Buying Advice The Standard Question

[MossRoad]

And in a nutshell you've shown my problem. My job is occasionally ad hoc. Either I'm on the computer at home doing diagnostics or I have to drive in to make fixes....either way I don't necessarily have the time to complete a task. At least if it's my tractor I can be assured that the work will get done and I don't have the hassle of arranging or returning a rental piece. Lousy way to have to go, but it puts me at less risk for plans going afoul.

Now once I've got the property cleaned up and various upgrades complete I could always offer my FEL to others on Craigslist or Ebay....But I don't know how well that would work. Either way I'm cool.

Ahhh....been there, done that.... 25+ years in I.T., on call primary every 3 weeks, secondary 24/7/365. Salaried employee. Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the work and the pay. But you gotta have some time off for yourself/family, etc... once in a while.

Anyhow, we live on a little over 1 acre and we own 20 acres about 9 miles away. We manage the 20 acres for nature, firewood and about 4 acres for veneer lumber (for maybe our kids' kids' kids'). We'd like to build on it someday if the stars align. If not, its still a nice place to visit and a refuge for wildlife (and tasty deer). We started out with a small Simplicity lawn tractor with a 26" cut for the house property, and a large, very used, IH2500B industrial tractor loader for the remote property. That's a 8000# cabbed machine with 3/4 yard bucket on FEL with 10' lift, 3pt hitch, 50PTO HP, lowboy (you straddle the transmission hump), HST tranny with 4 cylinder gas engine. It was a beast. We used the large machine to cut in a road and brush hog with a 5' cutter between the rows of planted trees. After about 5-6 years, it was too large to get down the tree rows, the road was cut in, the gravel spread on the road, the slag spread over the gravel, etc... and it pretty much was useless after that except to remove the occasional large tree that would fall down. It was just too large.

Back at the home, it took about 2-3 hours to mow the 1 acre with the little lawn tractor. We also had a snow blower for the little tractor, so that was nice.

After much thinking, we decided to sell both the lawn tractor and big IH and get something capable of doing the tasks we needed to do. One machine. Most tasks. Not all tasks, just most.

After about a year of research, I had narrowed down my choices to a John Deere 4100HST, a Kubota BX2200, a New Holland TC21D,a Cub Cadet 7205 and a Power-Trac PT425.

For many reasons, we went with the Power Trac PT425. That was back in 2001.

We got a 60" finish mower for the house and a 48" brush cutter for the tree rows, trails and fields. We got a set of pallet forks to move things (very handy for logs, rocks, brush piles, etc...), a 60" power angle snowblade, a 10 cubic foot bucket and a 5 cubic foot rock bucket with teeth, and factory loading ramps.

It now takes me about half an hour to mow the 1 acre. I'd remove the tailgate on my pickup, and use the ramps to back the PT425 up into the back of my pickup truck with the brush cutter attached and mow the tree rows and trails at the property. I'd also take the pallet forks and haul out firewood. I could do the same thing with the 60" finish mower and used it to maintain the ball diamonds at the Little League park and our church/school ball diamond.

After a couple years, we bought an 18' car hauler trailer, sold the pickup, bought a 3/4 ton van, and towed the tractor and all implements to wherever I needed to work. And I used the trailer to bring home firewood (we heat with wood now). Traded the van for a Suburban, but still the same thing with the trailer.

The goal was to find one machine that could do 90% of what we needed to do, do those tasks well, and eliminate as many motorized machines as possible to save space and cut down on maintenance. We got what turned out to be the perfect machine for our tasks.

Articulated machines with all attachments out front have a lot to offer. Power Tracs have their quirks and aggravations. You gotta be your own mechanic. But they are so simple to work on. All steel welded construction. No plastic. Just an engine, some hydraulic pumps, motors, rams and hoses and that's about it.

Its the quick attach feature of the Power Trac that sold me. I do not miss that 3pt hitch on the IH and will never go back to having one. When I was looking at conventional 3pt hitch machines, I was looking at the Delta hitches for quick attach. That is worth a look. You can change implements from the seat of a small, compact tractor.

So my advice would be to think really long and hard about the tasks you need to accomplish today, and the tasks in your foreseeable future. See if there is one machine that can do all of it. Or look for good condition used machines to do the immediate tasks with a goal of ending up with your dream machine to do your property maintenance once all the major tasks are completed.

Good luck in your search. It can be frustrating, but a lot of fun as well. :thumbsup:

 

[Wagtail]

A very good and comprehensive answer, MossRoad.

Sometimes tractor people have their blinkers on and see everything as a "tractor" solution.

 

[MossRoad]

A very good and comprehensive answer, MossRoad.

Sometimes tractor people have their blinkers on and see everything as a "tractor" solution.

Yeah, I wanted a tractor until I realized I didn't need a tractor.

 

[tractormonkey21144]

Yeah, I wanted a tractor until I realized I didn't need a tractor.

Gotta say if they had a dealer network I'd certainly give them a spin. Interesting approach to be sure. But as you've mentioned before there's part of owning the PowerTrac that require you do your own mechanical work to fix things. I fix things all the time, so I'm not afraid of that, but once I hit a point in the repair process or I deem such a repair task as better left to someone with more experience, I'd like to have service be more readily available.'

I'm in Maryland, so they're not across the country. That being said, they are near Tennessee. That's a 7-9 hour drive for me. Bit much.

Hope they grow enough to get a network going in the future. American made products are hard to come by and this one is definitely innovative.

 

[Steppenwolfe]

Ahhh....been there, done that.... 25+ years in I.T., on call primary every 3 weeks, secondary 24/7/365. Salaried employee. Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the work and the pay. But you gotta have some time off for yourself/family, etc... once in a while.

