I've wanted one of these for a very very long time !!! …… but the Bcat brand built model, and the fully hydraulically controlled model hi-flow 8' One ….. I've been studying all diff brand types and models, but None of them have exactly what I am looking for.
A buddy of mine built one that was modelled after a huge drag behind PTO driven type from at least a 100+ hp farm tractor …… he built it to mount on the quik-attach and driven with a hyd motor ….only he did not have all the bells and whistles like my Bcat to control power beyond with the Joy-stick buttons. So he built it with a much larger 12"diam drum and it has teeth that are 3" tall off of that … he only built it with 5' wide drum due to the lack of hyd power of his 1845 @ 16gpm and only 80% of the 54hp engine hp (which is the common hyd hp factor used) …. I've used his on my machine and also demo'd the 8' Bcat soil conditioner ….. the Bcat was awesome to use BUT it had a tendency to bounce over the larger rocks due to the way shorter teeth …. on the other hand my buddies one would pull out rocks up to 12" and condition the soil all in one pass (roots and rotten old stumps are also not a problem) ….. being too narrow for my Bcat is what got me shopping and thinking about what my wants were …. LOL
I've been building one for a couple of years now and its drum is 8' wide, 12" diam and am using 3/4" thick x 3"x 4-1/2" tall Hardox 550 Teeth (148 of them strategically placed) …. I modelled mine mostly after the Bcat version, including the articulating front axle & using bigger front caster wheels …. I am using from Bcat the hi-flow full function hyd manifold and wiring harness to plug'n/play with my 7-pin boom plug and will add a second 6-way splitter manifold to choose between 2 of the normal functions, What I added was being able to tilt the head left and right to compensate for twisting terrain as you would be driving in a straight line (the OEM manifold was short one 2-way function to do this) but not a problem to add the extra and will just choose to either operate the left/right angling for wind-rowing the debris and set it there and switch to the left/right head oscillation function at the touch of a switch, when reversing direction of travel switch it back, change angle and re-activate the oscillation mode ……… The only thing that I couldn't justify was to direct couple the hyd motor to the drum, I chose to chain drive it allowing me to change the drive sprockets and fine tune the RPM's perfectly …… It's a work in progress …. once I get it finished i'll make an attempt to post pics of it totally finished …. maybe by next spring … LOL ….
Cheers for now !!!