When I originally built my DIY Receiver Hitch Snow Plow, I mentioned that I wanted to be able to use it for multiple things. Well, I finally came up with another use case for it… Meet ‘The Lawndozer’

First, every invention starts with a problem. I had a rather large pile of dirt from removing 3 raised garden beds that I didn’t want to move by hand. So first I started with a tiller to loosen up the piles and get the dirt fine for compacting.

Loyal readers will remember that I fabricated an overkill receiver hitch for my zero turn mower earlier this year, and that a couple of years ago I created a DIY receiver hitch snow plow.

Today is the day that the two unite to become one awesome machine: <deep announcer voice> The Lawndozerrrrr! </deep announcer voice>.

The next step is to get it mounted up to the mower. I built this for my car/van that have rear bumpers. The mower doesn’t have any overhang, so I was able to slide the plow further into the hitch then mark and drill an additional receiver pin hole. By having the plow further in it brings the weight a couple inches closer to the rear tires of the mower so the plow isn’t hanging out back so far.

Next step was to hook up the electrical. The plow already had some Anderson style connectors on it, so all I had to do was make some pigtails to fit my mower. Luckily I am a hoarder, so I had two jumper cable style leads with ~2ft of cable that I harvested off a dead jump pack. I cut off the ring terminals and crimped on the Anderson connectors. Now I can just pin it in the receiver, hook up two jumper cable clamps and be on my way!

This is the first time I have actually turned the blade around for pushing as I had designed it many years ago. It worked out pretty well and now I am glad I went through the extra effort to set it up this way.

The plow has a remote control so there are no additional connections needed besides power and ground. I found that I could hold the remote in my hand and still be able to operate the controls at the same time.

I very quickly learned that if I tried to cut more than a couple of inches at a time I would just spin tires. After a small learning curve I got the hang of it and was able to move the pile pretty quickly.

There you have it! I spent a good hour drilling holes, hooking up cables, and setting up the plow so I could save myself 20 minutes of scooping with a shovel.
Was it worth it? Hell yea!

There is something to be said for stretching yourself and your abilities to try new things. I enjoy working on stuff way more than doing the actual work the tool is for. As a bonus, now I have a tool I can use for future projects. If I really need to push large quantities of dirt, I could always just hook it up to the van or a pickup and do a lot more with it. The mower was convenient in this case because it was tight quarters.

Let’s be reasonable and also acknowledge that I realize this isn’t a skid steer. I expect this blade to be able to push snow and loose dirt, that is about it. If I need to do something heavier I would obviously have to rent/buy something more substantial.

Questions? Comments? Cool related projects to share? post below!
Now YOU, go out and build something!