I've done my share of plowing with my Cub Cadets and full size farm tractors. I've never seen plow bottom draft broke down like Rick's post shows, but I think his numbers are really REALLY close. Rear wheel weight and rear tire tread design makes a huge difference. Some sort of lugged tire really improves a Cubby's ability to pull a plow. Turf tires really don't get a grip. I fall plowed my Sister-in-law's two BIG gardens with my 10" Ohio Steel Fabricator's plow and running over a wayward tomato would cause me to spin-out with turf tires. With lugged tires I never slowed down.
I also welded up a center mounted blade for my older gear drive Cub Cadets, the 70 & 72, the blade itself is a section of a replaceable cutting edge for a full size road grader, about 6 inches tall, 1/2" thk hardened steel, and 40 inches wide. I made a lazy susan from 1/4" thk steel that bolts on my mule drive frames with 1/2" diameter bolts. I've used it to grade loose dirt, packed crushed rock, even peal 1/2" of hard clay off a surface. Only thing that stops me is grass or weeds, the roots stop me instantly. I've always used turf tires, have used tire chains where I needed more Traction. I've even pealed up to an inch of ice off concrete once it started getting warmer and the ice wasn't frozen to the concrete. I'm a little hesitant to use the blade on my Cubbies with my Firestone lugged tires, the bolt that angles the blade could break, it gets lots of stress, and the back corner of the blade could pivot back and gouge a big hole in my expensive tires. To make the blade cut better, I stand on the ends of the actual blade while the tractor pulls itself forward rolling a good sized windrow of dirt off the most rearward end of the blade. I've never had a single problem with the mule drive not being strong enough. I can shift my weight from side to side on the blade and force the ends of the blade to cut much deeper. Just idling along with a 7 or 8 hp engine, now a nice running 10 hp in 1st gear. Blades don't really "push" well, they "pull" much better.
One of the bigger projects I did with it was the landscaping around my Father-in-law's in ground swimming pool. He'd get 3-4 single axle dumptruck loads of good black fill dirt, some was kinda wet I remember, I had my Cub Cadet & dump cart, and we had 1 or 2 wheelbarrows, we'd move all the new fill around the pool in big windows, shoveling everything by hand, no skid steer loaders in the family at the time. Once the dirt was all moved I'd unhook the cart and level the windows with the belly blade around the pool. Never took long, everybody else went in and cleaned up for lunch and I'd get done grading, park my tractor, come in, clean up and sit down with everybody else. Think we did this 5 or 6 Saturday's before we got the grade where my Father-in-law wanted it. The Cubbie did a good job of packing the dirt, there was no low spots, nothing anywhere sunk. We laid the sod a week after the last loads of dirt, think it was Memorial Day, think my Father-in-law expected to lay sod on Labor Day! But the dirt moving and grading took a small fraction of the time he expected. The pool has been filled in, no longer used in the 40 years since, but the grading around the pool is just like I left it back then.
I remember the loading & unloading the Cubbie into my pickup was my biggest concern, I left it in his garage for a month, I really gotta get me a trailer! Something big enough to move my Super H or M.
But these little tractors are capable of WAY more hard work than people think. Just takes the right attachments.
