What is a Harley rake, and how does it work?

This video will show you what a Harley rake is, and how it works.

It is a 3pt (rear) mounted attachment that goes on our John Deere 1025r subcompact tractor. Harley rake is the brand name and company that makes this model. Frontier PR1160 is John Deere's rebranded name and model.

A Harley rake or 3pt power rake is essentially 4 implements in 1, and yes it costs about the same or more than all 4 combined!

It is a soil pulverizer:
It loosens hard packed soil, and makes it light and fluffy for hand raking. When the soil is pulverised it breaks up the existing grass clumps, and allows us to reuse the topsoil for the new lawn. Traditional methods include scraping off the top few inches of sod. This means you have to haul, dispose, and purchase new soil.
New soil is very nice to work with, but it does not contain centuries worth of nutrients. Saving the existing topsoil will save money, but more importantly will result in a better soil structure, and composition.

It is a landscape rake:
Traditional landscape rakes work, but not to the extent that the user is expecting. They tend to clog up with debris in between the tines, and the operator can have a really hard time applying just the right amount of downforce on the rake. If too much down pressure is applied the rake can dig in and start grabbing to much soil, and if not enough pressure is applied the rakes will bend all the way back, and loose the material they are trying to bring with them. The Harley rake (Frontier Power rake PR1160) eliminates a lot of operator error by providing rear wheels that set the depth. You can lower the Power rake all the way down, and it will consistently hold its position.There really is no comparisons between a 3pt rake, and a Power rake.

Box blade:
End plates on both sides of the roller allow you to accumulate soil from high areas and deposit them in lower areas. Because the Harley rake can be fix mounted (not in float mode) it has a very long wheelbase. This long wheelbase high centers on high areas. When it high centers it accumulates that excess soil, and then holds on to it until it gets to a lower grade area. If you go over the area enough times, the area will be uniform in grade. This works for soil, and gravel applications where uniform grade is required. When compared to our skid steer, the Harley rake does a better job in reaching perfect, clean uniform grade.

Rock Hound:
This attachment has the ability to separate debris from the soil it is working in. There is an adjustable barrier that can be set close to the drum for fine filtering of material, or raised away from the carbide tooth drum to allow bigger material to pass through. The entire power rake is hydraulically angleable to either the left or right side. By removing one of the box blade end plates, and angling the drum you can windrow debris to one side. Continue doing this until the debris row is big enough to pick up with the tractor bucket, or until the debris is moved off of the final graded area and out of the way.

Of all the attachments we have this one is one of my favorites because the Harley / Power Rake saves money, time, and levels areas beautifully.

Not shown in this video is the ability for the rake to renovate gravel driveways. It chews up the existing gravel, and pulverizes potholes. Look for that video coming in the near future!

Sam