Patent Application
20090188228
This invention is in the field of rotary mowers and in particular an offset floating hitch rotary mower apparatus to be used for roadside maintenance.
Rotary mowers are used for cutting vegetation of various types; crops and non-crop vegetation such as grass, weeds, and brush. Most commonly they are used to maintain roadside ditches and other public lands. These rotary mowers are often a wing-type rotary mower apparatus include two or three mower decks mounted side by side. The decks are offset fore and aft to provide the required over lap from the rotating blade under one deck to that of the adjacent deck, and the outside decks or wings, fold upward to allow for transport. The wing rotary mowers are most often of the trailing type; wherein the mower is supported by the wheels behind the deck and by the hitch on the towing tractor. A wing-type rotary mower of the trailing type is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,546,707 to Degelman et al.
Conventional trailing wing rotary mowers follow directly behind the tractor, and the mowers travel along or in the roadside ditch. In this situation, the mowers have to cope with a side sloped terrain as while as crossing intersecting road approaches. This often results in uneven cuts as well as gouging of the approach as the mower is pulled up and over.
When a ditch slope is at the typical 10 degree grade or when mowing in the roadside ditch, mowers pulled directly behind the tractor work safely, but can be extremely uncomfortable for the operator who sits at an angle in the tractor. When a tractor travels on ditch slopes with a steep grade or when steeper grades present themselves, a potentially dangerous situation occurs, that sometimes results in tractor roll over and injury or death to the operator. Some small degree of offset can be provided for trailing mowers by moving the tractor drawbar to one side, an adjustment commonly found on tractors. For conventional mounted rotary mowers, an offset is provided in the hitch of U.S. Pat. No. 4,195,860 to Helams, and as well in the hitch of U.S. Pat. No. 6,138,445 to Toth. In all cases the degree of offset is to small to allow the tractor to remain on the road while cutting the ditch. U.S. Pat. No. 5,957,475 to Pearen et al. provides an intermediate offset hitch apparatus that is hitched to the tractor on one side so as to tow behind the tractor. A rotary mower is hitched to the Pearen et al. apparatus at the rear of the opposite side. The apparatus essentially provides a hitching location and drivelines for the mower that is a clone of the tractor hitch it self, but offset sufficiently to allow the tractor to remain on the road while the mower cuts the slope of the ditch.
It would be desirable to have an offset rotary mower apparatus adapted for attachment to a tractor such that the rotary mower follows a path offset from the path of the tractor allowing the tractor to remain on the road while the mower cuts the slope of the roadside ditch
It would be desirable to have an offset rotary mower that floated independent with respect to the tractor to allow the rotary mower to follow the ground contours, to ensure an even cut when mowing roadside ditches as while as preventing gouging of the road approaches when going over them.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an offset floating hitch rotary mower apparatus adapted for attachment to a tractor such that the rotary mower follows a path offset from the path of the tractor and wherein the amount of offset can be varied, to provide operator safety and convenience when mowing roadside ditches
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an offset floating hitch rotary mower apparatus that allows the mower to float independent with respect to the tractor to allow the mower to follow the contours of the ground, ensuring an even cut.
The present invention provides, in one aspect, an offset wing-type rotary mower, the offset rotary mower apparatus adapted for attachment to a tractor for towing the rotary mower along the ground in an operating travel direction. The offset floating hitch rotary mower apparatus comprises a central mower deck and one or two wing mower decks pivotally attached to the center mower deck, a plurality of rear wheels mounted behind the central mower deck and at least two front wheels mounted to the front end of the central mower deck, a cutting blade element rotatably mounted under each mower deck, a floating hitch member, a drive, and a mower angle control. The floating hitch is pivotally attached at the rotary mower end thereof to the front wheel assembly so as to pivot about a substantially vertical axis and is adapted for pivotal attachment at a tow end thereof to the tractor about a substantially vertical tow axis. The attachment at the ends of the floating hitch on the horizontal hitch axis further allow the floating hitch and mower decks to float independent with respect to the tractor to follow the contours of the ground. The drive is adapted for connection to the tractor and is operative to transfer power from the tractor to rotate the cutting elements, and a mower angle control is operative to selectively pivot the floating hitch apparatus about the vertical axis with respect to front wheel assembly of the central mower deck. Thus front and rear wheels support the mower deck, and the floating hitch member allows the decks to float to follow the contours of the ground. The mower deck(s) are guided into the desired offset path by selectively pivoting the floating hitch member about the vertical axis with respect to the front wheel assembly of the central mower deck by using the mower angle control. A driveline is conveniently provided by a series of gearboxes, universal joints, double universal joints and drive shafts having a rotational axis coincidental with the input of a gearbox having an output connected to rotate one or more cutting elements.
