Weight is bad

[TomOfTarsus]

My land is pretty much nothing but hills, and some pretty scary ones at that. I had the tires filled (per my 1999 Hew Holland manual) and it has helped. Purely from a mass and inertia standpoint it would appear to be better than cast iron, as the CG of the liquid is going to be slightly below the axle, whereas with weights it's right on the axle line. It'd depend on how your weights are mounted as to which (liquid or cast iron) is further outboard.

I likd the OP and it was great information. I'd love to haul around as little weight as possible, with my little 18 hp I don't have a lot to spare. But I really have no way to determine my F/R weight ratio. So I reckon I'll continue to go by "feel" and hope my pucker factor is calibrated properly.

 

[JSharp]

I was moving a lot of stuff with my 404 this weekend across soft ground and was wishing the rear tires weren't filled or maybe that they were R4's and not R1's . I had to go way out of my way on repeated trips to make sure I wasn't leaving ruts.

2 hours later I was moving some rock and needed all the traction I could get. There's no way I could have done it as easily without the weight of the filled tires. Sure, I could have done the same thing with iron weight but no way would I have removed it for the first job then re-installed it for the later work. Fighting 800 lbs of weight off and on doesn't seem like an enjoyable way to spend time and not every efficient if you have a bunch of small jobs to do.

There's cost and convenience with filled tires even if it might not be a perfect solution. How much does 800 lbs of CC cost vs iron and how much wider would the tractor be with the iron bolted to the wheels?

If nothing else it's proof there's no optimum that covers every job.

 

[Soundguy]

Good info.. really missleading title to the message though.

Weight in and of itself is not bad. Improper weight is detrimental. Not enough ballast is bad.. too much is bad.. IE.. the extremes.

soundguy

I just got out of a 4 hour class on weight and ballast. Thought I'd throw it up here for you all to chew on. It was run by New Holland, who is a middle of the road company when it comes to their own products weight.

The basic principle of this class was to dispel the old farmer myth that more weight is better. Todays modern tractors are built in a way that weight no longer is equal to durability. More often its the opposite. The basic consensus is that beyond a reasonable amount, weight is bad as it does nothing but burn fuel, wear tires, increase compaction, easier to get stuck, and make the tractor more sluggish.

Todays machines should be ballasted, not just heavy. For most of the work you see compacts doing a 35/65 F/R split is about right. Put too much on the rear and your front tires are not doing any work, have too much in the front and you start to fight the lead of the FWD. Neither are good. The work your doing changes this. Obviously loader work moves a lot of weight front, 3pt work pulls to the rear as the front end lifts.

The trend is towards doing work with as little weight as possible. They had a really interesting series of videos of tractors pulling cultivators and the difference that ballasting would make over even a short span. The most efficient machine out of the group happened to be the lightest machine without the duel tires and front weights we're used to seeing. Taking the same tractor and putting 2000lbs in the wrong place could skew things nearly 20%.

One thing I learned is that the liquid ballast that we often use in compacts is a huge detriment to traction. Changing a machine to iron weights improves ride and traction to the point that it can make a 10% difference in productivity. Field tractors are typically setup for 100-130lbs per PTO HP. Ideally you would want to be as light as your application will allow while being properly ballasted.

The first objection here is that you need weight for traction, however thats easy to overcome by lowering tire pressure providing that your machine is not setup go gosh darn heavy that the side walls can't take it. Modern tire designs and drive systems have made raw mass unneeded for most applications. They're putting 300Hp field tractors out at 5-6 psi. We spend good money for radial tires so they'll do this, but we don't put them to work. A bias ply is much cheaper if your not interested in running low PSI.

About the only application where you really want weight is when your working on hills (providing its all down low) and when you need to stop something like a bale wagon, manure tanker, etc.

thoughts?

 

[john_bud]

I think that the information presented is probably 100% correct.... for the ag tractors doing field work. That's what the presentation was for. There is probably still some information that is valuable to us utility users in there too. But, the benefit cost of cast iron weight vs tire fill is small for my uses -- so I don't worry about it.

It would be interesting to learn about the weight and balance for utility tractors and FEL tractors.

jb

 

[Matt_Jr]

This was a very good informative post. It's funny how we all pick apart all the good stuff we read here 'till we make it sound like (insert your own words here). I think what the OP wrote, or the info from NH is info we can take and use to help us load our tractors to fit our needs better.

I've got a BX 24 that I want to keep as light as possible for mowing but live on a hill so would like to load the tires, but in the winter I wouldn't want the traction loss of loaded tires even though I live on a hill. Basically what I'd like is a knob that makes the tires loaded when on hills and light when mowing or plowing snow. I'll just use my gravitational tipover sensor mounted to my rear and not load the tires.

