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Needed a drawbar, made one!

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grayrider

Well-known Member
Grandpa Love?s old Oliver 77 is in my care now, upcoming hayride resulted in me building a drawbar for it today as Oliver parts are non existent in south Alabama and I didn?t want to order one since I had stuff laying around. Used a grader blade, cut it to size, welded a receiver hitch to it, fixed it with two pins for easy removal, can swing it side to side or even flip it upside down if I want too. Will probably get some criticism from the Oliver purists but it?s the way I wanted to do it and being 100% authentic doesn?t matter to me...
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A receiver hitch Is really handy for a hitch you can use a hammer strap type or a single type or any kind of ball or pintle hitch
 
Looks nice, greyrider. Have fun!

We are supposed to going on a hayride Saturday... thinking our hayride might be a hair chillier than your hayride.

Probably going to need long johns by the time we get around to burning some hotdogs over the campfire.
 
We put a receiver on our little stunted 4WD yard tractor a couple of years ago, makes it real handy when shuffling trailers and equipment around the farmstead.....
 
My late Uncle liked to make things from used grader blades. (Cheap.)

Two hitches he made fatigued and snapped over time, one on the back of a truck to pull a small gravity box, and a hitch on the back of a DEERE "CCA" cultivator to pull a 14' disc grain drill.

YAMMV, but from those experiences, using grader blades as hitches or drawbars could have turned out to be DEADLY when they failed.

The gravity box was being pulled 10 or 12 MPH to get a ton or two of fertilizer home and in the shed at the start of a thunderstorm, and instead it wound up on it's side in the ditch! What a MESS!

When the drill/cultivator hitch broke, the hydraulic coupler barrels were mounted to it so the hoses back to the couplers tore fittings off when the hitch broke. NOT a pleasant scene, either.

(NOT being critical of your project, just relating a couple of life experiences!)
 
Agreed, Bob--I've also seen difficulties with welding grader blades--it can be done, but requires significantly different procedures than standard mild steel, and if done improperly will result in very poor weld strength and/or fracturing of the material. As you said, this isn't a criticism of his project, which looks very nicely done, but a drawbar is pretty much the embodiment of a critical part, and not one to be using materials susceptible to sudden failures on. At a minimum, he should keep a close eye on it and inspect it for cracks, weld separations, or other failure signs before each use--something that should be done anyway, but few people (myself included!) actually do.
 
Looks like nobody else will say it but I have to--A cold weld welding mild steel together is one thing but welding anything to a piece of hardened steel with a non penetrating weld is a accident waiting to happen. I hope the welds on the bottom we can't see are better than the one we can!!! I was going to mind my own business but if you are pulling kids on the wagon during the ride--it is all of our business...
 
Any people on site that are familiar with steel? I believe that grader blades are hardened alloy steel that is wear resistant and tend to be very brittle to impact and or flexing like a file. Very hard and brittle and and also subject to weakening or stress cracking at points of high heat input like welding without proper post annealing . Input please from people with more steel knowledge.
 
I would have concerns with the re-welded hardened steel snapping at the slide location.

Best to anneal and re-harden it if needed.

Please use safety chains.
 
Well let this old 76 year old man wade in. Looks great ,, BUT you selection of material was flawed. The grader blade has relative low shear strength. PLEASE re- think this before the hay ride. I would almost bet I have a guy in the shop that could shear that blade with one stroke of a 20 lb sledge hammer. Pulling straight out probably would hold more than the tractor can do but vertical strength is just not there. Just my two cents worth , oh yes have been there done that.
 
I'm going to throw my two cents worth in on the side of it's not a good idea. You can weld grader blades if done right, but that doesn't prevent them from snapping. Lots of cutting edges snap from impact or flex. Not the best choice there.
 
John glad you came to my rescue, I started not to comment but just out of the safety concern I had to. By the time he puts a ball holder in the receiver the pressure point is going to be well past 6 inches from the support bracket. Going over a large bump or just sudden down pressure I am afraid it will just shear off right there at the support, if in fact the weld holds. As others have said just welding to grader blade is somewhat tricky but shear strength is just not there. Sure does look good but would scare me to death with folks involved. An old plow out in the fild yea I would try it but not a hay ride trailer.
 
Actually a NEW grader blade is pretty tough , but after being used in roads that have some rocks, they become work hardened and snap easily. A three pound hammer can break a discarded one in sub-zero temperature. Welding one is unpredictable, Sometimes good and sometimes bad=
 
Please, please do not use that to pull a trailer on the road for a hayride. Grader blade can and will snap. You did a nice job but do it over using different material.
 
I found a topic about welding road grader blade steel on the American Welding Society website forum. E7018/E7018-AC rod was the most frequently suggested rod. The first welds did fail quickly. A pre-heat to 400 degrees F was recommended or switching to a type 309 Stainless Steel rod.

