Advantages of a gear/synchro over HST?

[kenstrac]

Just a clutch is cheap. If you need to replace half the sychros, a few bearings and lets say a scored counter shaft, the parts and labour add up really fast to the price of a drop in hydro unit.

I know you can replace parts of a hydro unit too but once metal flys around in one they are usually trouble forever after.

I might be wrong but doesn't a HST tractor have a range transmission that has gears in it,Can you pull a HST tractor to get it started?
If a gear tractor has a problem you normally have warning signals noise in the gears clutch starts to slip what happens in HST when all of a sudden it blows it's cookies.

I have owned many tractors and put a lot of hrs on them and I never put in a clutch or replaced gears in my own personal tractors.
The last clutch I replaced on my personal vehicle was a long time ago in my 1966 VW bug.

 

[slowzuki]

Hydro normally starts slipping when fluid is warm until it won't move when the fluid is warm. Too much leakage. They do have a range tranny too but the HST unit tends to be pretty easy on it and it doesn't have any sychcro's to wear out.

 

[patrick_g]

Reading through the entire thread I find a few conclusions. HST is not super expensive compared to gear over the life of the tractor. HST is far and away more convenient most of the time. There are a lot of ACCEPTED TRUTHS (AKA rural myths) about HST that are not the case with recent (less than 10 year old HST) and these include but are not limited to wastes a lot of power (typically a few percent), require you to have your foot on the HST pedal so you can't use cutting brakes which is pure BS, costs so very much more to repair, etc.

Seems that there are good reasons for having both styles available.

Seems that there is more than a little SOUR GRAPES on the part of gear tractor owners directed toward their HST cousins but not much animosity going the other way. (Go figure, is there a hidden religion here?)

Advantage of a geared tractor... A little less $ to buy but... ease of use and efficiency of working the tractor often reduces the usefulness of the geared unit in similar proportion to the $ savings so you still only get what you pay for not a BIG BARGAIN for every gear buyer.

I confess I have never owned a gear tractor. I have operated them though and most of the time (over 90%) I prefer the HST and never found a job that HST made harder or slower but plenty of things gears made harder and slower.

If you haven't operated a HST long enough to get really good with it I don't really personally value your opinion as it isn't likely based on actual fact. For those among us who can't walk and chew gum at the same time, maybe the HST IS TOO COMPLICATED for you to appreciate. Playing a violin well is harder than playing a triangle but more rewarding in the variety of its capabilities. Most of us have little or no trouble driving a stick shift or a gear tractor but may still find the HST to be superior for most of our needs.

This does not make gear owners wrong. There are plenty of ground engaging activities for which a gear tractor is just fine. Not everyone needs the flexibility and fine maneuverability of the HST and certainly some are real artists with a gear tractor raising its performance to near HST like handling.

I excuse myself from making unrealistic sweeping judgments (as some have made) that everyone should do what I do the way I do it because plenty folks don't want to do what I do and if they do they may not choose to do it the way I do it. This does not make them wrong. Of course I have yet to see an operator of a gear tractor in my size and power class who can maneuver around with FEL and box blade around a gravel or dirt pile filling a dump trailer or spreading dirt or gravel in a restricted space as well as I can. I'd gladly wager a rootbeer float against the beverage of their choice on the outcome of a contest. Of course not everyone wants to go at a job like a scared guy thrashing at snakes like I often do but the offer is there.

Pat

 

[MtnViewRanch]

Of course I have yet to see an operator of a gear tractor in my size and power class who can maneuver around with FEL and box blade around a gravel or dirt pile filling a dump trailer or spreading dirt or gravel in a restricted space as well as I can. I'd gladly wager a rootbeer float against the beverage of their choice on the outcome of a contest. Of course not everyone wants to go at a job like a scared guy thrashing at snakes like I often do but the offer is there.
Pat

Pat, If I had a geared tractor your size and lived closer, I would take you up on your offer, even up the wager to include a burger. I seriously doubt that I could even come close to your efficiency, I just want to see what a guy looks like working as if thrashing with snakes.

 

[Bedlam]

Question?

Does anyone have a HST that hasnt required any work on it for over 30 years? Most geared go that long without service.

 

[patrick_g]

Pat, If I had a geared tractor your size and lived closer, I would take you up on your offer, even up the wager to include a burger. I seriously doubt that I could even come close to your efficiency, I just want to see what a guy looks like working as if thrashing with snakes.