By using this information and applying it to our needs we can become more efficient using our tractors. In theory this information applies to both, AG and SCUTS. You just have to use common sense and good judgement to add weight to your's so that it best suits your needs. Thanks MessickFarmEqu for the post.

 

[MessickFarmEqu]

Neil, that seminar sounds like it is directed more towards ag tractors than the compacts most of us have.

Yes it is. Loader work requires rear ballast... but not raw weight.

What was the name of this class (I'd like to ask my NH dealer about it)?

Its offered internaly for salespeople. They say the principles and calculators for this are headed to the website.

Yikes, you probably just made a lot of people mad, or at least uncomfortable with that statement.

Yea myself included. We use liquid religiously. They also say that it adds to the rolling resistance of the tire, where iron does not. I can't argue, beyond cost it seems iron is clearly better.

Good info.. really misleading title to the message though.

thats intentinal... gotta spark some interest!


Someone asked about balance for 2WD. That goes about 70/30 from what I remeber.

There are going to be applications that require differing setups. If you own a ballast box and some cast weights you should be able to setup your compact for whatever your doing. The point to drive home is that a few minutes of prep before you go out to work for the day can be more than made up though added productivity.

 

[SouthernX]

Basically what I'd like is a knob that makes the tires loaded when on hills and light when mowing or plowing snow. I'll just use my gravitational tipover sensor mounted to my rear and not load the tires.

Well, they make the next best thing to the "knob" that you wish for. It is called a ballast box. With my NH deluxe 3pt I can get a ballast box on / off in 5 minutes. The ballast box is a lot cheaper than filled tires and you get to control exactly how much extra weight you want. My ballast box when fully loaded comes in at about 2000lbs. Good thing is I can take it off when I don't need or want it. You can have your cake and eat it too (so to speak). For people with a "standard" fixed 3pt I can see where getting the ballast box on and off might be more of a pain though.

 

[N80]

I think the liquid ballast observations are the ones that are most surprising. The others intuitively make sense to me. It seems like the penalty of rolling resistance in utility and CU tractors is relatively inconsequencial. Fuel consumption is unlikey to be a big issue for those of use in the 50hp and under group or at least us weekend warriors. I'm not sure how restricted sidewall flex impacts typical CUT use. I'm guessing but I'd suspect that most CUTs do not come with or ever get radials anyway.

Ballast boxes have no appeal for me. They just tie up a spot for an implement. I keep a BB on the back and find it necessary to have something back there when doing loader work. But as often as not, I'll have a use for the BB during most loader tasks and a ballast box back there ruins that. But that's just me.

I'd love to have cast iron wheel weights. I don't remember how much they cost but I do remember that I almost had a stroke when I heard. I also think if I had them or could afford them.....I'd keep the liquid ballst too.

 

[ScottFarm]

Below is an article I found on tractor weight. It reads pretty good. All I know is from real world experience. The only tractor I really hear farmers complain about is the Kubota. I've seen Kubota's that seem to be too light for some simple front end loader work in my opinion. I've know a couple guys who have Kubota's that like them, but when asked what is their biggest complaint, it seems to be wheel slippage and too light for the bigger jobs. I know my tractor is about 1000lbs heavier than the comparable Kubota and there have been a few loader applications that I would have liked to have more weight.

Everyone says you can always add weight, but how much can you really add? Anyone have an idea?

G1235 Tractor Tire and Ballast Management, MU Extension

 

[N80]

I think it is a reasonable generalization that Kubotas are lighter tractors, especially when compared with a brand like Mahindra for instance.

But, I have found this to be more model dependant than brand dependant. I was recently comparing some utility and Ag sized Kubotas to their JD counterparts and several of the Kubotas were heavier than the comparable JD.

For many CUT users, lightness can be an advantage. A lot of these smaller machines are used on lawns and for landscaping. Also, in my case, I have a 45 hp Kubota that is quite light in my opinion (even though it is about the same as its JD counterpart the 990). I have the rears filled but no other wieght. I figure with the rears filled, loader on, BB on, it weighs around 5000 pounds. A trailer might weigh another 2000. That's pushing the 7500 pound limit of my '03 F150 SuperCrew with towing package. If this tractor weighed another 500-800 pounds, it could exceed the recommended towing weight of my truck. I wouldn't want that.

And I would agree that I can get the wheels to spin, but I'm not sure at what cost. None I think. It pulls whatever I've hooked to it. Carries its rated loader weight, etc etc. If I was plowing hundreds of acres and tire slippage cost me in fuel, it might be an issue. Otherwise, it has not restricted my activites and don't see it being an issue with most CUT users.

As for how much, I don't know but I think it is reasonable to assume that you can fill the rears, add the recommended cast iron wheel weights, as much weight as the 3 pt is rated at and as much weight as the front wieght rack is designed to hold plus a laoder full. Now, I can't see any reason for all that and as the OP mentions, where you put it and why is probably more important than your total amount.