Dirt Moving I need a tractor - looking for suggestions

[DaBlue357]

Ok, so I've been lurking on this site for a few months trying to gather up some information on what kind of tractor I should buy. I bought an acre lot last summer and am planning on building on it this spring and I want to do the excavation/grading myself.

Now I have no experience with tractors and attachments and what I would need to do the job, so I'm looking for some help from you guys who are in the know. Here is the situation:

First, I need to put in a driveway about 80 feet long dropping about 20 feet vertically and on a 10% horizontal grade. I'm thinking I will excavate the high side of the driveway about 2-3 feet in places with the driveway being about 15 feet wide.

Second, I need to level the building site which is about a 60' x 40' area that I cleared last fall. It has a pretty even grade of about 20%, so I'm looking of excavating the high side about 5 feet.

The land isn't rocky, but I will involve digging up hundreds of roots of small saplings with the occasional larger tree root. I am in no hurry and would rather buy a smaller tractor that can do the job instead of getting a more expensive larger tractor that probably would be more efficient.

I'm not sure what attachments would do the job. Thanks for any suggestions!

 

[kevinj]

Ok, so I've been lurking on this site for a few months trying to gather up some information on what kind of tractor I should buy. I bought an acre lot last summer and am planning on building on it this spring and I want to do the excavation/grading myself.

Now I have no experience with tractors and attachments and what I would need to do the job, so I'm looking for some help from you guys who are in the know. Here is the situation:

First, I need to put in a driveway about 80 feet long dropping about 20 feet vertically and on a 10% horizontal grade. I'm thinking I will excavate the high side of the driveway about 2-3 feet in places with the driveway being about 15 feet wide.

Second, I need to level the building site which is about a 60' x 40' area that I cleared last fall. It has a pretty even grade of about 20%, so I'm looking of excavating the high side about 5 feet.

The land isn't rocky, but I will involve digging up hundreds of roots of small saplings with the occasional larger tree root. I am in no hurry and would rather buy a smaller tractor that can do the job instead of getting a more expensive larger tractor that probably would be more efficient.

I'm not sure what attachments would do the job. Thanks for any suggestions!

A tractor is not a bulldozer. I would hire the big work out and buy a small tractor for final landscaping and maintenance.

You could also rent a dozer or excavator if you wish to do it all yourself.

Chances are good that an experienced operator can do the job in half the time or less than you could.

 

[TDVT]

A tractor is not a bulldozer. I would hire the big work out and buy a small tractor for final landscaping and maintenance.

You could also rent a dozer or excavator if you wish to do it all yourself.

Chances are good that an experienced operator can do the job in half the time or less than you could.

I would have to agree. There is a learning curve with any machinery & an experienced guy could have those two things done pretty quickly with a site as you describe.

Renting would be my second suggestion also. I rented a small excavator a few years ago & was amazed at how much more I could get done (digging & trenching) than I could with a tractor. I had never run one before but got pretty competent after some practice & completed all that I had planned. I did a weekly rental which was pretty reasonable.

But don't rule out the tractor as there will be plenty of stuff to do after those two big jobs are complete.

 

[TripleR]

I have been operating tractors for a lot of years and we have them from 23 to 85 HP and my son and I are still working on a similar project often running two tractors at a time. It is hard to imagine how much dirt you will be moving.

I have to agree with the other advice given since you are starting from scratch with no tractor and no experience. The tractor needed to do the job is going to be bigger than the one needed to maintain your property.

Yes, you can do it with a small tractor; you could also do it with a shovel and wheelbarrow, but I wouldn't want to do it with either.

Here is one of several interesting threads.

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/attachments/195160-whats-best-attachment-leveling.html

 

[WM75Guy]

Price a dozer with a good operator. The amount of dirt you are going to move sounds like a pretty large job with a 1 or 2 yard bucket. When we bought our property I had about 2 acres of trees that the scrub was so thick you could not walk through it. There were lots of dead trees and fallen trees. I considered cleaning it out myself. I found a great company to come in and clean out under the trees. The dozer operator would stand up on his tracks and trim the trees with a chain saw to about a 10' height. He then pushed everything into two big piles to burn later after it dried out. Took him a day and a half, cost me $920. Would have taken me a month to do it on my days off. After seeing the size of trees he moved I realized I could not have done it with my 40 HP tractor. I still used my tractor and rake to clean up the small stuff afterwards.

 

[leveled]

really i have a d6 here and i cant imagine clearing what that thing can with my mx5100:thumbsup: but you will still have some fine work to do.:thumbsup:

 

[beeforty]

Depending on where you are, how are the powers in charge. In CA. with 10 and 20% slopes you can plan on having an engineer looking at your place. What is the ground water like? With a 5' cut you don't want a wet basement. If secluded you could do some rough work to be able to camp out and make it look like something was pre existing but be careful you don't do more harm than good.