While the invention is claimed in the concluding portions hereof, preferred embodiments are provided in the accompany detailed description which may be best understood in conjunction with the accompanying diagrams where like parts in each of the several diagrams are labeled with like numbers, and where:
Rear wheels 107 are mounted behind the mower decks 108, 108R, 108L and front wheel assembly FWA is mounted to the front end of the central mower deck 108 such that the mower decks 108, 108R, 108L ride along the ground on the wheels 107, 106. A cutting blade element, which is conventional and not shown, is rotatably mounted under each mower deck 108, 108R, and 108L so as to rotate about a right, left, and central substantially vertical blade axis.
A floating hitch member 119 is pivotally attached at the mower end 119A via a vertical shaft 120 inserted in the hitch mount 121 attached to the cross member 110 so as to pivot about a substantially vertical hitch axis VHA located above and in front of the front wheel assembly FWA of the central mower deck 108.
The floating hitch member 119 is adapted for pivotal attachment at the tow end 119B thereof to the tractor about a substantially vertical tow axis VTA. A mower angle control comprising of a hydraulic cylinder 122, and a bell-crank 131 fixedly attached to the vertical shaft 120 as illustrated in
The hydraulic cylinder 122 is oriented and configured to move the rotary mower 100 through a range of offset positions between that illustrated minimum offset position in
Refer to
The axis HHA is provided by pins 124 on the hitch standard 123. At the opposite tow end 119B the floating hitch member 119 is attached to a tractor attachment adaptor that provides a substantially horizontal longitudinal tow axis HLTA oriented substantially parallel to the operating travel direction T, and a substantially horizontal transverse tow axis HTTA substantially perpendicular to the operating travel direction T. Pins 125 pass through holes in the ends of the conventional hitch arms of a tractor to provide the axis HTTA. Thus the offset rotary mower apparatus 100 can float independent with respect to the tractor to follow the ground.
A drive is adapted for connection to the tractor and operative to transfer power to the tractor to rotate the cutting blade element. A mechanical drive is incorporated in the embodiments of
In the embodiments of
The double universal joints 129 and universal joints 128 allows connections of the drive shafts 127 where the alignment is at an angle and the location of the HHA at the center of the double universal joint 129A allows proper operation of the drive when the hitch pivots about the horizontal hitch axis HHA with respect to the front wheel assembly FWA and the attached rotary mower decks 108, 108R, and 108L.
The location of the vertical hitch axis VHA at the center of the double universal joint 129A allows for proper operation of the drive when the hydraulic actuator 122 of the mower angle control is used to vary the offset of the rotary mower apparatus 100.
The drive line comprising of drive shafts 127, universal joints 128, and double universal joints 129 is substantially aligned with the floating hitch member 119 and is adapted at the tow end 119B thereof for pivotal connection via a primary shaft to a power output shaft of the tractor through another universal joint 128 and stacked gearboxes 130 which pivot with respect to each other about the vertical tow axis VTA.
The front end of the central mower deck 108 is supported by the front wheel assembly FWA comprising two castering wheel assemblies 101 attached at opposite ends to the cross member 110. Front parallel linkages 111 are pivotally attached at rear ends thereof to opposite sides of the central mower deck 108 and at the front ends thereof to a cross member 110. This cross member 110 does not pivot with respect to the central mower deck 108.
Refer to
The foregoing is considered as illustrative only of the principals of the invention. Further, since numerous changes and modifications will occur to those skilled in the art, it is not desired to limit the invention to the exact construction and operation shown and described, and accordingly, all such suitable changes or modifications in structure or operation which may be resorted to fall within the scope of the claimed invention.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2590382 | May 2007 | CA | national |
| 2590385 | May 2007 | CA | national |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 11941020 | Nov 2007 | US |
| Child | 12364706 | US |
