Why A 4 In 1 Bucket Is An Ideal Attachment For Your Cattle Station's Skid Steer
Posted on: 7 October 2019
Running any cattle station is a daunting and often back-breaking task, and many cattle station owners use skid steers to make the business of maintaining their stations and tending to their herds faster and easier. However, a skid steer is only as useful as the attachments you use with it, and 4 in 1 buckets are becoming increasingly popular. These versatile attachments can be used to perform a wide variety of tasks using a single attachment and are particularly useful for cattle stations and other agricultural businesses.
How can I use a 4 in 1 bucket with my cattle station's skid steer?
At first glance, a 4 in 1 bucket looks like a standard bucket attachment for a skid steer. However, these unique attachments are far more versatile. As its name would suggest, a 4 in 1 bucket has four different configurations, which can be used to perform an enormous variety of tasks.
Bucket mode
In its default configuration, a 4 in 1 bucket looks and functions like a regular bucket attachment and is just as useful for various scooping and digging tasks on your cattle station. They can be used to excavate land to lay foundations for new buildings (such as shelters and milking parlours), lift and carry large amounts of manure, wet cattle feed and silage or create drainage ditches and culverts to channel run-off or alter the flow of nearby streams.
Unlike conventional buckets, 4 in 1 buckets can open at the bottom, transforming the bucket into a pair of 'jaws' and letting you dump a load straight out of the bucket rather than tip it out. This can be helpful when you need to disgorge loads with added precision — for example, when filling in a disused trench or dumping cattle feed in a hopper.
Levelling mode
Once a 4 in 1 bucket is opened, it becomes a much more versatile tool. The rear jaw of an opened 4 in 1 bucket is fitted with a rear-facing, horizontal blade that is designed to be used for levelling earth, gravel and other loose materials. This levelling blade is therefore very useful for levelling newly laid cattle trails, packing down recently excavated earth or levelling recently cleared land to make it suitable for grazing.
Pushing mode
The front jaw of an opened 4 in 1 bucket also sports a horizontal blade, but this one faces forward and is more useful for minor pushing and dozing tasks. Bear in mind that this will not convert your skid steer into a miniature bulldozer; skid steers simply lack the power for heavy grading and dozing projects.
However, the ability to push and grade smaller quantities of loose material can be extremely useful on cattle stations. The pushing blade of a 4 in 1 bucket can be used to clear manure out of wintering barns, remove loose hay and other feed types from feeding barns or spread out earth recently excavated from a new drainage ditch or foundation pit, as well as a host of other minor dozing tasks.
Grabbing mode
The articulated jaws of a 4 in 1 bucket also allow it to function as a versatile grabbing tool, which is suitable for grabbing fallen branches, loose or damaged hay bales and even small boulders. This grabbing function is extremely useful for land clearance and general paddock maintenance, and you may be able to use your 4 in 1 bucket for handling hay bales and other large objects without having to invest in a dedicated bale grapple attachment for your skid steer.
To learn more about the functions of 4 in 1 buckets, contact a company like Norm Engineering.
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