Manure Spreader

Overview

A manure spreader is a towed implement that takes solid manure, farmyard muck or compost from the yard, carries it to the field, and broadcasts it evenly so the nutrients can be worked into the soil. It has no engine of its own, a tractor both tows it by the Frame & Hitch and drives its working parts through the power take-off, so the whole machine is a load-carrying box wrapped around a conveyor and a set of shredding rotors.

The job has two halves: get the load to the back of the box, and tear it apart and throw it wide. The Floor Conveyor handles the first, crawling the entire load rearward, and the Beater Assembly handles the second, shredding the material and flinging it across a swath several metres wide. Spreading from a moving box this way gives an even application rate instead of dumping the load in heaps.

How it works

Power comes in through the PTO Driveline. A telescoping PTO shaft links the tractor PTO to a slip clutch, which slips harmlessly if a frozen lump or foreign object jams the rotors, then a gearbox splits drive to the beaters. The Spreader Box holds the load above a steel floor pan that doubles as the conveyor bed; an adjustable rear slop gate meters how much material reaches the beaters at once.

The Floor Conveyor is a heavy twin-chain apron with slat bars bolted across it. Driven slowly by the Hydraulic System circuit through an orbital motor, it drags the whole load back toward the tail of the box. Apron speed is the operator's main control over application rate: run it faster to lay down more per hectare.

At the rear, the Beater Assembly does the spreading. Fluted expeller rotors fitted with hardened paddles grab the arriving material, shred any clumps, and throw it outward; on rear-discharge machines a pair of spinner discs below the beaters widen the pattern. Power reaches them through the Beater Drive belt and chain set. The loaded machine rides on a Tandem Axle, a tandem walking-beam running gear on flotation tires, which spreads the weight across two axles to keep the heavy box from rutting and compacting wet ground.