SmallChange
Platinum Member
- Joined
- Apr 19, 2019
- Messages
- 728
- Tractor
- New Holland WM25 with 200LC front end loader, filled R4 tires 43X16.00-20 and 25X8.50-14 (had a Kubota B6200D with dozer and R1 tires)
There's a gas station with diesel 1.6 miles from the house and it's a beautiful clear day, great visibility, not a busy traffic time. So I decided to give roading a try. It felt very unnerving and I would up turning around just up the road.
The biggest surprise was that I can't go up a hill in top gear, and even a couple down from the top. That means I couldn't maintain even 10 mph. The tractor is 25 horsepower and 5,000 lbs. Unless I was doing something wrong, this simply means the power to weight ratio is extremely low relative to cars. I'd have figured it was lower of course, but didn't figure it was this much lower. There are two steep climbs on the way there, and one steep climb on the way back.
The other thing is that I take a little time to figure out what I'm doing, and the need to think fast on a public road is too critical. So I'm realizing driving it isn't going to be quite what I pictured, and it's threatening to stall on the hill, and I'm figuring out how to back it downhill into somebody's driveway to get out of people's way and turn around, and farting around with gearshifts and whatnot, when ALL my attention should be on the car right behind me and on whatever is about to crest the hill coming the other way. This is probably 500 feet from the end of my own driveway.
Unless I'm missing some major clue about how to do this, I think this means lugging the cans on my little rear hitch platform on the station wagon, and leaving the roading for people with much smoother experience and/or more powerful tractors.
The biggest surprise was that I can't go up a hill in top gear, and even a couple down from the top. That means I couldn't maintain even 10 mph. The tractor is 25 horsepower and 5,000 lbs. Unless I was doing something wrong, this simply means the power to weight ratio is extremely low relative to cars. I'd have figured it was lower of course, but didn't figure it was this much lower. There are two steep climbs on the way there, and one steep climb on the way back.
The other thing is that I take a little time to figure out what I'm doing, and the need to think fast on a public road is too critical. So I'm realizing driving it isn't going to be quite what I pictured, and it's threatening to stall on the hill, and I'm figuring out how to back it downhill into somebody's driveway to get out of people's way and turn around, and farting around with gearshifts and whatnot, when ALL my attention should be on the car right behind me and on whatever is about to crest the hill coming the other way. This is probably 500 feet from the end of my own driveway.
Unless I'm missing some major clue about how to do this, I think this means lugging the cans on my little rear hitch platform on the station wagon, and leaving the roading for people with much smoother experience and/or more powerful tractors.
