Tiller for smoothing out yard?

[kris77]

So i've got a very rough, bumpy, rutted yard. A lawn roller didnt do much to help things this year. My neighbor has a 50" tiller he uses for his garden. I was thinking about borrowing it and setting the depth very shallow, like maybe 2"-3" and going over my yard to knock the high spots down and then taking the roller and rolling it down nice and smooth and replanting grass.

Anybody ever done this? Seem like a good idea or a horrible one? Any better ideas? A harley rake really isnt in the budget, and to rent one, is pretty expensive around here. I have to rent the bobcat and rake together.

What's the "correct" way to fix this?

 

[bmblank]

I would think a Harley rake would be what you want. I haven't used one myself, but if I understand them correctly, it sure seems like it would do what you want, only with less work afterwards than a tiller.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

Just saw the comment on Harley rake... I'm blind I guess. I guess I don't have anything productive to add.

 

[Ike]

Use the tiller to loosen the soil then use a spring tooth drag to level it out. If it is real bad you may have to go over it more that once with the drag

 

[BravoXray]

A tiller won't really level your yard, it will till up the high spots, but they'll still be higher than the low spots. I like the box blade for this project, drop the rippers down a few inches to break the dirt up, and then go back over with the rippers up to level. As mentioned before, a spring tooth drag, or a rake would leave you with a pretty nice finish for grass seed. After seeding, use your roller to press the seed into the dirt. You don't need too much weight, if your roller is water filled don't fill it up. I used my tiller on a small area that I wanted to reseed, and it took forever to till and I still had to use the box and rake to finish it up. For really rutted areas I run a two bottom plow through first, then the box blade and rake.
Next spring you can use your roller again while the ground is still soft, but not muddy. This time of year a roller won't do much, the earth is too dry and hard.

Jerry

 

[bxray]

I second the box blade. I just fixed an old garden spot last weekend.
Found a new 4' lowery for $450 on craigs list
I see one used for $250 by me.
Been leveling out many spots with it.

Ray

 

[Wbk]

At our community center someone cut the newly seeded grass when it was too wet and left it with a lot of ruts, they used a smooth asphalt packer in the early spring to flatten it out and it worked pretty good. Maybe you have an asphalt company in the area? It was a big like the ones you see one the streets. Just a thought!

 

[WELD]

I am in the process of this now. I started about a year ago. you have to remember that if its grass now than you have to seriously break up that layer before"spreading" or moving anything around or it will just clump up.
the tiller does a good job at breaking the grass layer up but it takes many passes unless its a reverse tiller.

What I have in my quiver at the moment and its been working for me it the tiller, a box drag with rippers, and for finish smoothing i have a heavy duty chainlink fence section. 9 gauge, commercial grade. welded to a flat drawbar and i usually put a pallet and an couple old tires on it to weigh it down and I pull that fairly fast over the bare dirt and it leaves a nice smooth finish. it will get clogged up a bit if you dont remoove the clumps and roots/sticks first

another option is simply buy loam. and spread it out with a box blade or rake. or even a landscapers grading rake by hand depending how large an area

 

[esloser]

I'm going to be taking this on myself in the next couple of weeks. I have a bx1870 on order with tiller, fel, mmm, and box blade. I just had an inground pool installed and the trucks severely compacted one side of my yard. I'm trying to come up with the best approach to get the ruts / compaction out, while being able to reseed it. I was thinking of tilling it up to full depth then smoothing it out with the box blade to replant it.

Also, because the ripped out my sprinklers, only one side of my yard was getting any water leaving the rest to die and be overtaken by crabgrass. I was thinking of spraying it, tilling it, and doing something similar.

Has anyone tried this approach? Is it better to just use the box blade with rippers extended to loosen up the soil and smooth it out?

 

[WELD]

the rippers will surely unearth more than you think then youll be buying a rake or hand separating rocks.
I had some pretty deep ruts in my grass area from a logging company coming in and removing 15 trees. and it was a wet day when they showed up. I let it go and the frost from the winter raised the upper layer of sod and it all was back to normal this year.

the problem you will find with the smaller box blade is its not going to smooth as nice as a grader blade and you will always have an edge that will leave a proud edge. thats where the fencedrag helps for me.
cant help with the crab grass though

 

[kris77]

So, I'm thinking i might need to wait on this and see what else i can come up with...

I think what I want to do will work, it just might not be the best option at the moment. I'm definitely going to wait till Spring to try and tackle this though.

Thanks for the replies. Helped alot.

 

[Benhameen]

If I were in your shoes and my yard was bothering me, I would borrow the tiller, knock down the high spots then either back drag it with the FEL, if you have one, if not I would borrow or build a harrow to drag around until the low spots were filled in and the high spots were knocked down. Then reseed your lawn in the fall so it has a chance to get started over the winter.

Just my 2 cents anyway.... at least you'll would be on your tractor.

 

[ipz2222]

Smoothing soil that has grass in it is next to impossible. The clumps hang on the box blade and drag stuff along and make trenches. Your best bet is to try to knock off the worst high places and fill the trenches with fill dirt and reseed.

 

[08quadram]

Ive tilled several different spots in mine and other's yards due to similar circumstances. I didn't need to level out many high spots, but just fix ruts. After tilling, i used the loader to smooth. I didn't want to go get the drag from the old man's place. Worked better than i figured.

Typically i leave it alone for a week before dragging. Lets the grass clumps die and break up. Sometimes i even retill the area lightly if the grass clumps are an issue..

Biggest issue Ive had is the edge of the tilled area can be noticeable and felt when mowing if you are not careful.

Mike