Should I build a ride on mower

[Tony_4500]

Hey, I mow lawns in Nanango Qld, most peoples lawns are 1 acre or more and the ground is pretty rough, with lots of wire grass. I can also travel 30 km's to jobs. I have a John Deere and a Husqvana and both struggle. People usually wait until the grass is waist high before calling. I am going through cutting belts about every 15 hours and get plenty of flat tyres as well. My trouble is rides ons are to small and tractors (fergie etc) are to big, these little jap tractors are not suitable as they shake you to death, and tip easily. So I was thinking about building my own ride on mower, (front deck) Like connecting a old morris minor motor and box to a old 4 ft tractor slasher, should have enough power in first or second gear? to run it. And hook up a hydrostatic drive from an old ride on the front pully to drive it,(any better ideas welcome) and put like mini wheels with mud grip tyres on it maybe. I am a boiler maker so the fabrication side of it will be ok. I cant afford a new zero turn yet and cant find a second hand one. I have heard horror stories about the repair costs as well so am wanting somethimg simple and reliable. Am I crazy or has someone done this before. Your thoughts and ideas are welcome. I want to keep it conpact (max 1200mm wide) for easy transport.

[Arfa Brayne]

Go for it mate !!
It would be hard to do a worse job than some of the commercialy available equip.
I'm not sure what "wire grass" is - do you mean serrated tussock?
Either way it sounds like tuff stuff.
I build quite a bit of my own equip too, or heavily modify commercially available equip.
My best advice is to spend a bit more and use better metalurgy. Sometimes going for bigger heavier thicker materials is self defeating. Try to use bisalloy, spring steel, boron steel and put it together with solid welds and high tensile fasteners. Brace or gussett if in doubt.
With serrated tussock you are better to go with a heavy carrier disc and swing back boron blades about 2mm thick x 100mm-150mm long.
For a 1200mm cut, Run the disc at around 3000rpm. This is a little faster than most run, but the setup/combination gives good cutting on tussock without having to sharpen the blades when they blunt. You can slash all day non stop instead of having to sharpen every hour. If the blades are stuffed by days end, just chuck em, you've saved the cost in down time already.