interesting thread. I bought a used trac vac (11HP their top of the line uit 1080) this summer. It has been a dissapointment.
Part of the problem is my 72"MMM has low lift blades & doesn't get the leaves off the ground. Kubota doesn't offer high lift for my deck & so far I haven't been able to find any aftermarket blades that will fit (w/o modification to center hole).
The other problem is that when you dump it, the leaves don't come out w/o having at it with the pitch fork. The clamps holding the output chute to the trailer busted & I replaced them with sheet metal screws, so I can't even "dump" it anymore.
The third problem is it doesn't fit in my shed so the local mice decided they'd hole up in the shroud & snack on the coil wire ($200 repair).
With the slow emptying I'm not sure I'm saving any time vs. using the leaf blower & tarps. I currently have the unit for sale. If it doesn't sell, I will remove the blower from the trailer & mount it on a skid to be used with my country manufacturing dump trailer. Kind of like JackIL has done