 

[miramadar]

Since you're not in a hurry, I would have to disagree with some of the other posters here in that this may be a project that you want to do yourself instead of hiring it out to get it done quickly. Sure, a dozer would make light work of your project and could probably get the entire job done in 2 or 3 days. But if time isn't a pressing variable, and you really want and can afford to buy a tractor anyway, I'd say get a 25+ HP tractor with a front-end loader (FEL) and a box blade (one that is wider than the width of the tractor) and go to work! A box blade with scarifiers will do a great job on the saplings and smaller roots and is an awesome implement for grading roads and house seats (as well as a lot of other chores).

I built a house this past year and my tractor (w/ FEL and box blade) were indispensible...saved me thousands of dollars that I would have paid to have the work done. Sure, it took me longer being a relative novice (200+ hours of seat time) and doing the work in my "spare" time. But it was great fun learning (lots through trial and error) and I had a real sense of accomplishment getting tasks done. And if you do it yourself, you don't have to worry about someone else's shoddy work. :thumbsup:

You're doing the right thing by starting your reasearch here. If you want to learn to use a box blade, there are plenty of resources here on the ins and outs. A pro on this site is "3RRL". Do a search of his posts on the box blade and you'll learn volumes! I did. This guy can do nearly anything he wants with his box blade...and he has pics to prove it!

If you do end up deciding to purchase a tractor, go for one that's heavy. There's no substitute for weight when engaging dirt. My Kioti weighs in at about 4400#(counting the FEL, BB and loaded rear wheels), and is a bit heavier than most other 28HP tractors. And you'll need R4 or Ag tires. The drawback here is that a heavy tractor (especially w/ Ag tires) eats up the lawn if you plan to use it for mowing.

Good luck and happy tractoring!!!

 

[Usta]

I was in similar shoes. No tractor and I had zero experience with tractors before I bought in 2008. I talked to my local Kubota salesman and told him what I wanted to accomplish. Play in the dirt, move snow, and mow the lawn. I believe he treated me right and sold me the perfect machine. (I told him I did not need a backhoe.)
I have put in close to 400 tractor metered hours on my Kubota BX2660 of fun digging and leveling in my back yard. The entire area in the first photo is now lawn and almost level.
16 plus thousand dollars for the tractor and attachments compared to the cost of hiring 2 days work of a large dozer. Cost effective? NO WAY! Worth the fun of peking at it myself? YES!

As stated from others, I recommend you don't buy bigger than you will want for lawn mowing and maintenance later.

 

[cdaigle430]

Ok, so I've been lurking on this site for a few months trying to gather up some information on what kind of tractor I should buy. I bought an acre lot last summer and am planning on building on it this spring and I want to do the excavation/grading myself.

Now I have no experience with tractors and attachments and what I would need to do the job, so I'm looking for some help from you guys who are in the know. Here is the situation:

First, I need to put in a driveway about 80 feet long dropping about 20 feet vertically and on a 10% horizontal grade. I'm thinking I will excavate the high side of the driveway about 2-3 feet in places with the driveway being about 15 feet wide.

Second, I need to level the building site which is about a 60' x 40' area that I cleared last fall. It has a pretty even grade of about 20%, so I'm looking of excavating the high side about 5 feet.

The land isn't rocky, but I will involve digging up hundreds of roots of small saplings with the occasional larger tree root. I am in no hurry and would rather buy a smaller tractor that can do the job instead of getting a more expensive larger tractor that probably would be more efficient.

I'm not sure what attachments would do the job. Thanks for any suggestions!

Getting a tractor is easy, its the accessories and attachments that suck. I want a Curtis cab, box blade, mmm, and a rear mount snowthrower. It's gonna cost me almost as much as the tractor

Alot depends on the time you have available and your wallet. I have some time and a low cash flow so the best thing for me was to finance a tractor and pay a couple hundred a month at 0% financing. That way I could take my time and not go broke. If you hire someone to come in your talking a 2-3 thousand dollar bill righht off-THATS A WHOLE YEAR OF TRACTOR PAYMENTS!!!. If you bought a tractor you'd be one year closer to paying it off.

Same as renting-typicaly you'll pay 400-800 or more a week plus fuel/delivery. Most of the time in the machine will be a learning experience-money wasted.

Tractor like the SCUT and CUT models will cut, doze, plow, lift, dig, blow, chip or just about anything you can think of-and you will own it after several years. Equity-if your tractor is running good after your done it will have equity in it.