I often tend to make a game out of dull and or repetitive work trying to optimize the process, reduce the number of steps, or in the case of tractor ballet I try to reduce the number of direction changes, back and fills, etc while maximizing the throughput. Ram the dirt pile, hit full reverse on the HST pedal while whipping he wheel (sans suicide knob), and then whip the wheel the other way while hitting full forward, easing up to avoid ramming the dump trailer but getting really close, dumping quickly and then hitting reverse as the last of the dirt falls out of the bucket lowering the bucket while turning around to get the next bucket full. On the fly I try to decide if it is more efficient to make another shot at the pile if I didn't get a full bucket on the first try or better to take 1/2 or 2/3 to the trailer and get another without breaking the rhythm. I also try to park the dump trailer with respect to the dirt pile to optimize loading efficiency. Too close and you are cramped for space while too far and you waste time just traveling. Don't park with one side farther away from the main source of dirt as travel time will reduce your results per unit time.

You can get a bit of an aerobic workout (mostly upper body) doing this for a while. Then of course you get a breather driving the trailer to another location and dumping it which is fairly slow and then back to the tractor and dirt pile to repeat the above.

Once in a while I just poke along at "standard speed" like when I am pretty deep in a design problem and not able to commit full attention to tractoring.

The only time I was more active in the cab was when a carver bee got in with me and before I got a good look at it I thought it was a bumble bee. I grabbed my gloves and smacked the daylights out of the little moving target and then noticed it was a carver bee. I really don't know if they sting and didn't want to find out.

Full out maneuvers with round bales on the spike calls for a low position for the bale for stability when filling or emptying the hay barn. It gets a little comical like the Disney's Hippo ballerina on ice when the grass is lush and wet with dew but remains safe if you keep the weight low.

I probably wouldn't last so many hours in the cab if I didn't play the optimization game or otherwise enhance the experience.

Pat

 

[Reg]

I would take the challenge.
I think the challenge would be LESS interesting if it was hydro tractor vs gear tractor of SAME PRICE.
For MOST applications that I actually DO the higher horse power, greater weight and bigger implements would make it a DULL and uninteresting contest indeed.
I'm sure these is an obscure task that a hydro tractor could do "better" (more efficiently), but that advantage would be outweighed in just about every real world task that I actually DO.
I think pallet fork work has been quoted as "needing" hydro for precise stacking.
I don't do much of that, as long as I can get the pallets off the truck and place them more or less (within a foot) of where I want them, that is good enough.

\R
{Can chew gum, shift gears, use clutch lever, operate loader - ALL at the same time}

 

[patrick_g]

I would take the challenge.
I think the challenge would be LESS interesting if it was hydro tractor vs gear tractor of SAME PRICE.
For MOST applications that I actually DO the higher horse power, greater weight and bigger implements would make it a DULL and uninteresting contest indeed.
I'm sure these is an obscure task that a hydro tractor could do "better" (more efficiently), but that advantage would be outweighed in just about every real world task that I actually DO.
I think pallet fork work has been quoted as "needing" hydro for precise stacking.
I don't do much of that, as long as I can get the pallets off the truck and place them more or less (within a foot) of where I want them, that is good enough.

\R
{Can chew gum, shift gears, use clutch lever, operate loader - ALL at the same time}

I allow as to how gears fit some people just fine. If you are one then I have no problem with that. I get a bit dissapointed when either a gear head or a hydro head preaches that theirs is THE WAY and the other camp is stupid for several reasons which are typically not well thought out. Many of the combatants do not have credible experience operating the "other type" and are not really qualified to make their comments.

There are. of course, tasks where gears shine, others for HST, and those which don't matter much. Depends on the mix of your tasks what will work or work best for you. Also, what you are skilled on is likely to be what you are comfortable with and the "other type" may feel strange.

I can eat right or left handed with chopsticks just fine, faster than is needed or polite. I can also use a fork to great advantage. There are, of course, those who can use a fork just fine but are clumsy as a bear cub wearing boxing gloves trying to get at the honey using chopsticks and will blame the chopsticks.

Pat

 

[dex3361]

Question?

Does anyone have a HST that hasnt required any work on it for over 30 years? Most geared go that long without service.

If you want to count my Cub Cadet 129 that has worn out a very durable kohler K engine and the HST performed so well at the end of the motors life that I bought a new 16 HP K series engine (original engine was 12 HP) for it. The HST in the 129 is of similar design to the HST in most CUT sized tractors. It was refered to as a Swashplate Transmission at the time. It was made in 1973 and I think that makes it 36 years old and it is still used today. The only part on the tractor that has been absolutely trouble free is the HST.

 

[jimmyj]

I have an Allis Chalmers 616 HST (3 range) from the mid 1970's with a zillion hours on it that has never had a tranny issue.

I wonder if, 20 years from now when I read TBN, a thread will pop up HST vs Gear or R4's vs Ags and not solicit exactly the same responses.