safety question

[Rubee]

I was doing a little landscaping with my 1948 "Elmo" and front blade. Having fun moving dirt when I tried to pull a large tree stump out of the way. Elmo does everything I ask of him or dies trying. He couldn't move the stump much and bucked and kicked with the front end lifting at least a foot or two in the air before I could push in on the clutch. My question is: Do cubs have enough power to actually flip over and possibly injure or kill the driver? Thanks, Rubee

[Rudi]

I was doing a little landscaping with my 1948 "Elmo" and front blade. Having fun moving dirt when I tried to pull a large tree stump out of the way. Elmo does everything I ask of him or dies trying. He couldn't move the stump much and bucked and kicked with the front end lifting at least a foot or two in the air before I could push in on the clutch. My question is: Do cubs have enough power to actually flip over and possibly injure or kill the driver? Thanks, Rubee

Rubee:

YES

[George Willer]

AND IT CAN HAPPEN VERY QUICKLY!

Were you pulling properly from the drawbar?

[gitractorman]

YES, They will also climb straight up a tree faster than you can blink. DON'T ASK HOW I KNOW.

One more thing to watch. Lifting the front end off of the ground (well, actually dropping the front end after lifting it) is the quickest and easiest way to snap the front end casting on a cub.

[Bigdog]

Farm tractors were not intended to pull stumps out of the ground. It is a quick way to kill yourself. Or at the least, injure yourself seriously.

[George Willer]

Consider that any tractor will do a back flip in less time than it takes for the rear wheels to make 1/4 turn! That is a very short time when you and your tractor are trying to do a difficult job.

[technova]

YEs it will. I did it.
Search for my previous post in the thread about accidents.

[technova]

I forgot to add that we tried to pull a few stumps with tow trucks. Not one ton car haulers but semi sized wreckers designed to tow full semis.
We could easily lift the front end off the ground of the wrecker without budging the stump.
Get a guy with a stump grinder or dozer to rid of the stump.

[Lurker Carl]

A Cub tractor pulling tree stumps?

A tree is a gigantic water-logged pipe that sucks water out of the ground and carries it up to the leaves where the water is released into the atmosphere. A tree holds tons of water way up in the air. Foliage adds hundreds of square feet of wind catching surface area to push all that weight around dozens of feet off the ground. A tree puts a lot of energy into growing a massive root system right from the start.

A tree is tethered underground with a huge root system to withstand the stress of massive weight and large surface area swaying in gale force winds. The root system is basically thousands of wooden anchors to keep the tree from falling over.

When you cut a tree down, the root system stays intact. Even if the stump sits dead for several years, the decay is only within several inches of the soil's surface. Bacteria and fungi breaking down the wood fibers need a specific moisture and oxygen level to function effeciently and the "sweet spot" is right at ground level. Even with soft wood trees, the underground root system retains it's structure for years.

There was a stump removal at Cubfest 2006. The stump was about 12" in diameter and had been dead for several years. With his backhoe Cub, Rick Prentice dug a 4 foot deep trench around a stump in Gene Dotson's yard. Gene hooked a chain to one of his big Case tractors and it took repeated attempts to loosen and pluck that stump out of the hole.

[Bus Driver]

In 1974, I had a John Deere flip backward with me. Just a bruised elbow for me. About 85% of such accidents are fatal. Short wheelbase tractors are more prone to backflips. The CUB is short! Describing how fast it happens is difficult using ordinary words!

[JohnL (BlackJeep)]

Can a Cub flip if you are pulling from the drawbar?

I get concerned sometimes when pulling my loaded garden trailer up the steep bank in the back yard. I've never felt the front end getting light, but I'm always looking for it. I pull with a ball on the drawbar.

Thanks, this was informative.

BlackJeep

[George Willer]

Can a Cub flip if you are pulling from the drawbar?

I get concerned sometimes when pulling my loaded garden trailer up the steep bank in the back yard. I've never felt the front end getting light, but I'm always looking for it. I pull with a ball on the drawbar.

Thanks, this was informative.

BlackJeep

Anything is possible, but back flips are usually caused by hitching to a higher point than a RIGID drawbar.

[Jim Becker]

In 1974, I had a John Deere flip backward with me. Just a bruised elbow for me. About 85% of such accidents are fatal. Short wheelbase tractors are more prone to backflips. The CUB is short! Describing how fast it happens is difficult using ordinary words!

I'll try. A cub engine wide open under full load runs 1600 rpm, or 26 2/3 per second. Divide that by the low gear ratio, differential ratio and final drive ratio, you are all the way down to only about 1/3 revolution per second. An alert, young, adult male average reaction time is 3/4 of a second. In 3/4 of a second, a wheel turning 1/3 rps will turn 1/4 of a revolution. So the alert, young, adult male that tries to hit the clutch as soon as he sees the front wheels leave the ground will be under the tractor before he can reach the clutch pedal. Older people have slower reaction times but won't be any more dead.

[Harold R]

Older people have slower reaction times but won't be any more dead.

That probably doesn't factor in the time delay for saying an explicative!! Jim B used to have a pictorial on moving a smaller tree from one spot to another. Seems he pulled in reverse??

[John *.?-!.* cub owner]

I can attest to how fast a cub's front wheel will come off the ground. I occsionally use my rear mount disk plow to clean out ditches along our road. I was doing this one spring, travelling up hill with the chains still installed from plowing snow when the plow caught on a rock. That isn't supposed to happen with a disk plow, but it did. When doing that type work I ride with my foot about an inch or less above the clutch pedal. The inertia of the sudden stop threw me forward so that my foot depressed the clutch pedal before I even had time to react, but the right wheel was still 6 inches above the ground before it stopped and dropped back. I didn't get time to see if the left one was also.