Backhoe Backhoe removal

[MMA]

Greetings everyone. I'm looking to buy a used industrial type tractor for road maintenance and general landscaping work to include moving medium to large rocks on my property. My question involves backhoes vs skip loaders. Is it possible / economical to remove a backhoe attachment from a tractor (JD 310 or Case 680CK for instance) and replace with a gannon or blade for road work? I'll get more use out of a rear scrapper, but a backhoe would come in handy from time to time also. Thanks - Mike A.

[Rock knocker]

I'll have to cogitate on this. Besides the frame and a stouter front end loader (FEL) that comes with a true industrial tractor-loader-backhoe, don't you think you may be better off with an ag tractor with a FEL?

[Brad_Blazer]

The Kubota TLB series e.g. L45 has removable backhoes and 3ph.

[MMA]

Thanks Rock knocker. I live in the high (sun baked in the summer) desert of Nevada. My 9 neighbors and I live on a private road that we must take care of. One neighbor has a Cat D8 that he use to do road maintenance with, but it has track issues that he doesn't have the money to fix right now. I'm not even sure an industrial tractor will do the job but I thought it would be my best bet for the money.

[schmism]

a pull type box blade would be ideal for your situation. They are serious HD and can often be picked up for cheep because of the somewhat limited market for them (vs regular 3pt mount box blades)


should be able to be hitched to the rear of the hoe in such a way that you dont have to remove the hoe to pull it on the road.

you may be able to make that work behind a large 4wd pickup in 4Low also although you'd have to rig up a electric hydrualic setup for it if you did (but shouldnt be to hard with pre-made bolt on kits for hydrualic beds)

of course the real tool would be a real motor grader.

http://www.machinerytrader.com/list/...nu=CATERPILLAR

and for what you would consider spending on a industrial backhoe you may want to consider a MG. Course the MG is ONLY going to smooth dirt, but you didnt seem like you had a lot of other purpose planned for your backhoe so.... give it some thought

NOTE: the old school MG's were mosty mechanical and a few hydrualics. so they basicly last forever. The newer you go the more hydrualics youll have to worry about. (course if you get up to a new M series then they are joystick control and all drive by wire but then again, those are 150K-200K and i think a little outside your budget)

[MMA]

A pull box blade - hadn't even considered one of those, but it might be just the ticket for the hard baked roads in the summer. Thanks everyone for the input.