Chris_North
New Member
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2013
- Messages
- 178
- Reaction score
- 1
- Points
- 0
- Vehicle Year
- 1998
- Make / Model
- Ford
- Transmission
- Automatic
I've always kind of liked winter. As a kid it was obvious, the possibility of no school makes every kid happy. As an adult (young though I may be) it's the challenges and responsibilities that come with the season. Getting firewood for heat, using trucks to get around, and previously an operating an old 350 Moto 4 for snowclearing.
The quad works well enough for clearing the frequent snow accumulations (it certainly beats shoveling), but it does have a few drawbacks. Most prominently, you can't drive it very far. So to clear my grandmother's, girlfriend's, mom's, and occasionally dad's driveways, I end up loading the quad onto the trailer and towing it (often in less than stellar road conditions) to each of their houses and freeze my butt off while clearing the snow. Though it may not sound it, I actually have fun doing this. It keeps me busy and therefore worry-free. None of this is really important, but it does provide a bit of a backstory.
More to the point, I had purchased a front hitch receiver because it was the most cost effective way of mounting my Warn winch. I noticed that one of the uses suggested by the manufacturer for the receiver was for snow plow mounting. "A plow that mounts to a 2in hitch?" I thought. Sure enough they exist: http://www.thehomeplow.com/
Starting at $2100 they're fairly reasonable for those that can afford spending that much on something they'll only get to use a handful of times a year. For me this is not the case, and I'm not lucky or patient enough to wait for a well-priced used one to turn up. But they didn't look that hard to emulate...
My original plan was to build my own setup entirely from scratch using a commercial hot water tank shell for the body of the plow. I quickly realized this would be much more effort than it would be worth. My local scrapyard conveniently sells junked plows with frames for $150. The best out of the bunch was this:
I can't see why anyone would have scrapped it. Except for the one hole in it (easily repaired) which looked like it was done at the yard anyhow it was in better shape than the ones we use at work. I'm not sure what it would have been off of. It was only 7.5 feet wide but the frame was much longer than I was used to seeing. In addition the mounting holes looked like they were made for 1 inch hitch pins, not the 5/8 I'm used to. My portaband, grinder, and 40 year old Thunderbolt took care of shortening the frame to more usable length, as well as chopping about 6 inches off both sides of the plow itself to make it a more Ranger-friendly 6.5 feet. A 3/4 inch black nipple fit tightly to reduce the 1 inch mounting hole to something a bit more reasonable.
I really liked the idea of being able to mount the plow by simply lining up the hitch receiver and securing it with a pin. Unfortunately as building progressed this seemed less possible than originally expected. The hitch on the truck sticks out too far; consequently so would the plow. Instead I opted to make the mount for the plow separate, and to save on distance I attached the mount through the back of the hitch receiver, like so:
To raise the plow I am using an old Sears winch someone was nice enough to give me a while ago. I was originally concerned it wouldn't be strong enough to lift the plow, a concern which turned out to be completely unfounded as it not only lifts perfectly but seems to do so as fast or faster than a hydraulic mechanism. Right now the winch cable is anchored to the passenger tow hook with the winch angled for a straight cable pull. I have a feeling this may be a problem, but so far it has not. Right now the plan is to use a 1/4" chain looped through the two plow handle things and on the driver side tow hook to support the plow when traveling as I trust the chain much more than the winch cable.
The winch (I'm guessing it's rated at 1000 or 1500 pounds) only pulls 20 amps with no load and 42 when lifting the plow. Technically I would have been better going with #8 wire, but #10 was cheaper, more easily found, and should suffice. The winch is the two pole type so a specific winch contactor was needed but easily acquired off of Amazon for $23. To control it I used a spare ATV winch remote I had from another project, routed through the grill out of the back of the hood and through the door jam into the cab. All terminals and connections are crimped, soldered, and coated in electrical contact grease. Heat shrink and wire loom was generously used for wire protection, and everything is protected by a 50A auto reset thermal breaker in line. A small soft copper tubing cap on the contactor positive stud is intended to reduce the likelihood of shorts, especially when removing and hooking up the safety chain.
Currently there is full left/right angle, but it is manual and I'll have to get out of the truck and lock the selection in place with a 5/8 hitch pin. I have some ideas for a power angle, but I don't think the additional complications are worth it. The Homeplow says it can be angled by hitting piles of snow with one side of the plow first to cause it to tilt in that direction. I was thinking of putting an old shock absorber where the hydraulics would mount to smooth movement and giving that concept a try.
