YM1700 run a 5' tiller briefly?

[California]

I have an LMC 12-16. ... not as light as a lienback cheapo.

I have used a 5ft lienback and i could not pile enough weight on it and still pull it to make it cut deep.

Thanks. Ok there's my problem right there. A 'lienback cheapo' 5 footer came with the tractor. The seller told me he couldn't pull it on grassland, only in his soft flood-irrigated walnut orchard which was his primary application for the YM240 and this disc. I couldn't make it dig very much on grass with any ballast I could lift.

I later found a small Leinback (3.9ft?). Massive ballast on that one barely digs in. But it's a better match for the little YM186D so I use it to get into the odd corners etc where my neighbor's 'real' tractor (75hp) won't fit.

Photos:
Both discs
Little one with 350 lbs ballast
Cutting in around trees, YM186D and 4 ft disc. Note the trees to the left, beyond the 75hp tractor's turnaround lane. I will disc them next.

 

[clemsonfor]

Thanks. Ok there's my problem right there. A 'lienback cheapo' 5 footer came with the tractor. The seller told me he couldn't pull it on grassland, only in his soft flood-irrigated walnut orchard which was his primary application for the YM240 and this disc. I couldn't make it dig very much on grass with any ballast I could lift.

I later found a small Leinback (3.9ft?). Massive ballast on that one barely digs in. But it's a better match for the little YM186D so I use it to get into the odd corners etc where my neighbor's 'real' tractor (75hp) won't fit.

Photos:
Both discs
Little one with 350 lbs ballast
Cutting in around trees, YM186D and 4 ft disc. Note the trees to the left, beyond the 75hp tractor's turnaround lane. I will disc them next.

Yea, the 5 ft lienbach i pulled was to heavy that i could put a similar amount of ballest on it as my smaller disk but the 4 extra disks reduce the weight per disk i guess to a point were it dont cut as well. Dont get me wrong, im not saying mine is a premium brand. Its a small company i think in Al (i think) that makes them, its more on the light duty side but in my opinion its stronger built than the lienbach model (which i did look at at my dealer). He just could not get any in stock for me to buy and said that there was supply problems at that time and that lienbach was backordered. I said screw it and started looking on CL. I bought the one i got for either $200 or $250, i honestly cant remember im thinking i paid $200 though. The disks were all still sharp having the beveled edge still visible. He was a deer hunter that used it to disk between planted pines after the first thin with a ford 4000. He said he got it from an old guy who just used it to disk his garden.

 

[284 International]

The major issue I see with your plan is borrowing the neighbor's tiller. I hate borrowing or loaning stuff out. When you're using his tiller, and you hit the piece of rebar, buried concrete block, or whatever, and break something, he's stuck without his tiller, and you've broken his tool. Can you afford to replace it for him, or take time off to fix it correctly, or get a service shop to do it?

If you're tilling your garden, it's time for him to till his, too. As the loaner, he's in a bind, because he doesn't want to be a jerk, but it's not right for him to do without or have to pay for damages, either. I'm not wanting to preach or impose my views on anybody else, but borrowing things like that isn't worth it to me.

A 20x40 foot garden is no problem for your machine, pulling a 5 foot tiller. These tractors were designed to till, and have very low gearing as a result. Even if it's a heavy US built tiller, in 1st gear, low range and 540 PTO rpm, you'll be fine as long as it's not hard, unbroken soil. If it is, I'd figure out a way to break it up some. Rippers on a box blade work well, or what some people call a "middle buster" or potato plow. Take more passes, who cares? If the blades are good, any of the tillers I've used work the soil deeper than necessary for home gardening anyway, so you don't need to be able to power through soil with the box fully buried.

I'm not trying to start a flame war at all, but transit's remark about not planning sufficiently for your needs doesn't make sense. You don't need a 30 to 40 hp machine to prepare an 800 square foot garden. Your purposes, as I recall, are mostly slashing and driveway tending. Your machine will do fine for that, and kept a lot more money in your pockets, as well as giving you finer control and tighter access into any areas that you may not be able to get a larger machine. And there will always be times that you'll wish you had something bigger. There will also be times you wish you had something smaller.

My advice is decide if you want to borrow implements. If yes, go try it out and use it. Things will work fine, there's a learning curve no matter what. Take pictures so we can see things, then post them.

 

[clemsonfor]

If he has a garden make sure he uses it first for the reasons indicated by 284. And i also agree with 284 you dont need a ford 4000 t0 till your home garden. Acres and acres were tended over the past 50 years with an international cub tractor that has like 9 HP or so. You will be glad you this tractor instead of the bigger one when it comes time to fuel up, You can run at half throttle probably for what a 45 hp needs to idle.

 

[California]

You will be glad you have this tractor instead of the bigger one when it comes time to fuel up, You can run at half throttle probably for what a 45 hp needs to idle.

So true.

My neighbor with the 75hp New Holland and 8ft disc noticed the tiny 5.8 gallon fuel tank on my YM240.

"Don't you have to keep filling that thing all the time?"
"2~3 times to get through the summer."
"".
"One time I bought 20 gallons of biodiesel and used it at 90% blend, then 50%, and it took a year and a half to use it all up.
I don't think I've ever reached $100 for diesel in a year."
""

 

[Ginormous]

Good thoughts guys.

