4-5 acres, need tractor, bushhog....

[ljw]

I just purchased a log home on 7.2 acres, of which about 4 or 5 of the acres is pasture type land. I definitely need a tractor and bushhog, and would also consider some large gardening attachments. I've considered many old tractors, such as the Ford 8n, Farmall Super A, etc., since my price range right now is about $2,000 - $3,000. However, I'm starting to wonder if a new Kubota is the answer. It seems like more of an investment, rather than a "fixer-upper." I really don't have time to try keep an old tractor running.
Any Suggestions??? Thanks!

 

[W5FL]

Unfortunately, not all old tractors are cheap. I bought a Massey Ferguson 245 6 years ago for $8500 and added a Great Bend loader, 6 ft mower and boxblade and had about $12,500 in an 18 year old tractor. When the front end broke, I had to replace the castings, axle pin, and quite a few parts. I sold it and bought a new Kubota. I could have saved myself a lot of aggrivation and money if I had just done that to start with. You have no idea how much aggrivation.

Depends what you want to do with it. If you are satisfied with a gear drive the M4900 in 2WD with a loader is a bargain at about $19,000. If you find that you can use the B Series, they are considerably less expensive and are really nice tractors. The L Series has all the bells and whistles including hydrostatic transmissions, tilt wheels, and compact size frames. Any of the Kubota series will handle the mowing and small implement chores.

I would recommend that you look at all of the new models and talk to a knowledgable sales person about your uses and budgets. If it wasn't for the budget part, I would have a whole barn full of implements! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gifThere is a lot of information on this site as well as the archives that you can search and read (for days). /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Bird]

ljw, you're in the same situation I was 5 years ago. I looked at a lot of old tractors, both at dealers and individuals, before giving up on finding a used one at a reasonable price and bought a new B7100, then last year traded up to a B2710. Good luck.

Bird

 

[Thomas]

ljw,
Good Morning down there in Texas.

You might get lucky and find a Kubota with in your price range or another model thats update,but I think you will have to search long and hard.

The Ford 8n I believe would be your best pick than follow by the John Deere M.
The Farmall Super A ( I'm a Farmall nut also ) to me just doesn't have it for bush hogging,but does if you go slow with a cutter bar.
The Farmall B or the IH Lo-Boy would also fit your needs.

Check into farm & state auctions,bank repo's,news paper ads etc...

Buying a new tractor today is an investment,and maybe it would be cheaper to have someone bush hog your land until your tractor dollars have double.

Like the old saying goes, the parts cost very little....its the down time that cost.

Good luck and best wishes on your new home.


Thomas..NH

 

[gerard]

I was in the same boat and looked at used for quite awhile. Turned out to be like getting a used pickup, better buying new as they hold thier value too well. For a few thousand more you can get a new one without the problems. You could get by with a B series in the 20 hp range. Should easily handle a 4ft bush hog and maybe a 5footer. (I have a 27hp 22 PTO and it's rated for a 6foot bushog although I only have a 5footer)

 

[Opiekanopi]

What a coincidence. I have a log home on 5 acres about 4 of which I need to mow or bush hog. I bought a Massey Fergusen 50 about 5 years ago. It was a little more than I needed size wise but I got a deal on it. I fixed a lot of things did a little paint, but every year there was something else going wrong with it. I was looking at some expensive repairs on the way. So I just bit the bullet and bought the B7500DT. It was delivered just last night with a 5' finish mower. I have and old beat up brush hog type mower that I'll use for the ruffer stuff. I only have about an hour and a half on the meter, but the first impression is this is going to be better than the old Massy. The main reason I went with the DT (Gear Drive) over the Hydro is price. I was on a tight budget too. The DT goes for around $1500 to $2000 dollars cheaper. It gives a little more power at the pto too. I'd like to have the hydro but if you can't afford it you'll love the DT anyway. The 21hp should be enough for what you want to do. I just can't wait to get this weekend started so I can play, I mean get some work done with my new one.
Good Luck,
Rick

 

[Chuck]

I just traded a 1958 ford 641 in for a new L3010. I owned the ford for 4 years and I looked at much more that I was able to run it. I had a mechanic work on 2 or 3 times a year. It hadn't been run much in the years before I bought it, and once I started working it, things just went bad. The agrivation was not worth it. The worst part was that the tractor checked out fine when I bought it. Compression was good, started good, etc. so my mechanic told me that it was fine to purchase. Based on a sour experience with buying an old used tractor, I would recommend buying a new one. As has been said, hire someone to do what you need if you have to. I'm sure that not all used tractors go bad, but just be careful!