Anyhow, we live on a little over 1 acre and we own 20 acres about 9 miles away. We manage the 20 acres for nature, firewood and about 4 acres for veneer lumber (for maybe our kids' kids' kids'). We'd like to build on it someday if the stars align. If not, its still a nice place to visit and a refuge for wildlife (and tasty deer). We started out with a small Simplicity lawn tractor with a 26" cut for the house property, and a large, very used, IH2500B industrial tractor loader for the remote property. That's a 8000# cabbed machine with 3/4 yard bucket on FEL with 10' lift, 3pt hitch, 50PTO HP, lowboy (you straddle the transmission hump), HST tranny with 4 cylinder gas engine. It was a beast. We used the large machine to cut in a road and brush hog with a 5' cutter between the rows of planted trees. After about 5-6 years, it was too large to get down the tree rows, the road was cut in, the gravel spread on the road, the slag spread over the gravel, etc... and it pretty much was useless after that except to remove the occasional large tree that would fall down. It was just too large.

Back at the home, it took about 2-3 hours to mow the 1 acre with the little lawn tractor. We also had a snow blower for the little tractor, so that was nice.

After much thinking, we decided to sell both the lawn tractor and big IH and get something capable of doing the tasks we needed to do. One machine. Most tasks. Not all tasks, just most.

[FONT=&]After about a year of research, I had narrowed down my choices to a John Deere 4100HST, a Kubota BX2200, a New Holland TC21D,a Cub Cadet 7205 and a Power-Trac PT425.[/FONT]

For many reasons, we went with the Power Trac PT425. That was back in 2001.

We got a 60" finish mower for the house and a 48" brush cutter for the tree rows, trails and fields. We got a set of pallet forks to move things (very handy for logs, rocks, brush piles, etc...), a 60" power angle snowblade, a 10 cubic foot bucket and a 5 cubic foot rock bucket with teeth, and factory loading ramps.

It now takes me about half an hour to mow the 1 acre. I'd remove the tailgate on my pickup, and use the ramps to back the PT425 up into the back of my pickup truck with the brush cutter attached and mow the tree rows and trails at the property. I'd also take the pallet forks and haul out firewood. I could do the same thing with the 60" finish mower and used it to maintain the ball diamonds at the Little League park and our church/school ball diamond.

After a couple years, we bought an 18' car hauler trailer, sold the pickup, bought a 3/4 ton van, and towed the tractor and all implements to wherever I needed to work. And I used the trailer to bring home firewood (we heat with wood now). Traded the van for a Suburban, but still the same thing with the trailer.

The goal was to find one machine that could do 90% of what we needed to do, do those tasks well, and eliminate as many motorized machines as possible to save space and cut down on maintenance. We got what turned out to be the perfect machine for our tasks.

Articulated machines with all attachments out front have a lot to offer. Power Tracs have their quirks and aggravations. You gotta be your own mechanic. But they are so simple to work on. All steel welded construction. No plastic. Just an engine, some hydraulic pumps, motors, rams and hoses and that's about it.

Its the quick attach feature of the Power Trac that sold me. I do not miss that 3pt hitch on the IH and will never go back to having one. When I was looking at conventional 3pt hitch machines, I was looking at the Delta hitches for quick attach. That is worth a look. You can change implements from the seat of a small, compact tractor.

So my advice would be to think really long and hard about the tasks you need to accomplish today, and the tasks in your foreseeable future. See if there is one machine that can do all of it. Or look for good condition used machines to do the immediate tasks with a goal of ending up with your dream machine to do your property maintenance once all the major tasks are completed.

Good luck in your search. It can be frustrating, but a lot of fun as well. :thumbsup:

Really cool set up you have there. Smart choice.

 

[tractormonkey21144]

Paperwork for the purchase of the 1705 unit is underway. Will take delivery in the next couple of weeks.

Test drove the Deere. I'd say the differences are minute. I thought some of the PTO controls for the JD were oddly placed under the seat, but otherwise it appears to have similar attributes to the MF 1705. The JD wasn't worth the $2300 price difference in my opinion.

Did not care for the hood on the 1023 at all. Plastic and when fully opened access to the engine compartment was minimal. I've been dealing with that for 14 years on the garden tractor, and didn't care for it.

I expect this purchase will help me around the yard immensely. Thanks again for your input. I own up to what I don't know, and when I don't I ask. Thankfully the internet has created forums like this for someone like me to get the knowledge they need.

 

[2ndhalf]

Paperwork for the purchase of the 1705 unit is underway. Will take delivery in the next couple of weeks.

Test drove the Deere. I'd say the differences are minute. I thought some of the PTO controls for the JD were oddly placed under the seat, but otherwise it appears to have similar attributes to the MF 1705. The JD wasn't worth the $2300 price difference in my opinion.

Did not care for the hood on the 1023 at all. Plastic and when fully opened access to the engine compartment was minimal. I've been dealing with that for 14 years on the garden tractor, and didn't care for it.

I expect this purchase will help me around the yard immensely. Thanks again for your input. I own up to what I don't know, and when I don't I ask. Thankfully the internet has created forums like this for someone like me to get the knowledge they need.

Post Pics :thumbsup:

 

[Grateful]

Congrats on your new purchase. I took delivery of a 1705 in August as my first tractor. Have had so much fun. Like you I wanted to be able to be use and remove the mower and loader and find both quick to take on and off. I also added a front mount snowblower and can't wait for more snow. So much fun. You will enjoy your tractor. I was between a jd 2025r and the Massey. I got the gc 1705 with the snowblower for the same as the jd would have been.

 

[tractormonkey21144]

I have no idea how to reply and post photos. Got it two weeks ago and tomorrow I'll finish the ramp and take it out to do some stuff in the yard.