Considering a JD CUT for Coffee Farm

[Fred Cowell]

Aloha,
I'm working a 20 acre coffee farm that will grow to nearly 50 acres. We're using a Cub Cadet with a rear mounted Woods 48" rotary to mow the grass between our rows of coffee, but the CC is getting long in the tooth and has had to have repairs on the 4wd. My father uses a JD2210 with 54"MMM to do a similar mowing function on his 10 acres. I'm thinking of going with a 2520 with 62MMM to do my mowing. The times I've "raced" the cub cadet with Dad's JD I've gone more than twice as fast. Does the 2210 have a better stability than the 2520? BTW, we rarely mow grass longer than 3 inches. Grass strips between rows is roughly 8' wide so I don't think I can get a single pass down the rows and have any kind of maneuvering capacity.

Great site, I look forward to asking and hopefully answering many questions.

 

[Z-Michigan]

Is mowing the only task? If so, have you considered just getting a zero turn mower?

 

[Fred Cowell]

That's another question entirely. A ZTM might be the answer if it's tough enough. Mowing is our main mechanized requirement, but not the only one. We need to mow roughly every six weeks. We want the mowing to be done quickly and reliably. The other tractor functions are fertilizer spreading and occasionally some herbicide applications. I'd rather have a really good, speedy mower capacity and then use a heavier tractor for the periodic heavy spreading or spraying. We're slowly getting all our rocks out of the way and are fairly smooth. Most of our mowing is cross-slope so we have to have a very stable machine to handle up to 20%.

 

[RoyJackson]

Aloha,
I'm working a 20 acre coffee farm that will grow to nearly 50 acres. We're using a Cub Cadet with a rear mounted Woods 48" rotary to mow the grass between our rows of coffee, but the CC is getting long in the tooth and has had to have repairs on the 4wd. My father uses a JD2210 with 54"MMM to do a similar mowing function on his 10 acres. I'm thinking of going with a 2520 with 62MMM to do my mowing. The times I've "raced" the cub cadet with Dad's JD I've gone more than twice as fast. Does the 2210 have a better stability than the 2520? BTW, we rarely mow grass longer than 3 inches. Grass strips between rows is roughly 8' wide so I don't think I can get a single pass down the rows and have any kind of maneuvering capacity.

Great site, I look forward to asking and hopefully answering many questions.

If you think a finishing mower can do the job (since you're using a rotary cutter now), you might want to consider a rear mower rather then a mid-mount. This would save you several hundred (at least) dollars and time (the rear mowers are easier to get on and off).
Since I would think most of your mowing is in straight lines, a rear mower would do the job nicely.

 

[turbo36]

I have a 2305 (same as the 2210) and a 2520, the 2520 is more stable due to the wider stance and larger tires. When I bought the 2305 I thought it would have a lower center of gravity due to the smaller tires but because it is so low to the ground any load has to be carried above the centerline of the axles so the "real" center of gravity is higher then the 2520.