what kind of steel should I reskin a dozer blade with?

[oldirt]

I thnk I erred in using AR200 steel for the dozer blade face of my old D6D. This thing will absolutely not scour. Even after I spent a day with a sander attempting to take the black scale off. I can barely get to the bright stuff underneath.

Should I have used just mild steel for this? I am ready to cut my losses and recover it.. again.

 

[Scrub Puller]

yair . . . oldirt. I see your words but don't understand the problem . . . why would you need to sand the scale off a dozer blade?

Cheers

 

[willie59]

I have to agree with scrub, don't really get what your saying about the steel on the blade. If you're saying the steel on the face of the blade is just too contaminated with rust, scale, degradation to allow good weld bead without interruption of said contamination, perhaps you should just use the machine fill the blade with some loads of dirt. Pushing some full blades of material will scour that blade clean.

 

[dirty4fun]

When he said he can't get it to scour I assume he means the dirt sticks to it, instead of rolling ahead and coming off the blade. Pushing some sand for a while, I would think polish the blade and get the mill scale off.

 

[grandpa]

I know what your talking about oldirt ( they obviously don't have the quality of soil you have ) . I don't think your choice of sole material is wrong... you just need to push in some more abrasive type material to get her cleaned.

 

[Scrub Puller]

Yair . . . This I interesting. oldirt, granpa .You mean that in some material this is a noticeable problem that makes a difference to operation/production?

I have run blades with three by half flat welded on horizontally on about twelve inch centres to keep a layer of clay against the skin to prevent it scouring and it never seemed to affect the performance . . . but then again I always try and avoid rolling dirt, once the blade is loaded in the slot I would rather it just sit there for the ride.

Cheers.

 

[oldirt]

ok, the area I live and work in has light silty clay, usually (and this year is no exception) rather moist, and no sand, no rocks. The first cut will peel, but when you spread some sticks, pretty soon you have a yard or more of dirt stuck to the blade. This steel I put on had a dark gray coating which I guessed was mill scale or maybe case hardening layer. Anyhow after a day of hard work it looked exactly like it did when I welded it on. pretty and smooth, but wouldn't scour dirt. I took it back to the shop and polished it out with 80 grit and it looked a lot better, but dirt stuck just the same. Every half hour or so I have to shovel it all off, trying to get at least some dirt movement across the moldboard. This is no different than a plow, the moldboard must be soft enough to polish, but hard enough to last. This is why I am wondering if I should have used a much softer grade of steel.

 

[Nige]

As above. There's nothing wrong with the steel you used, it's only "medium-resistant" in the abrasion stakes. Get the blade in some more abrasive material and loads of black smoke coming out of the stack. That'll shine it up in no time. If you have any fore-and-aft adjustment on the blade (even if it's only a screw jack on one/both sides) try temporarily angling the blade a hair further forward to get the material to roll better. That will help. Once the blade is polished up you can angle it back again.