Depending on who made the cutting edge it could be high carbon steel, manganese steel, or abrasion resisting steel. There are some blade or bucket wear edges made to be welded on, but most grader blade cutting edges I've seen bolt on. Not knowing how or with what you welded the drawbar with, I think I would buy a piece of hot roll mild steel and rebuild your drawbar. I look at what a FARMALL H or M has for a drawbar and I wonder what the engineers in Charles City were thinking!
 
(quoted from post at 17:44:15 10/22/19) I found a topic about welding road grader blade steel on the American Welding Society website forum. E7018/E7018-AC rod was the most frequently suggested rod. The first welds did fail quickly. A pre-heat to 400 degrees F was recommended or switching to a type 309 Stainless Steel rod.

Depending on who made the cutting edge it could be high carbon steel, manganese steel, or abrasion resisting steel. There are some blade or bucket wear edges made to be welded on, but most grader blade cutting edges I've seen bolt on. Not knowing how or with what you welded the drawbar with, I think I would buy a piece of hot roll mild steel and rebuild your drawbar. I look at what a FARMALL H or M has for a drawbar and I wonder what the engineers in Charles City were thinking!
Click to expand...

By the way, H and M drawbars are high carbon and heat treated. Replace one with mild steel the same size and it will not hold up.

Heat treated high carbon steel can be welded with plenty of preheat even with 6011 but you do not know what the grader blade was made of and a lot of abrasion resistant alloys are just not weldable.

E309 is the best rod to join all types of steel but it can't help a base metal which is not weldable.
 
Just throwing a few more pennys in the pot. I always thought the tongue on a draw bar was just rolled steel. Well let the lesson begin.
 
Good looking project, unfortunately wrong material. Grader blades and other such cutting edges are bolted to a support (moldboard) to limit bending and flexing. The heat effect from welding, combined with the direction of and the loading it will receive used in this manner may lead to failure (snapping off) before cracks or bending will be seen. I've seen the results of people trying to use free cutting edges for projects. They will work for somethings, but this is not one I would use them for.
 
Lighten up guys, after reading all the comments, went out to the barn, took it off tractor, swung a 12 lb sledge hammer and hit it 8 times, it ain?t broke yet. It won?t be pulled down a public road, just around pasture land. I?ve got to repaint it now.....
 
The issue is NOT hitting it, the issue is the sharp edge it rides against.

As Ron White says, cant' fix stupid, you are taking other lives at risk.
 
I am sorry for my outburst.

I deal in the trades every day, bad decisions lead to people getting hurt or killed.
 
Had to laugh. Now the paint job got messed up. Not at you just the crazyness. Let us know the final outcome.
 
You could hit with a 100 pound hammer fifty times hook it to a locomotive and not break it but it still will not pass ytosha standards . Your pulling a 4 wheel wagon aren?t you ?
 
Ultimately it comes down safety. This is the weak link between the wagon and the tractor. You could have purchased an original drawbar but you have decided to rig one up from scrap. I hope you don't hurt someone. If you do, this post may come back to haunt you. If it were me, I would get on ebay quick and buy the first one I found.
 
As has been said, nice looking result.

I did a similar thing with truck springs, the welds literally fell apart in use. The truck springs ended up in the magnets of a chopper chopping sweet corn debris coming out of a canning factory. Someone was looking after me that day. Luckily I was not fired and no one got hurt and the brand new Fox chopper was not destroyed.

Can someone offer him a drawbar?

If you insist on using this please use a good set of safety chains.

Paul
 
Greyrider,to satisfy the naysayer install a chain round hitch to the angle iron frame. Thus if it ( doubtful)breaks pulling a 1500 pound wagon hauling 1500 pounds of people it wont take off n run away
 
Now aren't you glad you posted this and gave the safety Nazis something to whine about? Congratulations, you brought them out of the woodwork. TDF
 
Can't say I agree with that in this case since more than one who has said it is a bad idea has been vocal about the safety Nazis before too. When the risk takers are saying it's a bad idea it might be time to pay attention.
 
While grader blades would not be my first choice. I have welded them to things for use with no problems. We used to replace the cutting edge on our loader bucket. I would cut out the old edge and weld a grader blade in it's place. Never had one crack or break out of the bucket did it a couple or 3 times. Wore them out. We welded them in in the winter outside with 7014 rod. It did get more than one pass with the welder to fill in spots and fill gaps from the cutting.
So I don't see a problem unless he starts putting lots of weight on the tongue like in the multiple thousands of pounds.
 
I think most of the safety "Nazis" (as they are referred to here) are just posting a comment that they think might be something to give some thought to. What's wrong with a safety heads up, it might be accurate and if it's not, then no harm done. I'm sure the first guy that suggested putting seat belts into cars and trucks or roll-over devices on tractors was though of the same way. I think the very principle of a discussion forum is to encourage others to reply, why are some so set against doing that I wonder?
 
I too am worried about it. Especially on a hay ride. Some steel is so hard it can easily snap without warning. Hard to know what type of steel comes off the scrap pile ?
 
