Buying Advice John Deere 950

[JimRB]

Tractor House is a good place to get pricing. http://www.tractorhouse.com/list/list.aspx?ETID=1&catid=1111&Manu=JOHN+DEERE&Mdltxt=870&mdlx=exact

 

[RoyJackson]

If maintained properly, 2400 hours on a Yanmar engine (which is what is in the 950 and most Deere CUTs) wouldn't bother me a bit. Problem, of course, is you don't know how the tractor was operated or maintained.
I'd go for the 990...it's a lot more tractor.

 

[PHPaul]

Hard to beat the x50 series. I have a 750 that I bought new in 1988 and I have worked the stuffings out of that thing, running a 5' bush hog, a 4' tiller and a Woods backhoe, among other things.

Other than the usual consumables, tires and batteries, I've put one alternator on it.

 

[Cherokee140]

My JD 950 overheats occasionally while mowing the pasture. Usually caused by debris in the screen in front of the radiator (thistle seeds are the worst). Usually I just stop the engine, pull the screen, remove the debris, replace the screen, and restart the engine. Usually within a minute or two the overheat light goes out and I can continue mowing. Sometimes cleaning the screen is not enough and I use my air compressor to blow out any debris that has become lodged in the radiator cooling fins.

I have a 650, the baby brother and it will overheat when mowing if you look at it sideways. It does not seem to matter if I use the belly mower or a 3point....it will still over heat if the temp is much above 80. Very difficult. Everyone has looked at it...I even took it to Deere and they could not figure it out....so it just gets little jobs.

As to parts.....be careful...some are just not available anymore, and I have found that John Deere really does not want to claim it telling me to go talk to Yanmar about parts....Yanmar telling me to talk to Deere. Getting some mule drive bearings was a supreme pain. Also had a damaged rear wheel....yup you guessed it, they don't make it anymore so I had to have one custom made to the tune of about $400.

Funny thing however when looking at new tractors it seems that the sales people tell me that the new 1series are all Deere, pretty funny but that stuck in my head and played no small part in my buying a Kubota.