Steel Wheels & Concrete Floors

[CrankyOldMan]

Howdy folks - looking for some ideas and suggestions for two different scenarios with regards to Steel Wheel Tractors with 4" Lugs and Concrete Floors.

1. Existing building with concrete floor. Currently when moving tractors in and out - it is a kinda of a pain as I lay down 2x12's to get them in and out of the building. How do you guys get them in and out without tearing anything up?

2. If you could build a new building and the building will be both your storage area and workshop and you would have radiant heat in the floor - What do you do? 1/2 concrete - 1/2 gravel? Thoughts?

Thanks - Cranky

 

[504]

Just drive it across the floor. I would want the concrete to be at least a year old,but I have driven a couple of tractors on concrete and there was no damage

 

[showcrop]

As 504 posted you won't hurt fully cured concrete unless your tractor is very heavy. So far as new construction I think that it depends entirely on the size. If you are planning 10,000 square feet the extra cost would be a lot. If it is going to be 2,000 it would certainly worthwhile to make it all concrete.

 

[moresmoke]

I use rubber mats over the concrete where I park my loader with ice chains. The mats I have came from a farm store, they are rejects from a pickup bed mat manufacturer.

Local Cat dealer has pieces of 1/2 inch thick conveyor belt they lay down when bringing crawlers in the shop.

 

[560Dennis]

Suggest worn out conveyor belts from the conveyors systems at The Sand Gravel businesses you have locally.

 

[Blackhole49]

New or old, I would go with radiant tube heaters instead of in floor heat. I've had them in both my barns (natural gas) for 22 years and can't say enough good things about them. The many thousand sqft. DPW building I used to manage replaced their suspended gas furnaces with them. Much more uniform heat, and the savings were astronomical.

 

[Fritz Maurer]

No damage occurs with my F12 or 10-20. Except when backing over a coiled up extension cord with the skid rings. Now I have a bunch of foot long pieces of wire I need to figure out what to do with.

 

[Janicholson]

Howdy folks - looking for some ideas and suggestions for two different scenarios with regards to Steel Wheel Tractors with 4" Lugs and Concrete Floors.

1. Existing building with concrete floor. Currently when moving tractors in and out - it is a kinda of a pain as I lay down 2x12's to get them in and out of the building. How do you guys get them in and out without tearing anything up?

2. If you could build a new building and the building will be both your storage area and workshop and you would have radiant heat in the floor - What do you do? 1/2 concrete - 1/2 gravel? Thoughts?

Thanks - Cranky

Welcome to YT.mag. If the tractor is used in the field for work, then the lugs are needed, so following the recommendations here are good. If the tractor is or will be driven for shows, putting bands on the steel cleats will provide the best solution. Jim

 

[DoubleO7]

old Baler belt strips.

 

[Koolaid]

1/2 of our barn is concrete, other half is crushed asphalt that has been compacted. The crushed/compacted asphalt has worked very well for us with steel wheel tractors.

In an all concrete floor - we used 2' wide x 8' long strips of whatever discounted plywood / paneling we could get. Weighed less than 2 x X lumber. This was on a tractor with thick front bands and bar style rears - not sure how durable it would be with aggressive / pointy lugs and sharp bands.

Side note - even if we get rid of our steel wheel tractors - I still wouldn't regret having the crushed asphalt.

 

[Mule Meat]

Saw a shop in Maryland once where the guy used 1/4" thick, 6 or 8" wide T beam embedded in the concert when he built his shop. Cut the depth to about 2" before laying it in. He did it to bring dozers into his shop to be worked on.

Most likely would be to cost prohibited now with the price of steel and everything.

 

[redtom]

Howdy folks - looking for some ideas and suggestions for two different scenarios with regards to Steel Wheel Tractors with 4" Lugs and Concrete Floors.

1. Existing building with concrete floor. Currently when moving tractors in and out - it is a kinda of a pain as I lay down 2x12's to get them in and out of the building. How do you guys get them in and out without tearing anything up?

2. If you could build a new building and the building will be both your storage area and workshop and you would have radiant heat in the floor - What do you do? 1/2 concrete - 1/2 gravel? Thoughts?

Thanks - Cranky

I just run mine, W-30, F 12, on scraps of 1/2 inch osb on the concrete.

 

[Fixingfarmer]

I use rubber mats over the concrete where I park my loader with ice chains. The mats I have came from a farm store, they are rejects from a pickup bed mat manufacturer.

Local Cat dealer has pieces of 1/2 inch thick conveyor belt they lay down when bringing crawlers in the shop.

we did drive our dozers in the shop at CAT when I was there but the concrete was 80 years old in that shop. The thing we absolutely had to lay something down for was if a landfill compactor with the sheepsfoot came in. That would take a chunk out the size of your hand. The real dozer track shop in Minneapolis that was designed for it had railroad rails laid in 6 on each side concrete poured within an inch of the top so you would be steel on steel and not hurt the concrete. For the ops use, mud flap or your conveyor suggestion is pretty cheap and easy and lighter than a 2x12

 

[mechanicfred]

As far as in floor heat that depends on where you live, north yes south maybe. I personally wouldn't put up a shop without it. The radiant tube heaters are very nice as well. They heat objects up and not the air, same as in floor as it is also radiant heat. Just takes planning and a little deeper pockets. I've worked in both types of shops, we'd bring a cat in after being out in the Arctic and it would give off cold air for a week. The in floor heat would have a warm and dry floor and the radiant tube heat warmed up the steel very nice, made you feel like a little pig under the heat lamp!