On the issue of hayrides and other things a safety chain is a good idea regardless of the draw bar material.We had an original never welded on draw bar on a AC 190XT break while pulling a round baler.Very very fortunate it was on a level spot and the tractor was about stopped.After that I put safety chains on all the round balers,wagons etc.The baler deal could have been a real disaster.I probably wouldn't use a cutting edge but the idea you had is a very good one and I'm going to copy it on a couple tractors.
 
"I think the very principle of a discussion forum is to encourage others to reply, why are some so set against doing that I wonder?" So I replied. Or is it only okay if certain ones reply and/or say the approved lines?
 
I've repaired quite a few broken cutting edges in my time, and I've welded on a few grader blades as cutting edges. I don't see the comparison since it would be hard to get someone hurt from a cutting edges breaking. And from a structural standpoint a cutting edge is supported on both ends and all along by mild steel, not cantilevered off an edge and supporting weight and taking impacts. A really poor comparison.
 
Two Dogs ..... I don't think you read my reply very well, and certainly didn't answer my question of why would anyone post a critique of someone suggesting safety and to make sure things are done correctly in their opinion? To call them Nazi's is a childish and silly response in my opinion. If someone suggests safety then ignore them if you want to but to criticize them is totally wrong, discussion forum or not.
 
It looks functional for a wagon just pulling a 4 wheel hayrack.

Someday some serious weight from a 2 wheel trailer will be put on it. That is what tractors are for, heavy pulling and heavy hitch loads. So someday it will get that.

Grader blade metal is odd stuff. Built to wear and be stiff, but not possibly real strong. Might rather break than bend. Or some bend pretty easy.

Throw in the welding on it, that changes the structure of the metal on the weld seam. If you welded across the blade, you created a line that is ?different? and will react to weigh and bending and shock loads differently. That is kind of scary...

Dad made a drawbar for the Ford 960 out of regular metal bar laying around the shop. It was the correct dimension bar. Managed to cut it the right length and drill a big hole in each end with the hand tools of our shop. But it bent down with the first load he put on it, the bar was soft.

My Oliver tractor I pulled the manure spreader every August. You could see the correct factory drawbar spring down a little, under a lot of weight. It was best to bolt the pin holes in the drawbar together on each side of the drawbar. Or the swinging drawbar lip would break off, it had a lot of weight to hold up under. We ran the drawbar is short mode, not really much sticking out. By the time you put a receiver hitch in there, you are extending the wight way far out.

I?m sure your drawbar will work 100 years for what you plan for it today.

Just hope your plans don?t change, and someone gets hurt.

There are things that can go wrong, and might be the next owner before any of that shows up.

Enjoy your pics and your message, and I?m not trying to beat up or be critical of you. Not in any way at all. I?m sure my message is too long for anyone to bother reading anyhow.

Paul
 
You just don't get it do you? Go back and read all the responses again. Read them carefully this time. I just don't want to see anyone get hurt. "hit it 8 times" What would have happened on the 9th. time.
 
In summary, don't post any work that you are proud of, unless you want to be today's whipping boy. Same as the Quick hitch guy a week ago. :cry:
 
Everyone hates that guy so bad he probably went
and hung himself ! Even my post asking about him
got zapped good grief
 
JMOR, for you and the rest of the negative crew, spent my lunch
hour between two machine shops and a welding shop today, all three
places said the metallurgy of this particular blade is good stuff, I took
the piece I had left over as well as the drawbar itself for examination.
And I was once a pipeline welder 36 years ago as well, just had three
of my current pipeline welders look it over and they see no problems
either. So for all the doubters it?s time to pick on someone else and
whine about the next home built project, case closed.
 
(quoted from post at 14:28:58 10/23/19) JMOR, for you and the rest of the negative crew, spent my lunch
hour between two machine shops and a welding shop today, all three
places said the metallurgy of this particular blade is good stuff, I took
the piece I had left over as well as the drawbar itself for examination.
And I was once a pipeline welder 36 years ago as well, just had three
of my current pipeline welders look it over and they see no problems
either. So for all the doubters it?s time to pick on someone else and
whine about the next home built project, case closed.
Click to expand...
orry to see that you took me as part of the negative crew! I though it was a shot above the heads of almost all the posters except you! :?
 
wow, I am impressed, i wish i had a setup like that for my tractor, so many times a reciever would have been nice to have.
 
I've been welding and fabricating for 35 years and just the projects I've posted on here I believe would qualify me to be a really for real on the field quarterback in the field of fabricating. Of course I could be wrong.
 
Here is my phone number. 320 492 9077. Give it to those folks and have them call me at their leisure, I would like to give them a chance to educate me on metallurgy. I'm always willing to learn from a pro.
 
We have 2 pipelines running through our farm-the last one came though in 2000-I did not question the type of steel that you used-I questioned your ability to read the type of steel and your ability to weld it. I hope you weren't on the welding crew on the pipe that went though here in 2000-Your welds look like CRAP-NO HEAT-NO PENATRATION-and you almost missed your target! 36 years as a pipeline welder--God help us!!!!--Tee
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Your weld looks like a black night crawler on a grader blade!
 
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