Less expensive Culti-Packer design

I thought I would put this project on for all the food plotters out there who don’t use a culti-packer because of the $900 price tag on alot of them. I saw a similar design on some of the other hunting forums I read and thought I would put my own spin on the design.

I started with a single wall 15” poly culvert 10 ft long and cut it in half to make a 5’ packer. Decided I would use a piece of rigid conduit for the axle down the middle of the culvert. I cut two plywood end-caps that fit into the end of the culvert and cut a hole for the axle to pass through in the center of each. I secured one of the end-caps into the culvert with decking screws through the culvert into the edge of the end-caps. Next I stood the culvert on its end on flat ground and put the axle through the end-cap and poured 9-80lb bags of quickrete into the culvert then attached the other end-cap and let the concrete cure for 4 days.

I built the frame from some scrap conduit and tubing I had laying around so it was cheap. Used a couple of pillow block bearings where the culti-packer axle attaches to the frame. Spent about $175 total, the culvert was the most expensive part had to buy a 10ft section for $80 to get a 5’ piece out of it. The pillow block bearings were about $20 each plus bolts and concrete.

Some things I learned:

–         I could have used a smaller culvert. The one I built weighs about 1000 lbs by my estimate, with a 12” culvert could have been 700 lbs (less concrete and work) and probably would have done as good a job.

–         Could have avoided the pillow block bearings. I saw another design where the frame was all made out of pre-threaded pipe and fittings from Lowes. This doesn’t require welding and instead of bearings that design had T-fittings that the axle passed through

Now I need to figure out how to make a bulk lime spreader on the cheap.