20 Best Tow Behind Tiller (2022 Updated)

Got this mower from Fleet Farm and ran into issues right away. Product was not in a box, no manuals, no side discharge chute, FWD did not work, engine produces white smoke when starting and then goes away.

Very disappointed after reading so many reviews about how great this mower is supposed to be. Tried to return it and i was told “you cant if you put gas in it”. How am i supposed to to try it without gas? SMH.

I have had this Troy-Bilt Horse tiller a couple of years now and have had a chance to give it several good workouts. The Tiller works great as long as you remember that in hard compacted soil that you may need to make more than one pass before tilling as deep as you can with this tiller or else it may try to “lurch forward”.

In previously tilled land, the tiller can handle it easily with a single pass. The tiller tines and seal shields are a great improvement over my old 1981 Troy-Bilt H-70 that still works and runs well, just smokes and leaks oil around the worn tine shaft.

It is hard to believe that improvements could be made on the old H-70 (serial # 326035) Horse tiller from 1981 but Troy-Bilt addressed and improved several things. The fuel shut off lever is quick and easy on the Briggs engine; better that the petcock from 1981.

Another improvement is the PTO tine disengage feature that is great for transporting the tiller from the garage to the garden without the tines turning. The safety handles that kill the engine on both handles is great to should you need to stop immediately.

The only negative comment about this tiller is that the Wheels/Tines/ PTO Drive forward – reverse lever is not stout enough, it bends when you attempt to disengage the engine to stop tilling. The lever needs to be stronger since to disengage it requires some force.

I have had my Big Red since March 18, 2000. We live on 1. 3 acres in the Piedmont area of North Carolina which has very heavy red clay; they make brinks out of it! After five years I had to replace the original tines with the extra heavy-duty set I had purchased with the tiller.

With regular servicing I expect it will last another 18 years by which time I will no longer be on this earth or at least gardening as I do now. When we moved in in 1998, I asked that the builder not do any landscaping.

I had seven loads of composted horse manure brought in and paid a local farmer to plow, till and plant the yard with winter rye the first year. Then I spent the winter putting my landscape plan together.

In March 2000, I tilled the entire back yard, over an acre, with my new Big Red: planted fruit trees and shrubs and prepared a 60 X 60 foot vegetable garden area. I till the garden twice a year incorporating free horse manure and barn litter from the horse barn behind us (six horses produce all I will ever need)! I keep the vegetable rows 3-4 feet apart so I can cultivate during the growing season and keep the weeds down.

I also use Big Red on annual flower beds around the yard, pre- and post-season. When I first got it, the battery start was fine, but it does not charge very well, so I hand crank it to start. Even on cold mornings and after it has been sitting in the unheated barn unused for a couple of months, with the choke on, it only takes one or two pulls on the cord to get it started.

It is not a hard pull either. When my 550 pound lawn tractor quit on me at the bottom of the hill (of course), I used big Red in low gear and a rope to pull the riding lawn mower back up to the garage – 200 feet up a 30 degree slope.

While I can now walk beside it and guide it with one hand, I still have to man-handle it to turn it 180 degrees at the end of each pass. I call it “Waltzing Matilda”. After 20 years of tilling and amending, I have some of the best soil in the county; my tomatoes currently stand 7 feet tall! I could not have done it with out Big Red! Thank you for building a quality product.

Delivery was a fiasco but that’s not DR’s problem. Everything seemed to assemble ok. machine sure is a lot smaller than I anticipated but that is OK. The machine seems durable enough but with all the plastic controls.

it seems kinda hokey. The machine doesn’t engage in any gear, nor engage in any function so I set out to adjust the clutch. Following the instructions. I’ve had it tightened all the way up and all the way loose.

Nothing. One thing I can say about that Briggs & Stratton engine is boy it starts just like a Honda. Started right away. They could do some re-design so that checking and filling oil is a lot easier but whatever.

Still too wet. I’m glad that I can’t rototill yet bc all this machine is for me is a $900 joke and I’m disappointed in DR. But I will figure it out somehow.