 

[flusher]

Ok, so I've been lurking on this site for a few months trying to gather up some information on what kind of tractor I should buy. I bought an acre lot last summer and am planning on building on it this spring and I want to do the excavation/grading myself.

Now I have no experience with tractors and attachments and what I would need to do the job, so I'm looking for some help from you guys who are in the know. Here is the situation:

First, I need to put in a driveway about 80 feet long dropping about 20 feet vertically and on a 10% horizontal grade. I'm thinking I will excavate the high side of the driveway about 2-3 feet in places with the driveway being about 15 feet wide.

Second, I need to level the building site which is about a 60' x 40' area that I cleared last fall. It has a pretty even grade of about 20%, so I'm looking of excavating the high side about 5 feet.

The land isn't rocky, but I will involve digging up hundreds of roots of small saplings with the occasional larger tree root. I am in no hurry and would rather buy a smaller tractor that can do the job instead of getting a more expensive larger tractor that probably would be more efficient.

I'm not sure what attachments would do the job. Thanks for any suggestions!

What's your budget for the tractor? For the implements?

 

[csholler]

If your not in a hurry then I say have fun with it. I agree that if the ground is very hard all, you may have to have at least a backhoe for excavating. A backhoe attachment will go a long way for breaking up dirt and dealing with the tree roots. It is completely possible with a small tractor and a backhoe attachment. It just depends on the amount of time you have to put in the project. So Enjoy!

 

[banjodunn]

G'day if you are not in a hurry for a tractor as such and seeing you have got alot of earthworks to do for a start why not a cheap loader/backhoe ( the industrial type) far better suited to what you need to do for a start and then after all the heavy work is done it is a good trade on a new smaller machine


Jon

 

[Ford tractor]

Unless you are going to buy an inexpensive larger tractor to do the initial dirt work then sell it for a smaller one to maintain the property, I don't see it working out. Now, if you hire a dozer to rough the road in and the pad for the house, then use a small tractor to finish it up, that might make sense. Then again, you can work at it for months and spend lots of hours and fuel only to need to hire a pro to fix it. Its very easy to bugger up grade work and real hard to get it right.

 

[DaBlue357]

Thanks for the replies... this really helps me decide.

I do have all the time I need to get it done and I want to build as much equity in this house as I can, so I'm leaning towards doing it myself.

Right now I have my eye on the Kubota BX25 but I'm worried as many of you have pointed out that it just doesn't have the power to do the job. Time I have, but I don't want to try to take out an elephant with a pea shooter.

But then again many of you have had success doing exactly this...

I think I'll price out the work for the heavy lifting and if its reasonable it might be worth it and finish the job with a BX25 type of tractor.

I appreciate the help guys...

 

[bp fick]

Get that mountain moved by hiring a dozer. Done. Five feet?!?!? Please!!!
Otherwise, you're moving the beach using a teaspoon.

Then, your tractor decision will be based on your remaining chores and will come into focus so much better. There will still be lots and lots of work to do after the dozer is done, but you'll be well suited to deal with it.

You know what is the right thing to do here. Enjoy your new place and your tractor shopping.

 

[Baby Grand]

1) Figure out what model you think might get the work done in a reasonable time.
2) See what the same model goes for, used, with a few hundred hours on it.
3) 1-2-(taxes+maintenance) = approximate cost if you buy the machine, do the work then sell it.
My father in law did this frequently and turned 30 acres of trashy, damp second grown woodland into a beautiful setting for his house, complete with 2 big ponds over a period of 5 or 6 years.
4) Are you excavating a full basement or just a pad? If digging deep, drill a few bore holes to make sure you're not sitting on top of ledge.
5) Will you have town sewer or septic? If sewer, plan accordingly = perc test.

 

[Ford tractor]

5) Will you have town sewer or septic? If sewer, plan accordingly = perc test.

??

Perc test is only needed if septic tank will be used. At least around here...

 

[Baby Grand]

??

Perc test is only needed if septic tank will be used. At least around here...

Doh! I see I got that backwards - should have read if septic then perc test.

 

[miramadar]

Get that mountain moved by hiring a dozer. Done. Five feet?!?!? Please!!!
Otherwise, you're moving the beach using a teaspoon.

If there isn't bedrock, 5 feet isn't that hard with a medium-sized tractor and box blade. I took the grade down around my house about 3 feet this summer with no real problem at all. If I had the scarifiers fully down the whole time, I really could have dug down. I didn't hit bedrock.

As an earlier poster mentioned, getting some sort of core sample done is necessary if you're going to dig down 5'. If you hit bedrock, your tractor isn't going to do the job...but neither is a dozer. You'll have to get a jackhammer to bust it up.