or break anything unless your bale spear is really flimsy! This is how I used one with a JD 2440/145ldr combination.

 

[old]

I have one and use it all the time. The first time I used it I took out the bottom of my bucket. Since then I have rebuilt my bucket and it now has a 1/2 of steel along the bottom front of it. 2 1/4 plates welded on so the bottom one is out about a 1/2 more then the top one. It bolts down about the center of the bucket and works well now. I also just to be on the safe side hook a chain around the spike and to the corners of the bucket where I have chain hooks welded on. Drop me an e-mail and I can send you a few pictures of it. By the way my bales are heavy one 6X6 and around 2000-2500lbs
Hobby farm

 

[Anonymous-0]

Do what Jim/Iowa said, the more you stick out from your bucket, the less you'll be able to lift. Buy a Shur-lock or similiar quicktach and buy the fork to fit your loader. chris

 

[Anonymous-0]

I've got one on our main loader tractor that attaches to the top of the bucket and sticks up at a 45° angle so it's out of the way but can be used by dumping the bucket part way. It's nice for feeding hay but even with a 95hp MFD tractor it puts alot of weight on the front end and I don't like to carry a bale any further than needed with it. For a 2wd tractor I think removing the bucket and attaching a bale mover directly to the loader arms is a much better way to go, we had a spear that sliped over the cutting edge years ago and finally quit using it after having to rebuild the bucket for the third time.

 

[Anonymous-0]

If you don't have really heavy bales I've seen a good strong bucket mounted one. The part the slipped over the lip was very wide and strong so it didn't flex the cutting edge, the spear extended underneath and had a wide plate to bear on the underside of the bucket where the back of the bucket starts up. Was chained on.

 

[RodinNS]

I'd take it one step further than what Jim suggested, but that works A-1 too if you don't need to switch a lot. I put a Universal Skid Steer attachment system on mine. Swap all attachments with the skid steer now. I also have a 3-point quick hitch that I made for the skid steer, so I just use my 3 point bale spear on the front now. Makes life a lot easier when you can switch back and forth in a couple minutes without any tools. There are companies out there that make these conersion plates. Just watch the bucket back angles because some of them require blocking kits to get the correct dump angles and such on a farm loader.
Don't waste your time on the spear on a bucket jobs. I've never seen a AG loader bucket that wasn't destroyed by one. AN industrial might survive it, but then you wouldn't have loader enough to lift it....

Rod

 

[Jeff Oliver]

Well i went ahead and welded a peice on the top of the bucket to put the spear in. I figure I can get about half of the bale in the bucket. I do plan on building something where I can take the bucket off but this should hold me for right now. The way the bucket is built the end of the top is about 23 inchs from the front of the bottom.

This thing has been converted from one cylinder in the center to 2 of them on either side. For what I am doing I would rather have the single cylinder but what the heck.

 

[Kelly Campbell]

seen a lot of them done that way with out any problems

 

[Walt Davies]

I have one I will get a pic for you tomorrow it' just to late right now.
Walt

 

[Don-Wi]

That'd be mounted upsde down on our loader!! We've got a MAssey 165 with an Allis loader on it, and for some odd reason they thought it'd be a good idea to put the cylinders on the bottom, and the arms attach on the top....

Just seems screwy to me... but it came on another tractro and the price was right.

Donovan from Wisconsin

 

[Joe(TX)]

I makes a lot of sense to have the cylinders under the arms. They are less prone to damage and there is more tilting force for the same size cylinder.

 

[Don-Wi]

To me it seems like they'd be more prone to damage, atleast on our farm.

Does make sense though that a smaller cylinder has full potential vs. one that has to pull to curl the bucket though. The bucket on it is just about junk, but it was one we had made 15+ yrs ago for the 1st loader frame that was on the 165 that wasn't built very solid and I was much younger = I trashed it. The Allis frame came on our Oliver 1755 but it was way too small for that tractor,(saw the same one on much smaller Allis tracotrs) although it really wasn't tore up. The 1755 died so we had it retroed to fit the 165. It may be a small tractor, but it's the best loader tractor we've ever had.

Donovan from Wisconsin