I bought my Brinly Disc Harrow last winter so I would have it in time to to get my garden ready for spring planting. I use it on my Husqvarna TS354XD garden tractor with an electric sleeve hitch. I typically use it after plowing and turning the garden with the Brinly Plow which is another great implement.

I usually make 3 passes per row with the disc. With the down force created by my electric sleeve hitch the disc makes short work of cutting and leveling the large clumps and mounds of red Carolina clay created by the plow.

It leaves a nice fairly tilled soil surface that I then fluff with the Cultivator. I have also used the disc to lightly rough and loosen the soil surface of my yard to plant grass seed. I have future plans to use it to help create a few food plots on my hunting land.

I even plan to eventually get a second one to pull in tandem with the first. So far I have been extremely pleased with my Brinly Disc and would absolutely highly recommend it for anyone needing a quality build, dependable, garden tractor sized disc harrow! I also do recommend using it with an electric sleeve hitch instead of just pulling it so you don’t have to worry about putting extra weight on it.

I purchased my disc harrow from Northern Tool and Equipment. I picked it up and took it home to assemble. When I tried to assemble it, I discovered the Hitch Bar holes had been stamped out backwards making it impossible to assemble.

I returned to Northern Tool and Equipment and they opened up another box and swapped the Hitch Bar out for one that was done correctly. Once assembled it seems to be a solid piece of equipment that will hopefully serve me well.

I realize that people make mistakes but Quality Control should have caught it before it left the factory.

I bought this for small food plots ( 40 yards X 80 to 100 yards ) for deer hunting and small garden work. The ground where I live is hard clay but this little disc works really well for me. I pull it with a lawn mower with somewhere around 100 lbs or so added to it and it works well.

I go slow and take my time making multiple passes but it is getting the job done. Very impressed. Just what I was looking for.

I have delayed my review of the Super Bronco CRT tiller until I could get a fair amount of dirt time with it. First off, if your looking for the quality of of the old time TroyBilts ( I have a 1977 model still working hard), you wont find it here.

This one came with a warped shield on the back, I kind of bent it back so its functional, but irritating. The engine is all chinese. I hope I can actually buy parts when the time comes. One thing to note is there is NO fuel shutoff to the carbruator.

Yes, there is even a place on the carb to put one, but somebody got real cheap and didn’t have the shutoff included. As a matter of practice, I always try to shut off the gas and run the remainder out of the carb before putting the machine away.

I can say that the engine starts and seems to run OK for now. As far as operation goes, I bought it mainly for tilling between rows and it seems to do that OK, Its nicely balanced which makes turning around easier.

The reverse is easy to operate and convenient. To engage the tiller, you have to pull the lever up, I would have preferred to push a lever down, but it works. You’ll just have to get used to having one forward speed, it seems like it takes forever getting to and from the garden.

The most irritating part is that once you kill the engine, you can’t move the tiller, you have to drag it. unless you get down on the ground and pull the pins on the wheels. and slide then inward. and put the pins back in.

and that’s the easy part. To re-engage the wheels you have to reverse the process, only this time you have to find the hole ! That’s a lot of screwing around. couldn’t the engineers at MTD come with a better solution than that? I’ll bet the TroyBilt guys could have.

Just thinking about this makes me want to adjust my rating down a notch. Maybe I’ll build a dolly and run it up on the dolly so I can move it around the barn. In summary, I guess I can say that it works.

I should have looked around more, and maybe I still will and try to dump this on Craigs list or somewhere. I wish Honda made one like it.

Very nice rear-tine tiller. Extremely easy to operate; way different from the front tine machines! Well made and very well balanced. If the machine gets bogged down due to digging too deep in lighter soil, merely lift up on the handle and it walks right out and continues forward.

You can use the reverse lever to back out of a situation, as well, such as when encountering a very large rock or root. I thought the 208cc (~6hp) engine might be a little small for the job, but no matter how deep I set to till, there is absolutely no strain on the engine, what-so-ever.

It only has a single forward speed, but they hit it perfectly. It does an excellet job of tilling!! I’m looking forward to a long career of gardening with this machine.

