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I'd like to do the same thing. I have some fencing to do and some corrals to build. Where can you buy a hydraulic post hole auger? Also if you know of any for sale, what size motor does it have, etc. I would rather spend money to buy/make one as opposed to renting a digger everytime I want to do a few posts. Here is what I know and have done so far. On my front bucket, I have bracket(s) with drilled holes for the bottom of a 3 point hitch and welded pad eyes for the top pin of a 3 point hitch. This is so I can use a 3 point bale mover. I also plan to make and weld a bracket(s) and pad eyes on the hoe bucket or brackets hooked to the hyd cylinder. I'm still trying to decide exactly where it will work best so I can put the bale mover on the hoe and also be able to tie on to a small 3 pt. implement such as a spring tooth or something to drag it around and do a little dirt work. The hitch on the front and back would also allow me to use a 3 pt adjustable angle blade for snow and some grading. TSC and Orscheln sells the 3 point PTO augers for about $420. I believe the 12" auger is about $120 or so. I talked to a local hydraulic repair company and he suggested a particular hydaulic motor that would probably work which at his (probably high retail price) was about $300. He wouldn't tell me what size and power the motor was although it probably wasn't more that 6" to 8" long and about 4" to 5" across. He said I would need to check my hyd pump gpm as well as the pressure it was putting out to match it up right. He couldn't tell me what HP the motor had, the motor rpm, etc. He said the rpm would vary with the hyd psi and gpm flow rate. It may also need some type of adjusting valve with it to control the rate of turn. We figured it would be easier to install it on the hoe on back and Tee off the loader lines with disconnects going to the back. Putting it back on the hoe would save on the lenght of hyd hose and also prevent having to turn around to reach to operate hoe hydraulics if it was on the front. Maybe that may not matter much, I don't know. Also teeing off the loader hyd lines may require some type of shut off on the lines to keep the loader from moving also. After looking at a pto driven auger, I figured it would be cheaper and easier to build my own 3 point bracket out of pipe and angle iron (similar to what they have at TSC) to hang a hyd motor from instead of spending over $420 for a 3 pt auger and then not using the pto shaft and right angle gear box. My IH tractor has a 12 to 17 gpm pumps (rated at new anyway and probably less now) and psi is supposed to be about 1600 psi or so. I haven't flow or psi tested it. If anyone has an idea on where we can get the right size hyd motor and parts at a decent price then let me know. Regarding operation: I have used the 3 pt pto driven auger from the back of a tractor and a rented motor and pto driven one that is basically hand held but are very heavy and wear you out after a few holes because you are constantly holding them and pulling them 3' up and out of the ground. We have a lot of heavy clay and gumbo around here. You have to hold the auger back or it will just screw itself into the ground and can't be lifted out. You basically have to reverse it and screw it back out. The way to do it is to set the auger on the ground but only give it a few inches of slack so it doesn't screw itself in. Allow it to dig so much at a time (3" to 12") and then pick it up and allow the dirt to clean off the auger before going for more. After the recent freeze and power outage, I watch the power companies dig power pole holes. Their boom and auger trucks do not have a whole lot of lifting power. They would drill a little, pick it up, have a swamper knock dirt/clay/mud off the auger and then take another bite. It was a slow process to keep from sticking their big augers. I also noticed that their augers don't turn a very fast rpm. Just guessing maybe 100 to 200 rpm for the auger. Does anyone know what rpm the pto mounted augers turn?
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