 

[Factotum]

I did Industrial refrigeration and heating system service for 30 years. When I built the shop I chose natural gas radiant tube over all else. The shop is kept at temperature, the heater never gets too warm to stand under. It is more evenly comfortable out there than the house! Everything has its pros and cons, but the tube heat has the most pros to me. The in floor radiant needs a boiler, pump, filling equipment and controls as well as the extra associated maintenance. I can drill into the floor for anchors and not worry about hitting a buried heat loop. I don't want a noisy unit heater. A ductless split heat pump is a maintenance pig and I don't need A/C. The tube heater is quiet and easy to maintain, just clean the burner and blow off the dust from the tube and reflector every fall. This is not to say the other options are not good, they just aren't for me.
The floor gets protected from snowmobile carbides and studs with a couple of horse stall mats.

 

[Fixingfarmer]

The heated floors were cozy if you fell off your creeper and use very little fuel that’s true. If all I did was park my pickup in or even the grain truck, classic tractor even a dozer I’m all for it despite the expense especially if you can put a run out the door and do the cement pad melt your snow. But we are talking propane here or if you are very lucky natural gas. There is a bit of recovery time that also kinda stinks compared to tubes. I did the math on our shop quote we got at the time was an extra 60 grand on top of the concrete for a 104x76 shop. It was a bit unique there was a service pit to deal with. Provisions for a future crane. It has gotten even more expensive. 3 tube heaters were 12000. We spent our money on insulation. 1400 bucks heats that fairly large shop for a year. The idea was to supplement it with a waste oil burner if it got bad but that didn’t materialize. So assuming the propane price would increase about the same as what you would burn with your infloor because the in floor heat will use some lp just not as much we just assume the in floor heat used nothing for easy figuring. 42 years was the math I came up till it pays back not burning the fuel. Plus if my tube heater dies what do I do? Bolt a new one on doesn’t even bother me a whole day if I had a spare. If my floor heat dies what do I do? Cap it. Then cap the next one. I’m young enough I didn’t really want to replace the floor. Even if one cuts the shop size in half it’s a 30000 dollar heater vs a 5000...for what?

 

[TerryfromSWIowa]

The heated floors were cozy if you fell off your creeper and use very little fuel that’s true. If all I did was park my pickup in or even the grain truck, classic tractor even a dozer I’m all for it despite the expense especially if you can put a run out the door and do the cement pad melt your snow. But we are talking propane here or if you are very lucky natural gas. There is a bit of recovery time that also kinda stinks compared to tubes. I did the math on our shop quote we got at the time was an extra 60 grand on top of the concrete for a 104x76 shop. It was a bit unique there was a service pit to deal with. Provisions for a future crane. It has gotten even more expensive. 3 tube heaters were 12000. We spent our money on insulation. 1400 bucks heats that fairly large shop for a year. The idea was to supplement it with a waste oil burner if it got bad but that didn’t materialize. So assuming the propane price would increase about the same as what you would burn with your infloor because the in floor heat will use some lp just not as much we just assume the in floor heat used nothing for easy figuring. 42 years was the math I came up till it pays back not burning the fuel. Plus if my tube heater dies what do I do? Bolt a new one on doesn’t even bother me a whole day if I had a spare. If my floor heat dies what do I do? Cap it. Then cap the next one. I’m young enough I didn’t really want to replace the floor. Even if one cuts the shop size in half it’s a 30000 dollar heater vs a 5000...for what?

60K sounds more like geothermal price. I did my 30 x 50 infloor heat in 2008 for 3K for parts and me and my warden did the labor.

 

[Fixingfarmer]

I’m 100 percent sure that you did in 2008! In the last 16 years stuff has gone crazy you couldn’t buy the pieces to do that for 10 now even the electric grid kind. To me I would worry about all those plastic tubes and little plastic lego bricks they sit in and not sleep well. I suppose that’s more a problem with me but I have seen it fail. So we graded it. Packed it a ton. Then we are going to set a foot square lego on it and in case it in concrete with a poly hose running through it. Hope we packed it perfect. When the combine unloader belt shreds and we want to go in out of the rain to put the belt on are we going to trust that lego brick sandwich to hold the combine loaded? Boy you would be having second thoughts and be out in the rain trying to slip a belt on to get it unloaded instead of just pulling in the nice cozy shop to work on it while you listen to the rain. I think I’d rather have concrete crack under the stress of unforeseen stupidity on my part and not have the spring appear in my shop. The local coop did one and needed to have some of the concrete redone. Blamed the installer. What did they do on the next building? Did it again different installer. Time will tell if they were right but I don’t have that 2nd chance to try.

 

[Geo-TH,In]

Howdy folks - looking for some ideas and suggestions for two different scenarios with regards to Steel Wheel Tractors with 4" Lugs and Concrete Floors.

1. Existing building with concrete floor. Currently when moving tractors in and out - it is a kinda of a pain as I lay down 2x12's to get them in and out of the building. How do you guys get them in and out without tearing anything up?

2. If you could build a new building and the building will be both your storage area and workshop and you would have radiant heat in the floor - What do you do? 1/2 concrete - 1/2 gravel? Thoughts?

Thanks - Cranky

Depending on soil type and how dry your soil is, dirt floors may cause a condensation problem.
Before I got a 6 inch floor poured, my pole barn was a rain castle.

As for in the floor heat, I wouldn't do it because of the expense and it may take days to warm up the concrete.
If you plan to heat the floor 24/7 it will work, but be very costly.

I love my second pole barn. I made it 14 ft tall and put a loft in it for storage and put windows under the eves on both sides.
I can work in there without turning on the lights during the day.
If you made a workshop in the loft and not worry about cold feet. Heat rises.
Very cheap to add a loft. You might make a man cave on the second floor.
My Kubota is my elevator to the second floor. It put this wood in the loft.

 

[Hoenes]

Looks like AI is alive and well in Awalker. Second commercial add in a couple of weeks.