I had a Tory bilt Horse that I bought in 2001 and it was getting too difficult to use when I wanted to cultivate. between rows due to its weight, The super bronco was what I was looking for – so that I can control it between the rows yet can do some heavy tilling when needed.

I was deciding between this and a DR tiller – and the choice came down to either – the DR had CRT tines or regular tiller tines – while the Troy Bilt had only CRT but had power reverse. The final decision was the difference in weight – the Troy Bilt was much lighter.

So far so good – what I was looking for – a Tiller that can do heavy duty tilling – yet light enough so I don’t “wack” my plants when I am using it for cultivating. So far – engine starts right up each time.

I am pleased with the Mantis Garden Tiller. I have used it to dig holes in my yard to plant shrubs. The ground is difficult to dig by hand but the tiller made short work of it. I have also used the aerator attachment to help with lawn over-seeding and it worked well.

Considering the light weight and general ease of use, the tiller is impressively strong. There is a short learning curve, so following the provided instructions was helpful. I was skeptical that it would do all the things it is advertised for, but now I am confident that it will perform as intended.

The instructions advise that fuel should not be stored in the machine. I was not able to find a way to drain the unused fuel from fuel system so I ran the tiller on idle for about 20 minutes to consume the remaining fuel.

It is light weight but weight distribution is a little awkward for carrying the tiller. The tines have the potential to be dangerous when carrying or moving the tiller. Always be aware of where the tines are in relation to your feet and legs when carrying the machine.

Don’t carry it when the engine is running. It would be nice it there was a way to safely hang the tiller for storage.

First, Tillers Direct is a great company to deal with. They kept us posted almost every day as to the shipping progress. The machine arrived in perfect condition. There was no damage to the box, and it was very well packed.

Follow the directions, and it’s simple to assemble. I filled it with fuel, primed it as instructions, and on the second pull away we go. I took it out to the garden, and it is amazing. I’ve used a full-sized tiller for years, but this machine leaves the dirt super fine and well mixed up.

I had heavy clay soil (here in Ga. ), so I mixed in compost and Perlite, and the machine did the rest. We’ve just had some heavy rains, and most of my garden is mud but the two large raised beds I bought the tiller for are ready for planting after just a quick turnover with a fork.

The dirt is very soft and only medium wet. It’s well-drained thanks to the Mantis. One final item. The second time I tried to start it and had a bit of a problem. Operator error left the off/on switch off.

Moved it to ON and started on the second pull. I won’t do that again. I’m very happy with both the tiller and Tillers Direct.

My Super Bronco has to be at least ten years old and runs strong to this day, never a failure to start despite ethanol-laced fuel. Goes through virtually anything as long as one uses a degree of common sense and caution.

The traditional rotation tines can cause the tiller to “pop wheelies” if one bites off more than one should chew, BUT if used correctly, the tiller will pulverize virtually anything. I keep going and wondering when one or both of the venerable drive belts will finally “retire.

” They are apparently made of stern stuff as they just keep going on doing their thing of transferring torque to the wheels and tines. When they quit, they will owe me nothing! I did finally sharpen the tines last year.

I went from a sandy soil to a lake-bottom clay and putting a new edge on them helped the tines cut through the tough yellow clay and lessened the wheelie effect. My main maintenance issues are to use full synthetic oil and keep the fuel stabilized and the air cleaner clean.

I wash off the tiller when I am done with a period of use and spray the dried tiller with my witch’s brew of WD-40 and light oil out of my spray gun. That keeps the rust at bay and the fasteners from corroding.

This has to be one of the most economical tools I own. It just keeps amortizing the original purchase price by adding yet another year to its service.

This tiller is a huge engineering failure. Good for breaking new ground – but even then, you have to hold up the back end or it will just dig itself into a hole. Extremely disappointed with this model.

The dealership that sold it to me refused to take it back so now I am stuck with an ergonomic disaster that cost way too much and I have to manhandle to keep going forward.

