Custom Striping kit for the small Toro Timecutters!

[SouthallMowing]

After having just the mower making the stripes, and doing a good job at it, I decided it's time to make a striping kit. However, nowhere makes one for my 38" cut. So I made one....for under $25! Aluminum: $12.00 Nuts, Bolts, and Washers: $11.39 Scrap Rubber and solid iron: Free. In the horizontal aluminum bar, there are 3 3/4 inch dia. rods to add about 5 pounds of weight, without it looking junky. Sorry about the blurry picture.

Attached Images

toro stripe.jpg (57.0 KB, 68 views)

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[wat5150]

Lawn care business tips

The only problem I see is if you have a few bumps here and there. Is the bracket able to move up and down? I can see potential issues with that. Uneven terrain might cause a problem.

[brian'slawncare]

that's the first thing I saw too. It would be great to add a spring system.

[SouthallMowing]

Spring system! Great idea! I was trying to think of something that would help it. I mowed with it on hills and stuff. I didn't have any problems with it. But I don't want to get into that one in a million thing and get stuck and break something other than the striper. Any idea on what kinds of springs though? I don't know much about them.

[Steve]

What if you mount it a little further back off the mower and then have a hinge at the top. Maybe make it so it can't flap forwards but it can flap back.

Then have a spring on each side that attaches at the bottom of the striper to the mower itself. This could give it some flex when it runs over or hits something.

Home depot has a bunch of different springs. Like these.

[jrayb39667]

I was thinking about getting a stripe kit for my mower but down here there are a lot of ditches and I think the stripe kit would get hung up if I were in the bottom of the ditch and turned around like I do a lot. Do you have ditches that you mow? have you had any problems with your striper getting hung up when turning around in the bottom of a ditch?

[SouthallMowing]

Steve, I'm liking where this is going. It's all coming together now. I think this winter, I'm going take all of the ideas from everyone, and make a few different prototypes, because it works, but it can be better.

jrayb, I mow ditches too. I didn't get it stuck today when I mowed them. However, it does not like coming off of sidewalks, got it stuck. Stupidest moment of my day. But it was a simple push to get it to swing to the wheels touched the ground.

I think I'm going to make it go in between the mowing deck and the rear wheels. That might solve some problems. I'm not sure if it will create new ones though.

[Steve]

I look forwards to seeing your next creation.

Here are some other design options.

[jrayb39667]

I like the idea of between the deck and rear wheels. When i'm in the bottom of a ditch I have to raise my deck up as high as it will go with my foot pedal to keep my anti scalp wheels from digging into the sides when i'm turning around. If the striper were on the deck then it would raise up too. Good thinking Southal!!!

[brian'slawncare]

If the striper were on the deck then it would raise up too.

This would also be good because if you are going up a curb and need to raise the deck up, this would go with it. Or if you are going down a gravel path and don't want it banged up, just raise up the deck.

This. Is. Genious.