Consumer Reports: Deere Tractor over Gravely ZTR?

Dargo · May 5, 2006

( CR, they are about as worthless as it comes.)

Yeah, I know what you mean. I should have taken your advice and gone completely against them in their recommendations. They said that the Yugo was the absolute worst vehicle they have ever tested and the reliability was awful. They said the same thing about the GM engines in the 80's that were converted from gas to diesel. I could have purchased hundreds of them because the price was so low on those units because the stupid people at Consumer Reports said that they were awful. Silly me! You make so much more sense saying that they (Consumer Reports) are as worthless as it comes. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif I'm sure your testing is vastly superior and you have considerably more than the mere tens of thousands of customer reports as to what models are troublesome and which ones are not. Please be sure to publish the results of your superior knowledge so we can all take advantage of your factual information rather than hearsay and people trying to justify buying junk because it was cheaper. /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

JeepOne · May 5, 2006

I agree. Consumer Reports is not credible. My experience is opposite what they recommend. Many years ago I took their recommendation, on several occasions, and was burned every time. Never again!!

RSKY · May 6, 2006

Mowed my 1.1 acres yesterday in 50 minutes! A new record. Reason was I mowed every part long ways instead of trying to make pretty stripes by angling across the yard.

One more small gripe about the Gravely. The tires on the drive wheels are small and have a non-agressive tread on them. This does affect traction when the grass is wet.

Gosh, I am looking for things to gripe about on this mower. I took it out of the building today so I could get to a cart stored behind it. My wife and I were working cleaning up the patios. Suddenly I heard the mower start up and the wife sailed by with a grin on her face and made a few laps around the house stopping a few times to spin around in circles.

Yep, I don't mow near as often.

AFCBlink · May 17, 2006

WHAT DID HE EVER DECIDE? Well, with all the advice I got on this forum, plus my gut feeling, I went with the Gravely. I bought a ZT1640 for $2995. I couldn't be more pleased. The time to cut my 1/2 acre has dropped by about 60-70%, and includes doing the trimming around trees and fences, plus push-mowing one very steep, tricky incline. I did mow that part once with the ZTR, but it meets a retaining wall at the bottom of it, and there's a 6' dropoff onto our driveway. The ZTR slid downhill a bit at one point, and it made me quite nervous, so I'll get out the push mower for that section. However, that doesn't make me at all unhappy with my purchase of the ZTR. I doubt a regular lawn tractor would have been any more secure on that slope.

AFCBlink · May 17, 2006

WHAT DID HE EVER DECIDE? Well, with all the advice I got on this forum, plus my gut feeling, I went with the Gravely. I bought a ZT1640 for $2995. I couldn't be more pleased. The time to cut my 1/2 acre has dropped by about 60-70%, and includes doing the trimming around trees and fences, plus push-mowing one very steep, tricky incline. I did mow that part once with the ZTR, but it meets a retaining wall at the bottom of it, and there's a 6' dropoff onto our driveway. The ZTR slid downhill a bit at one point, and it made me quite nervous, so I'll get out the push mower for that section. However, that doesn't make me at all unhappy with my purchase of the ZTR. I doubt a regular lawn tractor would have been any more secure on that slope.

LBrown59 · May 19, 2006

[quote

But you pay for time savings. If you have all the time in the world and place no value on it, then by all means go buy the little lawn tractor. But if you don't want to live in your tractor seat, and if your goal is to mow your yard in LESS THAN 1/3 the time you currently spend, then buy the ZTR.
)You will need the time saved with the ZTR to perform all those backbreaking tasks you have to do by hand because you don't have a tractor to do them with.

LBrown59 · May 19, 2006

[quote

But you pay for time savings. If you have all the time in the world and place no value on it, then by all means go buy the little lawn tractor. But if you don't want to live in your tractor seat, and if your goal is to mow your yard in LESS THAN 1/3 the time you currently spend, then buy the ZTR.
)You will need the time saved with the ZTR to perform all those backbreaking tasks you have to do by hand because you don't have a tractor to do them with.

rdln · May 19, 2006

Wow, you blew that one too Lbrown59, what backbreaking chores did you have taken care of by a little lawn tractor lately?

rdln · May 19, 2006

Wow, you blew that one too Lbrown59, what backbreaking chores did you have taken care of by a little lawn tractor lately?

rdln · May 19, 2006

And have you seen the televised version of Consumer Digest?