I bought this a few weeks ago and have backbladed the driveway with it. Works well for scraping and rolling gravel behind a lawn tractor. Ok for cutting sod away from edge of roadway. Could maybe use a little more weight in the blade, but overall great product for what it is and designed for.

Easy to put together and attaches to sleeve hitch perfectly.

Bought this blade approximately 10 months ago. Worked well with snow and light dirt work. I added rear adjustable skid shoes for snow removal on stone drive-way. The channel that runs from sleeve hitch to blade is a bit light duty, but blade was exactly as anticipated and wrks fine for my purposes.

Using this rear blade to clean the snow away from my garage door. Just back the tractor up and drop the blade at the bottom of the door. Then pull forward, dragging the snow about 15 feet away from the door.

Next I back up again, over the snow I moved with the blade. Drop my front large blade, that has hydraulics, and push the snow on down the drive. No more using the front blade to back drag and all the turning around that goes with doing this.

I’ve completed the first season of tillage with no problems/issues. Along with garden plots I’ve also tilled areas of yard that needed leveling and reseeding at a lessor depth. I attach to a JD 1025R direct to the 3pt so I did need to shorten the shaft.

Service is still minimal (1 yr old) but access to grease fittings and gear boxes is very good. The “kickstand” is a nice feature to stabilize the unit when stored. The slight offset makes precise alignment of cutting swath easy to control.

Hinge plate exposes enough to make cleaning easy and thorough. It makes quick work of what would normally be very laborious tasks. I look forward to incorporating it to a slew of landscaping projects as I develop my operational skills.

I would give the King Kutter 5ft Pro (green) tiller a high rating. (I also read every review I could find before my purchase!).

The tiller works well and does what you expect it to do but they missed the mark in one area. The instructions say to attach a pro with slip clutch, unfortunately they didn’t leave enough clearance between the tiller cover and the body of the slip clutch.

This required a separate trip to town for a pro shaft extension at a cost of 2 hours of time and $30. This is an obvious miss by their engineering team it makes me wonder if they ever set up and use the equipment they design.

The XB tiller made for Series 1 tractors (less than 25 horsepower) came with a Series 4 PTO Shaft (looked very different than the picture). When I asked Blains for help they referred me to King Kutter who told me that the Series 4 PTO shaft came standard with the 4 foot King Kutter XB and that I needed to cut the PTO shaft down in order for it to fit (said I could use a hacksaw).

I ended up going to a machine shop and was charged $100. If you watch any youtube video with the John Deere 1025R and this tiller it doesn’t discuss the PTO shaft being 2 – 4 inches too Long.

I would have given it 5 stars but I had to drill out the upper mount hole. There was excessive weld blocking the pin on one side. This should have been checked at the factory. Other then that it is a good tiller.

The color match looks good on my Kubota BX2380.

So far great! I have tilled about 3500 square feet of lawn for a garden and some reseeding of grass. Center gearbox was low on fluid, so be sure to check before use. Also best practice would be to adjust slip clutch to match your PTO.

It is set at max. This is a heavy tiller so consider adding weight to front of tractor. My Kubota BX1860 front end lifts a bit when tiller is weighed down with stuck on dirt, but only when driving with tines lifted obviously.

For the BX1860 you will need to take about seven inches off of the PTO Shaft. Make sure you get a short top link.

I’m developing about 1 acre of new ground that’s light clay to clay loam here in Belize, Central America. The engine starts easily, & has plenty of power. However, I really need a reverse gear, & a second gear to get it to the work sute fast, & a clutch for the rotors.

I find also that it doesn’t penetrate well, nor dig out bigger weeds & grass. It seems it would suit a smaller garden with soil that’s been dug before, & with only small weeds, & also cultivating between the rows.

Haven’t had a chance to use it yet but if its anything like my 30 year old junior it will be great

was perfect part works great

An easy to put together, tough piece of equipment, that gets the job done. I created food plots and after discing the soil, adding pelletized lime, mixed it in with the disc, I firmed up the seed bed with this tow behind Cultipacker, seeded the fields and re Cultipacked the soil.

Made my life easier knowing that small seeds need this vital step for germination. A great implement that will last you a lifetime. You won’t be sorry.

