djdowd said:
I'm wondering how many would look at the 2015 as a mowing solution for a 5 acre hilly parcel, or is this like hitting a fly with a sledge hammer?
Not uncommon, but I totally disagree with the others. And I'm not saying that a 2015 won't mow, I'm simply saying that for 5 acres of lawn, it is too small. Here is my justification:
At best you will get a 60" mower deck with that tractor, and if your grass is lush then you will have to drive very slow or only take partial width cuts. So the reality is that you might be better off with a 48" or 54" mower deck given the lack of PTO horsepower available from 20/21hp tractor. But it will take a very long time to mow 5 acres with a 48" to 60" mower deck on a tractor. A lot depends on your lawn conditions. 5 acres is a lot to mow with such a low horsepower tractor. I'd strongly recommend you look up the horsepower scale to something that will generate about 24 PTO horsepower/30 Gross horsepower. At that point you will have plenty of power to run a 72" mower deck through the thickest most lush lawns, and if you are in very arrid conditions or if you are in an area where lawns are very thin, then you'd even have the ability (under those conditions) to go up to a slightly larger deck if you wanted to push your tractor and reduce your cutting times.
Now if you really are not getting a FEL, then skip buying a traditional tractor and look at true mowing machines like a Steiner or a Ventrac. First they are designed for hills, something that a tractor is NOT designed to operate on. Secondly, they will mow at rates that are far faster than a traditional tractor because they are vastly more manuverable. I can do "figure 8's" and "U-turns" on some of my slopes with my Ventrac 3000 and I can do it on slopes where I will not take my Kubota or my New Holland, let alone try to turn them on those slopes. Further, when we were cutting our property with a New Holland and a Cub Cadet, it would take the better part of a day. The Ventrac shaved 90 minutes off our mowing time and it uses a smaller mowing deck (only 54") compared to 60 on the other two machines we mow with. BTW, we mow about 6 acres and we live where 2 ridge lines intersect so we have some pretty steep elevation drops.
It boils down to the right tool for the right job. I should also point out that an appropriate Ventrac or a Steiner is going to be smaller than the 2015, but it will mow faster. It will also have more horsepower to handle mowing up hills, and many tractors don't have the power to provide a good cut while climbing hills.
