Please give it to me. I am interested in buying one. I have a sand arena and a gravel driveway to maintain.
Thanks in advance.
The good: Harrows sand well and works well on driveways.
The bad: Difficult to adjust. Pricey
The good:
- Works really well on the arena and on the driveway
- Really solidly built. I’ve replaced a wheel bearing (which I had never got around to greasing), but the main parts might actually last forever.
The bad:
- Expensive
- Not actually as idiot-proof as the vendor videos would imply. You will need to tweak the depth and angle to get it right for your dirt, and take multiple passes on hard surfaces to get full depth. If you drag the same arena frequently you can just leave it set up.
- Expensive
- Gets clogged up if you try to drag grass, twigs, pine needles, or fallen leaves into your sand or gravel
- Expensive
Is the standard for competition arenas, gets the ground just as you want it, shallow and packed for some events, deeper for others, even all over.
It is expensive, but last forever, so if you have plenty of use for it, or want a good re-sell option later, it is less expensive than those that are worn and/or torn in a few years.
If you want cheaper, you can definitely find many others out there that will work, some better than others.
We have TR3 and it does a fabulous job of grooming and creating an even depth throughout the arena. However, we have sand arena and that is exactly what it is designed for. It will not work on an arena with the textile type footing as it will bundle all the footing up and make a mess.
Thanks for all the replies. I searched a lot and couldn’t find anything that looked like it could do both jobs well.
Seems like this might fit the bill. Expensive but sounds like it will last.
I have a TR3, and I found mine used. Use Search Tempest and look for one… I drove quite a ways to get it, but it was exactly what I wanted and a great deal.
I love ours.
My biggest complaint is that it does get clogged if you’re dragging anywhere with weeds/grass, etc. But that’s such a minimal thing for me, it’s hardly even worth mentioning.
I highly recommend it.
My best friend just bought one this summer. I have heard no complaints. They love it!
I did not know about searchtempest.com. This is awesome! (What are good keywords for an arena rake/groomer?)
So this is a rake that is good for a real arena, but does it cope with a patch of dirt? It sounds like not so much. What does it mean to be “clogged” dragging an area with weeds?
LOVE our TR3 rake.
Works great on gravel drive. Works great on all my arenas. For the arena’s with rubber, I set the leveling blade higher. It is true you need to make adjustments between uses. Lower scarifiers to soften, raise to just rake the surface, float leveling bar for sand, fix leveling bar for gravel drive That is the reason it is so versatile. One of the better investments we have made in farm equipment.
Did I mention that we LOVE our TR3?
Left to right leveling is pretty good. However, front to back leveling is poor and can actually make such a problem worse.
Also, the rake is pretty fussy – you can’t just have anyone use it to drag an arena and expect good results.
[QUOTE=Justice;7863480]
I have a TR3, and I found mine used. Use Search Tempest and look for one… I drove quite a ways to get it, but it was exactly what I wanted and a great deal.[/QUOTE]
What did you use to transport it and how did you get it on and off the transport?
We love our TR3, have had it a few years and use the heck out of it.
Great in the arena. Awesome on our rock driveway, yanks out pot holes and makes everything smooth again. I used it to tear out my front lawn when weeds took over, graded the lawn area too so I got rid of the low spots and weird lumps and rolls.
I’ve used it in the woods to clear out undergrowth and smaller rocks. I’ve gone through some serious brush with it and not had an issue with it clogging to the point where it wasn’t working anymore. If doing a weedy/brushy area it’s never going to be a single pass job. First pass tears out the crap I don’t want. Second pass softens the ground. Third pass if I want to smooth it all out again.
I find it easy to adjust. I just put the e-brake on the tractor, raise the TR3 and hop off to run back and flip the teeth, lower/raise the teeth or move the pin to level/change angles, then hop back on the tractor and off we go.
A big plus IMO is it’s weight. That thing is HEAVY so it can do what it needs to do and be great tractor ballast.
I think it was worth every penny, even if I did yell at Mr Blue for paying that much before it was delivered, LOL!
We have one for our arena and gravel driveway and we do like it a lot. However, I was under the impression that it would keep my arena footing a uniform DEPTH and it does not, in fact do this. It DOES level the surface, but if you have problems with uneven depths around the arena, you have to do more than just drag. They can give you some different dragging patterns to help even out the depth.
It’s great though - I would definitely recommend it, and the customer service has been excellent.
[QUOTE=LookmaNohands;7864312]
What did you use to transport it and how did you get it on and off the transport?[/QUOTE]
Flatbed and front end loader with chains for our Riata Rake.
Highly recommend the TR3. You asked if it can cope with a “patch of dirt” - yes t can! We recently moved to our farm and turned a grass pasture into an “arena” using only the TR3. We used it to rip out the grass and level the area, and we use it to prep the soil for riding. We have sandy loam and it is actually quite nice if we’ve dragged recently. We are having some footing put in next month, so I will have a real arena - I’m so excited! But, YES the TR3 is great! We also use it for our very long gravel driveways and it works well on that also.
Ours came in a commercial hauler truck and we unloaded it with the pallet forks on the tractor.
When they call about the delivery once in your area, they will ask if they need to bring a truck that can unload it, or if you have a way to do it.
If you need it unloaded, they will bring a truck that can do that, with a lift on the back and a rolling pallet fork on casters to get it there and move it once on the ground.
I purchased the smallest TR-3 rake available for my 1986 Ford 1710 25 HP tractor. ABI recommended this size rake as appropriate for this tractor. The tractor could barely pull the rake on a good day. When the arena was wet, it couldn’t pull the rake.
Thinking that the tractor is old, and so possibly not putting out the full 25 HP, I traded the Ford in on a brand new 33 HP Kubota. The Kubota has 15 hours on it. While there is a little improvement in pulling the rake, it does not come close to pulling like ABI shows in their videos. As a matter of fact, it won’t pull the rake like ABI shows in their videos even immediately after I have groomed the arena. And it still won’t pull through wet arena sand.
My arena is on compacted sub-base with geotextile separating the base from the sub-base. The base material is 10" compacted fill. The footing is 3" of crusher fines. The arena has a 1.5% slope and drains well.
ABI just misleads about the horsepower needed to pull their rake.