Need a extra hand to put together. Seems to be built well. Performed great.

KK BX rototiller has preformed great! No issues at this time after using it for the first season. Shipping was extra fast on the delivery, ahead of schedule. Other than a loose bolt on the side gear drive housing, and a few scratches.

Very Pleased, great value.

Shortened PTO shaft to fit tractor. Used it once to try it out and seems to work good. I did have to top off the gear oil and make sure to lubricate fittings as they come dry. Paint had a few spots that were gone/ rusted but overall looks very well built.

It when on sale the day after I purchased but after speaking to the manager he gave me a gift card for the difference. Very professional.

Purchased this tiller in 2014(7years ago) and initially tilled an acre+ garden and 4 acres worth of food plots a year with it. Now I’m not doing more than a quarter acre a year with it due to changes in how we manage our plots and garden.

First day the tiller developed a massive gear oil leak from the side gearcase, but hardware wasn’t tightened from the factory. Once the hardware was tightened, leak stopped. Next year another leak popped up but just needed some tightening to stop that leak.

After we finished that year(2nd year), I tore the gear cases apart and put new seals in them. LocTite the hardware and never a problem again. I run this 54″ tiller on a 1620 NH which runs a strong 25 pto HP and it does great in previously worked ground, but virgin ground this tiller works it.

Working depth is maxed out about 4 or 5 inches if I’m lucky. After the initial issues, this tiller has been reliable and trouble free. Issue from the start I think is that Fleet Farm lets them sit outside in the elements until they are sold.

and they don’t have a system where they send the customer with the earliest serial number(oldest on-hand unit, rotating stock properly), so some units may sit on the lot for multiple years. Size your PTO properly for your tractor and you’ll be good to go.

The manuel was stuck to the door. When i pulled it off i pulled a big section of paint off. The paint job on Tiller was terrible. Missed seversl spots and coming off in others. Obviously they didn’t allow paint to dry before applying decals, manuels.

Rest of machine looks good.

Using on kubota B2601, prefect size. Had to shorten PTO shaft. Well made, glad it says made in USA. Wish other companies would manufacture here in US. Fast shipping, shipped next day. Great to deal with.

This tiller worked great on a my 3560L Grand Kubota tractor. The shaft fit perfectly without shortening! The tiller came fully loaded with grease and oil. I tilled right into grass and hard clay with 2 passes north to south and then east to west in low gear crawling 1 to 2 miles an hour.

Very quiet. I thru out a 6” rock without causing a problem and it ended up on top…… with the 6 tines instead of 4 the rocks were being pushed out the back instead of being sucked into the tiller. I will be letting the soil set until next spring to let the microbes do their thing to enrich the sod and clay mix.

I set the the tiller depth to 5” and it cut about 3” each time and did a great job… If I went deeper I would of brought up more clay in the mix which is not what I wanted…. Great tiller can’t wait to use it again! I used full throttle on my tractor to get the speed of the tiller at the rpm recommended by the manufacturer so maybe that’s why it worked so well without bogging down.

Yea!.

No instructions on how to put it together and you should buy new retaining clips for the pins. 2 popped off within minutes of the first use. They felt cheap when putting them in and sure enough, it almost came off the 3-point.

The 3rd one last about an hour and then went MIA as well. Had spares, and they’ve lasted just fine. I can’t tell if the gear box is full of oil or empty. I’m going to empty and change it out to make sure, but you can’t just look inside and the view hole is useless with new/clean oil, so.

I think, but I can’t tell. Last thing, the shipping crate is crazy sharp angle iron and bolts were rusted on. You have to take it apart to get it off, which was worse than putting it together. Those are the gripes, but it does its job and works well.

I have no complaints after getting it setup and working. For reference I have a 2022 Kioti CK2610 and it does just fine, even if I have to go pretty much as slow as I can on our compact high desert rocky soil.

Easy to follow instructions and assemble. Works great in the field and easily tills the rough spots to make planting a “cake walk”. One of the better choices I’ve made in purchasing attachments for the tractor.