I'm hoping it works out to borrow my neighbor's tiller once a year to till and thank him with a case of good beer -- good = free right? :drink: I don't like the idea of spending ~$900 for something I will only use once a year. We shall see.

284 -- beware of flames. But seriously, my main uses for my little tractor are finish mowing 2 acres, rotary mowing 3 acres and the odd task like hauling brush or pushing some snow. I chose a Yanmar compact tractor for good reasons, not just because I liked the color.

Clemsonfor/California -- absolutely! One of the reasons I didn't get a larger tractor is fuel costs. My gas lawn tractor (48" cut) has 27 HP. After having it for a while I wished I hadn't gotten the biggest engine they had because it drinks up the gas pretty quick. There I go talking about drinking again! :drink:

 

[284 International]

I'm sometimes too verbose in my posts, I think, but I try to explain everything. Sometimes that has led to misunderstandings of my intentions. I don't know anything about Transit, but his remark(s) just didn't flow well with the type of questions a new tractor owner is asking. It's not personal, it's just a disagreement on point. I didn't mean to sound like I was attacking him.

For a couple acres of use, your machine is great. A big one will do it faster. It also won't reach places you can get with the smaller machine. As you've found, your riding mower will do some things much quicker than your tractor with a mower can. Mowing large areas fast probably isn't one, in spite of almost doubling the horsepower.

I wish I could afford a new 35 to 40 hp class machine with power steering, a hydrostatic drive or shuttle shift, new loader with a straight bucket, a backhoe, and a warranty. I can't. However, I do own a 46 PTO hp heavy diesel 464 International Harvester machine. For my 5 acre toy farm interspersed with cherry orchard, it's way too big. I can't get near the trees, because the huge tires hit the branches and would tear them off. Even with orchard wheel pants, there's just too much machine to disk up near the trees for weed abatement. One reason I got my first little Yanmar was to gain the ability to work around and under the trees, where larger tractors can't go. A 35 hp tractor would be too big as well, so I would still need a smaller machine to not have to go run a walk behind tiller around and under 40 trees.

My point is simply that one size doesn't fit all, and no person's needs are exactly like another. There are certainly tendencies and general guidelines, but having several small machines is actually easier and quicker for my uses than having one new, high quality bigger machine.

If you have a close enough relationship with your neighbor to make that sort of exchange, terrific, and I'm envious of you. As you said, it doesn't make sense to spend 900 bucks on something that you'll use possibly 20 times.

I've noticed that the little Yanmars do really well on fuel use, but my big IH diesel isn't worse. Obviously it burns more fuel disking heavily for 30 minutes than my YM2000, but it does much more work, too. At low or idle speeds fuel use seems comparable, for the work done. The brake specific fuel consumption (A measure of an engine's efficiency at turning fuel into power over time) seems to get better with larger engines versus smaller ones. They are all much more efficient than cheap gas engines in riding mowers or similar applications, in my experience.

 

[Pete Judd]

I have to agree with international, my (gone to tractor heaven) JD 324 18 hp gas riding mower would cost me around 7-13 gallons a week to do the mowing around the place. I can do the same weekly mowing with my 18 HP 186D on between .9-1.2 gal of diesel. And in the same amount of time. I don't have room for a larger tractor, and a larger tractor would not work around the fruit trees as well. Bigger is not always the best way to go.

 

[clemsonfor]

I have a free mower that a coworker could not get to run. I cleaned carb replaced fuel filter and it runs smoothly at operating speed but lulls and is uneven at idle (needs new carb, thanks to fuel sitting in it). It is a 15hp or 20, i cant even remember. It has no electric as we both made sure it was disconected and i jump start the starter to start it. But to cut an acre of lawn grass it uses about 1 gallon maybe a little more, my tractor to bushhog kneedeep to thigh hig grass uses a similar amout, where that lawnmower could not even think about cutting. But in the lawn that 42" cut will go faster than my tractor can pull the bushhog in the same area.

 

[deepNdirt]

all great explanations for uses and why tractors are built of different sizes,
same with mine,
Even though sometimes I use my tractor beyond its size and intended built purposes, there is one thing I don't think I would put my tractor through and that is using an over size over rated rotor tiller,
I have disk cut ground and pulled over large rocks some which could get tangled up in the tines of a rotor tiller, and i could only imagine the results if was only 17 hp, A rotor cutter ( bush Hog ) only uses the amount of HP needed to start it up then it uses its own momentum to keep it going which reliefs the strain on the engine & PTO.... Unlike using a tiller that is under constant need of power and rotation of the PTO and IMO by using an oversize tiller would put even more risk of tractor damage, and as mention the possibility of running hot etc,etc,
Yes our tractors are designed to run tillers, but just as they are different size tractors for different task so are they're implements for these size tractors,
Our PTO are rated to produce 17 hp some of these 5 ft tiller require 25-40 hp,
I'm not sure if this is measured at PTO or actual engine power, but either way its more than our tractors can produce at even its highest 17 hp rating,
a 4 ft tiller requires 20-30 hp and this is at the Max of our tractors...... Oh i got this information on the King-Kutter brand tillers, There are lighter duty built tiller to match up with the ratings of our size tractors,
You go ahead with using it and let us know how your tractor done, I'm sure it will be OK...... but do remember this.. the hours that register on your tractor under normal use will be double by the use of an over sized implement.... for example if you till for 1 hour of engine use it will be more like 2 hours on tractor wear & tear,