 

[Will]

In my area there are some trustworthy people who specialize in buying old tractors, restoring them to good working order, and who will work on them for not much money. If you don't have anyone like that around, you'd better enjoy tinkering with tractors. Some of these repairs take a while, so I wouldn't go with an old tractor if you can't afford to be without it for a week or two at unexpected times.

I had a Farmall Cub for about 10 years. It was cheap, reliable, and I sold it at a profit. It is amazing how quickly you get used to a tractor with brakes, plenty of power, 4WD, a 3 point hitch, power steering, ROPS, to say nothing of total reliability and no more oil dripping everywhere. Wild horses couldn't drag me off my B2100 and back to that Cub.

 

[PaulB]

ljw - where are you located? In my area (Central New York), staying within your budget will only buy you an old American farm tractor like a Farmall or Ford. Many of these, such as Farmall, JD, and Allis Chalmers will be so old they will predate the universal 3 point hitch, so will accept only a limited number of very old accessories. They will also not have a live pto, no ROPS, and other safety concerns that for me eliminate them as considerations regardless of price (I do not want to die or get hurt by a piece of equipment I have no business operating). If you really have to stay under 3 grand, and still have all of the safety features I think are absolutely essential, I think the only way would be to get a used grey market diesel compact imported from Japan. These things are often listed at well under $3000 for a small one, but big enough to bushhog 4 acres for sure. I would just make sure that the model you are looking at has a universal 3 point hitch so any catagory one accessory will fit. Most grey market dealers seem to located in shoreline states, which makes sense I guess because these tractors likely come off ships. A search engine should help locate some for you.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Last summer, I purchased a little under four acres of land. After the sticker shock of purchasing a new tractor sent my wife into orbit, a friend of mine talked me into purchasing the original estate tractor--a 1959 International Cub Lo-Boy (an offset, red one, not one of those yellow and white, garden tractor on steroids 154s.) I spent all of last fall and winter restoring this old small tractor. I even sent most of the sheet metal through an electrolytic rust-reduction process; so, that I would have a clean, smooth substrate on which to apply the new finish. I ended up with a very pretty antique tractor that was basically useless. Why? because the PTO spins backward at engine speed. Yes, I could have gone with a Hub City PTO Reverser/Reducer at $400.00, but my $1,500 dollar investment had already blossomed into a $3,200.00 investment, and I still needed to purchase a mower (if I did not purchase the PTO reverser/reducer, I was looking at ~$1,300.00 for a Woods 42CLH.) I said the heck with it, sold my Lo-Boy to my restoration buddy, and decided to get a compact diesel and just deal with my wife.

After a couple of months of looking at every used compact tractor that was being "sold by owner," I decided to bite the bullet and look on the dealer lots. Lets say that one stands a much better chance of getting a nice used Kubota from a dealer than from an individual, that is, unless the sale revolves around a death or divorce (i..e., people do not seem to get rid of good tractors unless they are trading up.) Kubota dealers in my area do not take beat Kubotas in trade (the reason why the owners of the beat ones are selling them through the papers.) This week I purchased a B6100HSE with 449 hours on it. I paid $4,800 for the tractor (which is about $800.00 more than the beat-up, gear-drive B6100s that were being sold by their owners), but it came with a five-foot belly mower, not a four-foot mower like most of the B5200 and B6100 tractors that were being sold by their owners. The guy who owned this tractor was so **** about its care that he even waxed the mower deck. The paint is like new, and there is not a single ding in the sheet metal, not even on the grass chute. It is about as close to new as one is going to get in a used a tractor. It was used to mow a postage stamp-sized suburban lawn (the guy who traded it in left his original bill of sale in the owner's manual, and his address is in one of those yuppie planned urban developments.)

In closing, I had just about given up on finding a nice, used, small Kubota that was not priced within a thousand or two of the original sticker price when I found this tractor (i.e., I was prepared to purchased a new one.) Granted, it is an older model, but tractors are designed to be used for lot longer than cars.