The truck handles remarkably better than expected despite the weight of the plow. The air shocks I made work in the front keep the front of the truck from doing a complete nosedive, but some ballast material in the bed wouldn't hurt. I tried to make the plow as light as possible, but there's only so much I felt comfortable taking off. I haven't been able to verify, but I would expect total weight to be somewhere around 275 lbs. An idea stolen from the Homeplow was to mount caster wheels to the plow to allow easier moving and positioning off the truck. It just so happens that I had a few wheels laying around, and more conveniently 1" black pipe fits perfectly in the skid mounts. Some welding and a few pins and you wind up with this:
They are easily removed and mounted when the plow is lifted on the truck. They help tremendously on concrete and to a lesser extent paved surfaces, but are obviously totally useless on dirt or gravel. I was going to put wheels on the back, but it's easier to lift on the A-frame and move it that way.
I know how hard snow plowing is on a truck. Since I need my Ranger for work and daily driving, I have no intention on plowing anything other than a few of my close family's driveways. I'm not going to start plowing neighbors' houses or parking lots or anything like that. It's not worth the hassle or the added wear on the truck. I'm also not leaving it on the truck the entire winter, and plan on only mounting it prior to an expected snowstorm.
Thus far, I have not had a chance to use it. In fact the day I more or less had it all put together we had unusually warm weather and it was 65 degrees, haha. I am eager to try it out, but knowing my luck it won't snow until something happens that would prevent me from using the plow so I'll have to shovel. Though there is technically nothing that prevents the mounting of the plow on any other 2" hitch receiver, even one on the rear of a truck. Power and controls are easily hooked up and are not permanent on my truck and would not be on any other truck.
Total build tally:
$150 Plow with A-frame
$40 Misc. steel (mostly for mount)
$60 Misc hardware (Bolts, chain, shackles...)
$25 Winch contactor
$12 Plow edge markers
$20 Wiring, Wire loom
$25 Paint
I just now saw a full setup posted for $400, but hey I had fun building mine. I wasn't originally expecting to spend as much, but built over the period of a few months the cost didn't seem as great. Still it's far less than the Homeplow or even the no-frills straight blade non-lifting plows I've seen.
Questions, comments, critique? Also sorry about the quality of some of these pics. I only have my 8MP camera phone.
The quad works well enough for clearing the frequent snow accumulations (it certainly beats shoveling), but it does have a few drawbacks. Most prominently, you can't drive it very far. So to clear my grandmother's, girlfriend's, mom's, and occasionally dad's driveways, I end up loading the quad onto the trailer and towing it (often in less than stellar road conditions) to each of their houses and freeze my butt off while clearing the snow. Though it may not sound it, I actually have fun doing this. It keeps me busy and therefore worry-free. None of this is really important, but it does provide a bit of a backstory.
More to the point, I had purchased a front hitch receiver because it was the most cost effective way of mounting my Warn winch. I noticed that one of the uses suggested by the manufacturer for the receiver was for snow plow mounting. "A plow that mounts to a 2in hitch?" I thought. Sure enough they exist: http://www.thehomeplow.com/
Starting at $2100 they're fairly reasonable for those that can afford spending that much on something they'll only get to use a handful of times a year. For me this is not the case, and I'm not lucky or patient enough to wait for a well-priced used one to turn up. But they didn't look that hard to emulate...
My original plan was to build my own setup entirely from scratch using a commercial hot water tank shell for the body of the plow. I quickly realized this would be much more effort than it would be worth. My local scrapyard conveniently sells junked plows with frames for $150. The best out of the bunch was this:
I can't see why anyone would have scrapped it. Except for the one hole in it (easily repaired) which looked like it was done at the yard anyhow it was in better shape than the ones we use at work. I'm not sure what it would have been off of. It was only 7.5 feet wide but the frame was much longer than I was used to seeing. In addition the mounting holes looked like they were made for 1 inch hitch pins, not the 5/8 I'm used to. My portaband, grinder, and 40 year old Thunderbolt took care of shortening the frame to more usable length, as well as chopping about 6 inches off both sides of the plow itself to make it a more Ranger-friendly 6.5 feet. A 3/4 inch black nipple fit tightly to reduce the 1 inch mounting hole to something a bit more reasonable.
