A And A

[bigbruh]

Anyone have any experience with a and a scale kits. Any pros or cons. The price is intriguing.

 

[bball]

Bought a set up a couple years ago. Very pleased for my purposes and the price was very reasonable.

 

[pricefarm]

I have looked at them for a couple years. Never have bit the bullet and bought a set yet. Sure would be nice. When you see your calves everyday it's hard to till if there growing

 

[bigbruh]

Will deep unistrut be strong enough to be used as a framing material for the load bars? I think it is 3 1/4" thick.

 

[bball]

Will deep unistrut be strong enough to be used as a framing material for the load bars? I think it is 3 1/4" thick.

I used 1" square stock to frame up a rectangle 8 foot by 27"(with supports in the middle) then covered with plate steel for the platform. It's heavy, but sturdy. Load bar on each corner. Couple coats of primer. Held up well so far.
There's a link okn here from a while back that may have more info and a pic. Will see if I can find and link it.

 

[bball]

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=98123&start=15

The A&A is definitely a cheap scale compared to the more expensive, higher quality ones out there, but for my purposes, have held up well so far and been quite accurate when compared to local scales.

 

[Supa Dexta]

Have a platform made of 3" C channel, have weighed 2k with it.

 

[bird dog]

A & A folks will do everything they can to help you but they are really just sellers of Chinese components. Saying that, most of the components are pretty good value for the price but if you are going to use the scale a lot and plan on using it for a number of years, i would pay more for a better quality set like Tru-Test. My A & A have trouble locking on to a nervous animal and the readout devise has to be rebooted if not used for a few months.

I have a set of both and have real confidence that the Tru-Test will work and be accurate. Not so much from the set I bought from A & A and put on my home made platform. It also helps that the Tru Test are under the chute which to me is by far the way to go if your set up allows it.

 

[bigbruh]

I had the same problem with having it lock on to nervous animals. I called them and discovered that there is an animal weigh mode. I adjusted the sensitivity and now it works great. Only problem I have now is that since I painted the platform to protect it from the weather, it is really slick now. I wonder if a rhino coat would do the trick or is there a better product to give the cows some footing as they get on the scale? Any ideas?

 

[bball]

I had the same problem with having it lock on to nervous animals. I called them and discovered that there is an animal weigh mode. I adjusted the sensitivity and now it works great. Only problem I have now is that since I painted the platform to protect it from the weather, it is really slick now. I wonder if a rhino coat would do the trick or is there a better product to give the cows some footing as they get on the scale? Any ideas?

I used a diamond plate with a couple coats of primer. No real slip issues. Maybe try some of that leak seal spray on stuff in a spray can . Pretty tacky stuff that seems to stick well. Rural king has it cheap enough

 

[bird dog]

On slipping. I welded 3/4" bars on my platform about 10" apart. Solved that issue. Rhino coat will work until it gets covered in wet manure.
My animal weigh mode made it work better but not near as good as I wanted. The instruction manual was not very well written so there maybe something I missed. . My A & A set is old so surely it has been upgraded to better technology. Yours probably works better than mine.

My True Test is always locked on by the time I get the animal's head caught.

 

[wbvs58]

I had the same problem with having it lock on to nervous animals. I called them and discovered that there is an animal weigh mode. I adjusted the sensitivity and now it works great. Only problem I have now is that since I painted the platform to protect it from the weather, it is really slick now. I wonder if a rhino coat would do the trick or is there a better product to give the cows some footing as they get on the scale? Any ideas?

Paint it again and while still wet get some course sand and sprinkle over it. A tin can with appropriate size holes punched in it makes a good "sand shaker" so you get a nice even coverage.

Ken

 

[M & P]

I had the same problem with having it lock on to nervous animals. I called them and discovered that there is an animal weigh mode. I adjusted the sensitivity and now it works great. Only problem I have now is that since I painted the platform to protect it from the weather, it is really slick now. I wonder if a rhino coat would do the trick or is there a better product to give the cows some footing as they get on the scale? Any ideas?

Paint it again and while still wet get some course sand and sprinkle over it. A tin can with appropriate size holes punched in it makes a good "sand shaker" so you get a nice even coverage.

Ken

I use a rubber stock trailer mat cut down to size no slipping and cows seem to like it better.