Two years ago, Darragh Scott from Gortnahoe, Urlingford, Co Tipperary, completed a cubicle shed on his farm.
The shed needed scrapers but after carrying out the building work, there wasn’t much money to spare for buying automatic scrapers.
The tractor and scraper wasn’t an option either because his smallest tractor was 7.5ft wide and the passageway for the cubicles was 7ft wide.
He got an idea to fit a scraper to an old lawn mower to do the job. He found a lawnmower online suitable at a cost of €100.
The bed of the mower was taken off already but the petrol engine was fine.
He made up the scraper by fitting a bracket to the chassis legs of the mower. A 3mm steel blade was attached to the bracket and a rubber liner was cut off a cubicle mat and it was bolted to the blade.
A steel cable from the scraper was attached to a handle so Darragh can lift the scraper when he needs to. He says the scraper only weighs 25kg and finds it easy to put it up and down as he is scraping.
When he started using this system, he found where there was a steep gradient the wheels of the mower would slip in the muck. He added one tractor weight block to the back of the mower and this helped increase the traction and he can go anywhere in the yard now to scrape.
“I got the idea to use a lawn mower from a trip to the States, people over there fit snow ploughs to the front of their mowers to move snow off their driveways,” explained Darragh.
When he is using the mower in the sheds, he moves cows to one side to ensure the work is done safely.
Two years ago, Darragh Scott from Gortnahoe, Urlingford, Co Tipperary, completed a cubicle shed on his farm.
The shed needed scrapers but after carrying out the building work, there wasn’t much money to spare for buying automatic scrapers.
The tractor and scraper wasn’t an option either because his smallest tractor was 7.5ft wide and the passageway for the cubicles was 7ft wide.
He got an idea to fit a scraper to an old lawn mower to do the job. He found a lawnmower online suitable at a cost of €100.
The bed of the mower was taken off already but the petrol engine was fine.
He made up the scraper by fitting a bracket to the chassis legs of the mower. A 3mm steel blade was attached to the bracket and a rubber liner was cut off a cubicle mat and it was bolted to the blade.
A steel cable from the scraper was attached to a handle so Darragh can lift the scraper when he needs to. He says the scraper only weighs 25kg and finds it easy to put it up and down as he is scraping.
When he started using this system, he found where there was a steep gradient the wheels of the mower would slip in the muck. He added one tractor weight block to the back of the mower and this helped increase the traction and he can go anywhere in the yard now to scrape.
“I got the idea to use a lawn mower from a trip to the States, people over there fit snow ploughs to the front of their mowers to move snow off their driveways,” explained Darragh.
When he is using the mower in the sheds, he moves cows to one side to ensure the work is done safely.
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