I really liked the idea of being able to mount the plow by simply lining up the hitch receiver and securing it with a pin. Unfortunately as building progressed this seemed less possible than originally expected. The hitch on the truck sticks out too far; consequently so would the plow. Instead I opted to make the mount for the plow separate, and to save on distance I attached the mount through the back of the hitch receiver, like so:
To raise the plow I am using an old Sears winch someone was nice enough to give me a while ago. I was originally concerned it wouldn't be strong enough to lift the plow, a concern which turned out to be completely unfounded as it not only lifts perfectly but seems to do so as fast or faster than a hydraulic mechanism. Right now the winch cable is anchored to the passenger tow hook with the winch angled for a straight cable pull. I have a feeling this may be a problem, but so far it has not. Right now the plan is to use a 1/4" chain looped through the two plow handle things and on the driver side tow hook to support the plow when traveling as I trust the chain much more than the winch cable.
The winch (I'm guessing it's rated at 1000 or 1500 pounds) only pulls 20 amps with no load and 42 when lifting the plow. Technically I would have been better going with #8 wire, but #10 was cheaper, more easily found, and should suffice. The winch is the two pole type so a specific winch contactor was needed but easily acquired off of Amazon for $23. To control it I used a spare ATV winch remote I had from another project, routed through the grill out of the back of the hood and through the door jam into the cab. All terminals and connections are crimped, soldered, and coated in electrical contact grease. Heat shrink and wire loom was generously used for wire protection, and everything is protected by a 50A auto reset thermal breaker in line. A small soft copper tubing cap on the contactor positive stud is intended to reduce the likelihood of shorts, especially when removing and hooking up the safety chain.
Currently there is full left/right angle, but it is manual and I'll have to get out of the truck and lock the selection in place with a 5/8 hitch pin. I have some ideas for a power angle, but I don't think the additional complications are worth it. The Homeplow says it can be angled by hitting piles of snow with one side of the plow first to cause it to tilt in that direction. I was thinking of putting an old shock absorber where the hydraulics would mount to smooth movement and giving that concept a try.
The truck handles remarkably better than expected despite the weight of the plow. The air shocks I made work in the front keep the front of the truck from doing a complete nosedive, but some ballast material in the bed wouldn't hurt. I tried to make the plow as light as possible, but there's only so much I felt comfortable taking off. I haven't been able to verify, but I would expect total weight to be somewhere around 275 lbs. An idea stolen from the Homeplow was to mount caster wheels to the plow to allow easier moving and positioning off the truck. It just so happens that I had a few wheels laying around, and more conveniently 1" black pipe fits perfectly in the skid mounts. Some welding and a few pins and you wind up with this:
They are easily removed and mounted when the plow is lifted on the truck. They help tremendously on concrete and to a lesser extent paved surfaces, but are obviously totally useless on dirt or gravel. I was going to put wheels on the back, but it's easier to lift on the A-frame and move it that way.
I know how hard snow plowing is on a truck. Since I need my Ranger for work and daily driving, I have no intention on plowing anything other than a few of my close family's driveways. I'm not going to start plowing neighbors' houses or parking lots or anything like that. It's not worth the hassle or the added wear on the truck. I'm also not leaving it on the truck the entire winter, and plan on only mounting it prior to an expected snowstorm.
Thus far, I have not had a chance to use it. In fact the day I more or less had it all put together we had unusually warm weather and it was 65 degrees, haha. I am eager to try it out, but knowing my luck it won't snow until something happens that would prevent me from using the plow so I'll have to shovel. Though there is technically nothing that prevents the mounting of the plow on any other 2" hitch receiver, even one on the rear of a truck. Power and controls are easily hooked up and are not permanent on my truck and would not be on any other truck.
Total build tally:
$150 Plow with A-frame
$40 Misc. steel (mostly for mount)
$60 Misc hardware (Bolts, chain, shackles...)
$25 Winch contactor
$12 Plow edge markers
$20 Wiring, Wire loom
$25 Paint
I just now saw a full setup posted for $400, but hey I had fun building mine. I wasn't originally expecting to spend as much, but built over the period of a few months the cost didn't seem as great. Still it's far less than the Homeplow or even the no-frills straight blade non-lifting plows I've seen.
Questions, comments, critique? Also sorry about the quality of some of these pics. I only have my 8MP camera phone.
Last edited: