ssrfenton
Member
My wife sent me a text and photo of the new toy today. After much reading and assessment we decided the GT6000 will fit our light duty needs around our little 1.25 acre lake lot and tow our utility trailer to boot.
Just a few reasons to puchase this item that may interest some readers:
Purpose:
1. Trailer pull, loaded dock sections, gardening items, tree cleanup, wood haul...general light duty haulage.
2. Fall leaf cleanup. Our lawn guy mows, trims and cleans up for $35 per cut but there is no fall service. So we will attach the deck and run around a few weeks late Oct through Nov. and get that job done. Not sure if we will mulch or Cyclone Rake it.
3. Snow plow part of our drive with the dozer blade and finish off with our 30 inch snow blower. We had a plow service but the large and heavy blade just cut up the drive edge and lawn together with the sprinkler heads. Plus we don't like the look of banked up snow.
4. Hopefully the dozer blade will work OK to level out the 7 yards of soil I dumped. Just will take it easy on the trans and frame
Build
1. The transmission Hydro-Gear 730 is very comparable to Tuff Torqu K66 spec, excluding diff lock. In my mind this is the workhorse of the unit. K66 is used in many GT series and I recall on the Deere 5XX series.
2. The frame, axles and steering all seemed just OK or will meet requirements for the intended purpose. So I really didn't want to over buy a build for things we will probably never over stress.
3. I am not really partial to air cooled motors due to the potential over heat issues. A local service center sais many air cooled engines from all makes are not able to have sufficient air flow and require good and regular cleaning to ensure longevity. So I just gave up on this issue since we were not going for the Kawasaki liquid cooled engine which the service center sais they are great but expensive. I think Deere uses the liquid cooled gas engines in the 7XX series.
Support
Well I'm not alone on this, and parts availability was a major factor for me. Once the warranty is over it will be up to me so if I can buy online that will suffice. I think Sears has good support in this area and members here have even provided upgrades for front wheel bearing replacements.
Value
It is a very good value proposition for our purpose but others who cut grass have different views. Hopefully I don't need to cut and it is a job I don't think I'll enjoy anyway. However for general light duty it may hold up OK. We have a good Deere dealer local to us but we really didn't want to spend a premium for the build level that we may never need. And our needs are not primarily lawn cutting so the added weight, build quality and engine durability for a machine that needs to hold up over alot of miles seemed excess to us.
Just a few reasons to puchase this item that may interest some readers:
Purpose:
1. Trailer pull, loaded dock sections, gardening items, tree cleanup, wood haul...general light duty haulage.
2. Fall leaf cleanup. Our lawn guy mows, trims and cleans up for $35 per cut but there is no fall service. So we will attach the deck and run around a few weeks late Oct through Nov. and get that job done. Not sure if we will mulch or Cyclone Rake it.
3. Snow plow part of our drive with the dozer blade and finish off with our 30 inch snow blower. We had a plow service but the large and heavy blade just cut up the drive edge and lawn together with the sprinkler heads. Plus we don't like the look of banked up snow.
4. Hopefully the dozer blade will work OK to level out the 7 yards of soil I dumped. Just will take it easy on the trans and frame
Build
1. The transmission Hydro-Gear 730 is very comparable to Tuff Torqu K66 spec, excluding diff lock. In my mind this is the workhorse of the unit. K66 is used in many GT series and I recall on the Deere 5XX series.
2. The frame, axles and steering all seemed just OK or will meet requirements for the intended purpose. So I really didn't want to over buy a build for things we will probably never over stress.
3. I am not really partial to air cooled motors due to the potential over heat issues. A local service center sais many air cooled engines from all makes are not able to have sufficient air flow and require good and regular cleaning to ensure longevity. So I just gave up on this issue since we were not going for the Kawasaki liquid cooled engine which the service center sais they are great but expensive. I think Deere uses the liquid cooled gas engines in the 7XX series.
Support
Well I'm not alone on this, and parts availability was a major factor for me. Once the warranty is over it will be up to me so if I can buy online that will suffice. I think Sears has good support in this area and members here have even provided upgrades for front wheel bearing replacements.
Value
It is a very good value proposition for our purpose but others who cut grass have different views. Hopefully I don't need to cut and it is a job I don't think I'll enjoy anyway. However for general light duty it may hold up OK. We have a good Deere dealer local to us but we really didn't want to spend a premium for the build level that we may never need. And our needs are not primarily lawn cutting so the added weight, build quality and engine durability for a machine that needs to hold up over alot of miles seemed excess to us.