We’re going to have access to a harley rake for another project this weekend and I keep eyeballing my arena. The arena was built with stone dust - allegedly six inches - which has largely compacted and only the top 0.5-1" remains loose enough to “groom” with a chain harrow, which is my only routine implement at this time. I’ve never used a harley rake, but have 6-7 acres to do with it to get a feel for it before I’d dare touch my arena with it. Any advice on whether this may be a good strategy to loosen the top 2-2.5" and possibly address some of the unevenness that has occurred over time? The eventual plan is to put a less compacting footing over the top of the stone dust, with the stone dust effectively become a [very well draining!] base, at which point I also plan to invest in a better arena drag solution.
I have put weights on my chain harrow to help loosen the hard stuff… I bungied on two sections of 6x6 but you could perhaps run a landscape timber through cement blocks and tie it off to the top of the harrow… jsut a thought.
The company who built my arena comes back once a year to power rake it. It’s great.
get it adjusted well before you put it on your arena but I think you’ll like the results.
Agreed… my indoor is 2 inches of screenings mixed w a DOT product. The screenings were originally part of the base. The arena builder loosened it w a Harley take and used same to mix in the DOT product. It worked great.
