Newbie trying to pick the right LS for our needs

[danisiri]

I don't know how you have chosen LS over all others but if your settled on them it just comes down to required features to do the work you have for it to do. Be sure to get enough horsepower and weight to run the largest equipment you need to run and haul any loaded wagon up hill and down with complete safety.
Excavating for ponds might be best done by an excavator so should not push you to the wrong model.
It might come down to how many of your seventy acres you need to till and plant and how big a tractor you need to accomplish that in a timely manner.
From what youv'e said a LS p7030 should do nicely.

LS seems to give the best value at a given price point compared to the mainstream brands. I can pickup a p7040cps for about $52K including loader, box blade, and shredder. Plus my Korean wife likes the idea of getting a Korean tractor, lol.

 

[vtsnowedin]

LS seems to give the best value at a given price point compared to the mainstream brands. I can pickup a p7040cps for about $52K including loader, box blade, and shredder. Plus my Korean wife likes the idea of getting a Korean tractor, lol.

A wife that likes the idea of you getting a new tractor, no matter where she or the tractor are from is a gift to be honored and cherished.

 

[GManBart]

As soon as you start talking baling, the P7040 sounds about right. One thing to consider is that with the right trailer, you Tundra could pull a P7040 without the FEL on it. The power shuttle is worth every penny over the standard shuttle! It's not quite as easy to use as a hydrostatic transmission, but definitely easy enough that anybody can learn to run one pretty efficiently.

 

[charles todd]

P7010C shuttle shift. P7040CPS power shuttle.

I have the P7010C on 50 acres. I also help my father hay on his 137 acres. $38.7k out the door. I think I made the right decision.

The P7010C will run a small round baler... Vermeer 504C and 504 H.

CT

 

[danisiri]

Well...I ran the math on baling in our area. It would cost me $25/bale to pay someone to bale. I can sell hay bales here for $30. So, a $5 profit per bale. Estimate about 180 bales per year - so only a $900 profit if I pay for all the bales. If I do shares (the best I found was someone would go 60/40 - so I get about 70 bales), I profit about $2100 and don't have to do the work nor invest in the baling equipment/supplies/maintenance. Or I could spend $10K on equipment and recoup those costs in 2-3 years. Rain has been so plentiful here, hay is super cheap.

So the question then becomes, do I try to future proof my tractor investment with the larger tractor now, or get a slightly smaller tractor and more implements, lol. Plus, maybe build a big barn to store it, hehe. Decisions...

 

[vtsnowedin]

Well...I ran the math on baling in our area. It would cost me $25/bale to pay someone to bale. I can sell hay bales here for $30. So, a $5 profit per bale. Estimate about 180 bales per year - so only a $900 profit if I pay for all the bales. If I do shares (the best I found was someone would go 60/40 - so I get about 70 bales), I profit about $2100 and don't have to do the work nor invest in the baling equipment/supplies/maintenance. Or I could spend $10K on equipment and recoup those costs in 2-3 years. Rain has been so plentiful here, hay is super cheap.

So the question then becomes, do I try to future proof my tractor investment with the larger tractor now, or get a slightly smaller tractor and more implements, lol. Plus, maybe build a big barn to store it, hehe. Decisions...

Oh now I see !! You are trying to make your tractor pay for itself! Don't see much of that around here.myself included.

 

[danisiri]

Oh now I see !! You are trying to make your tractor pay for itself! Don't see much of that around here.myself included.

Hahaha! Yeah, I can't help but calculate the ROI, plus it justifies some of the purchase to the wife.

Farming/ranching is my side business to eventually become my main business once it grows enough. Hopefully it doesn't become a cliche, where if you want to make a $1M in farming you just need to spend $10M, lol!

 

[vtsnowedin]

Hahaha! Yeah, I can't help but calculate the ROI, plus it justifies some of the purchase to the wife.

Farming/ranching is my side business to eventually become my main business once it grows enough. Hopefully it doesn't become a cliche, where if you want to make a $1M in farming you just need to spend $10M, lol!

Well the best thing on that is a good tractor will ,if kept in good repair, hold it's value as well as about anything else you can think of. I see twenty five year old 100 horse tractors being offered for close to their original purchase price regularly. The bad news is that twenty five years from now a loaf of bread will cost $15.00

 

[danisiri]

Well the best thing on that is a good tractor will ,if kept in good repair, hold it's value as well as about anything else you can think of. I see twenty five year old 100 horse tractors being offered for close to their original purchase price regularly. The bad news is that twenty five years from now a loaf of bread will cost $15.00

Haha! 25 years? Maybe less than ten...

 

[danisiri]

I have decided that for now, I will have someone do my hay. So that eliminates one reason for a big tractor.

I saw an interesting comment on another thread about HST versus a shuttle shift. The comment was that if you want everyone in the family to drive the tractor, HST is better. Sure, everyone can learn to drive the shuttle shift, but will they want to do so? Early on in my marriage, my old car died. So I decided I wanted a WRX. My only hesitation was that it was manual only, no automatic transmission. My wife can't drive stick. My wife assured me that I could teach her. So, we bought the car. For years I offered to teach her, but she refused to learn. In the end, I had to sell that car so she could buy what she needed for commuting. So, now thinking about tractors, I don't have high hopes that the wife will learn to drive the bigger tractors no matter how often she tells me that she will learn, lol.

If the P-series came in HST, I think I would not hesitate. But the largest HST tractor is the 4046. That might be too small.