The price and service at the local Tractor Supply store can’t matched anywhere else.

I purchased the King Kutter Gear Driven Tiller 2 years ago. I purchased for use once a year to till around hay fields in preparation to burn in the winter so it is used VERY little (less than 15 hours on tiller with paint still on the teeth).

This morning while tilling, I noticed something was wrong. Tiller was leaking gear oil from the gear box and extremely hot on the left side. The bearing has went out where the drive shaft meets the gear box.

I called King Kutter and the warranty department informed me that they would offer NO help with this. They stated that they have seen this regularly and it is due to my tractor has too much horsepower, and they recommend NO MORE than a 65hp.

He informed me that this would void the warranty even if it was within the 1 year warranty. Since this is a common problem, I would expect their to be warning stickers on the tiller, but nothing. Long story short, do NOT think that you are buying a quality product, and even worse is the customer service.

They will not stand behind their product.

Bought this tiller 3 years ago for use in my garden. I’ve had the pto shaft split – had to buy a new one to replace. Had the main gearbox bolts shear off. Now today the main shaft to which the tines bolt on completely broke in half! I’ve called Tractor Supply and they say talk to Tarter Gate who is the manufacturer.

They say talk to tractor supply. In the end neither offer any customer service saying the warranty is over. This is not a quality unit and the customer service is worse.

I think I purchased the last one of these in my area. It required a bit of assembly (no biggie) and I had to cut the PTO shaft down to size to fit my tractor (Ford 600). This is a good tiller and my tractor handles it well.

I am using to prepare a base for a driveway. I am tilling everything first and then using a box blade to smooth it out and so far, so good. My only complaint is that the hitch pins continually vibrate loose.

I stop about once an hour or so and tighten them. I have even tried locktite without any results. I am working on fresh (never been tilled) soil, so I think that’s part of it. Beyond that, the tiller works very well.

I would recommend it.

I have only had this tiller a short time, it was a replacement for a 35 year old Troy-Bilt horse tiller. This Honda is certainly a refinement and upgrade over my old tiller. I have been planting gardens and tilling with various machines for 40 years.

Let me say, please ignore the less rated reviews, especially the ones complaining about tine rotation and controllability. Rear-tine tillers are generally designed with forward rotation, if they were not, it would be practically impossible to move thru the dirt in a forward direction.

Counter-rotating tines have their place, but not in a large commercial grade garden tiller. Yes, the tines will grab occasionally in solid or compacted soil. again, nature of this type of tiller; use the bar and read the book.

This is a fantastic piece of equipment, much easier to control, run, and use than some different brands and models.

This thing is a beast. I can run the engine either close to idle or full speed, and it never stops – tremendous torque. It pulls out shrub stumps (with roots) with at least a 1-inch trunk diameter. I have clay soil, with occasional rock up to about 3 inches.

It goes through it all like nothing, leaving the soil light and fluffy (stepping in it depresses the soil at least 4 inches). At most I make 2 passes when breaking a new garden area. I had a front tine tiller for almost 30 years before – the difference is like night and day.

I wish I had bought this a long time ago. As far as runaway when hitting something, I’ve never had an issue with it like others say they have. Sometimes it will jump when it hits a small stump, but so would a front tine tiller.

From a safety standpoint, I think you’d be crazy to want reversing tines, as some reviewers suggested – I’d be surprised if any manufacturer still makes them that way. Besides, there’s no reason to need it with this tiller.

The only negative is that I bent the drag bar so now I can’t raise it all the way. It probably happened when I hit and got snagged on a stump too big for it to take out. The drag bar design is probably good, though, since bending absorbed some of the impact and protected the rest of the unit.

You won’t regret buying it!.

I bought my tiller almost 18 years ago. It has been incredible. I have done some maintenance on it and finally had to replace the tines last year. Tine replacement made it fluff the soil better than ever.

If people are complaining about hard soil they are probably trying to till dry soil which all gardeners should know is a no-no. Two passes is that most I have ever had to do. Amazing tiller, still starts in a pull or two after all those years outdoor.