The call it ATV television.

rdln · May 19, 2006

And have you seen the televised version of Consumer Digest?

The call it ATV television.

Bird · Sep 18, 2006

Bird said:
( if someone tells you that Consumer Reports is bogus because it reports the brand they are selling as being repair prone, I'd find a different dealer because that dealer is flay lying to you )

Maybe, but not necessarily so, unless you know more details. Suppose I buy a car that goes back to dealer 5 times for repairs or recalls, such as my Windstar did. Everything worked fine, but they (1) added an additional ground strap for the rear air-conditioner, (2) checked the trailer wiring for corrosion and put an anti-corrosive coating on it (I don't have a trailer hitch), (3) replaced the cover over the windshield wiper motor (don't know why since it worked fine), (4) replaced the front floor mats (looked just like the originals to me), and (5) replaced a seat belt buckle (I don't know what the difference was from the original). Now suppose you buy a different brand and blow the engine, stranded on the freeway, etc. Now mine has a repair frequency of 5 and yours only has one. Who got the better car? Well Consumer Reports will probably say you did, and will for sure say you did if yours was a Toyota. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

I subscribed to Consumer Reports for awhile and dropped my subscription over 20 years ago when I realized what a waste of time it was. Well, recently they sent me an offer in the mail; one sample monthly magazine and two books and when you receive the bill, if you don't think it's worth it, to write "CANCEL" on the bill, return it, and keep the free books. I got the one magazine and the bill on the same day, and a note that the books were enroute. After reading last month's issue, I wrote "CANCEL" on the bill and returned it. Now a few days ago, I received the issue mentioned in this thread; still no sign of the books. And although I've read through the two issues, I don't even consider them worthwhile for recreational reading; much less to make a purchasing decision.

Well, it's been 4 months now and they're still dunning me trying to get me to pay for their magazine. I responded very promptly that after looking at one issue I was not interested and wrote "CANCEL" on the bill, as they instructed. However, they sent a new magazine, and a bill, every month for 4 months, and they continue to send me letters and bills, wanting me to pay $20 for a subscription. I continue to send them back with the bill marked "CANCEL" and a note telling them I DO NOT want their magazine and WILL NOT pay for it. They sure are persistent, so I've quit paying for postage and send their bills back "postage due".

And that's the kind of people who expect you to give any credibility to their opinions as to the quality of different products.

Hard · Sep 18, 2006

Are you ok bird? Something wrong with your clicking finger?? Take a break.

Dargo · Sep 19, 2006

Yeesh, that's gotta be a record; six posts in a row saying the same thing. Tell me it's some sort of a software glitch, and not Bird upping his post count by posting each post six times.

Bird says that CR is persistant, but I think he has them beat.

Bird · Sep 19, 2006

I sure don't need to up my count.

I have an idea what caused the problem, though where computers are concerned, I'm never sure. At any rate, it was unintentional and I think it was my fault.

So I removed some of them.

klm · Sep 19, 2006

Guess if you don't know better than to buy a YUGO or 350 GM gas/diesel maybe Consumer Reports could help. I quit takeing it years ago. I have had several new cars, trucks tractors and lawnmowers and they never contacted me for my maintenance history.

Fordlords · Sep 20, 2006

I subscibed to the Consumer Reports Online for a little while. It can be considered useful for researching a purchase to an extent, but I would not accept eveything they publish as gospel or use it as my main influence as to wheather or not I buy a certain product. I think many others agree to this too as not everyone on earth has a Toyota minivan in the garage and a John Deere in the shed

-Fordlords-

IslandTractor · Sep 28, 2006

I've never trusted Consumer Reports recommendations much but I agree with Dargo's point that the repair records they report are statistically derived from subscriber's reporting and useful. Whatever the weaknesses in that data are they are by far the least biased and generally available service data available to the general public. Bird's original example of taking his Windstar in to the shop 5 times for non critical or nonservice related issues would not actually bias the data against the Windstar as CR collects data by specific issues like steering problem, engine etc. They don't have a catagory for floor mats so things like that don't count.