Performance question on 4010

[trafford69]

Dutch,

Thanks for your response. I really appreciate the input from an experienced JD dealer.

Yes, this last year we had a lot of rain and between my job and other maintenance work, mowing every 10 to 14 days was the best I could do. My yard is 2" of topsoil over 30' of clay (info according to my well report from the driller and some personal experience). The water does not drain well to say the least, so for 2 or 3 days after a rain you cannot mow without ripping up the yard even with the turf tires. Fortunately with the poor soil, the grass does not grow as fast as it would in a typical yard because the soil becomes compacted very quickly from the tractor. I just bought an aerator this year to address that problem. I do not run anything else off the PTO. I'm not sure if the dealer did a dyno test on the tractor when they had it but I would be surprised if they didn't. I've never been really please with the mowing performance even though I clean the deck after every use and sharpen the blades at least twice a season.

My office is a very "green" one when it comes to tractors and they convinced me that green was much better than orange or blue, particularly when you look at mowing performance. I have pushed the FEL to its limit and the tractor has performed fantastically. The mowing performance has been sub-par at best. My dealer has been great to work with and they have been very helpful and understanding with this tractor rookie. If it wasn't for them and the guys at the office I would probably be a "blue" man right now.

This season I will try to mow on a weekly schedule and see what results I get. My dealer has told me that the replacements for the 4010/4110/4115 will be out next fall. If I am still not satisfied, perhaps I will take the opportunity to upgrade to one of the new JD compacts.

I really don't feel that anything I have asked the tractor to do in the way of mowing is really out of line but I am still disappointed compared to the performance I got from my very beat-up, used Cub. I do believe that I have really pushed the limits on the tractor's earth and stone moving capabilities but it has performed admirably. My dealer was stunned that I was able to fill my bucket completely with 2B gravel and not only lift it but carry it several hundred feet with no problem at all.

Perhaps I am just expecting too much from a very nice compact tractor due to my inexperience with tractors. I went from a 1/8 acre lot I could mow in 12 minutes with a hand mower to a 6.5 acre lot with 2+ acres of lawn. I never thought I would use let alone own a FEL. Now I'm just not sure my expectations are realistic. I am just very puzzled that this tractor performs its most difficult tasks so well and its easiest tasks somewhat poorly.

 

[keeney]

The hydraulics don't have much to do with mowing other than that the power steering and drive wheels take some of the power from the engine that you seem to want for the mower deck.

It sounds like you just want more power, period so as to be able to churn through heavy grass cutting at high speed. This is probably too much to ask for from an 18HP machine with a 54" deck.

For quality of cut reasons, I never cut in high range.

Maybe your Cub had more power than it claimed, a smaller deck, or had a slower ground speed?

The 2210 might be a better choice with its more powerful engine.

- Rick

 

[trafford69]

Ralph,

I moved the 2B gravel (0.75"-1.5" crushed limestone) with just the FEL. I was able to fill the bucket (54") completely. It was full enough that if I hit a bump it would spill some gravel. I ran it to the end of the driveway (about 850'). I had my backhoe operator cut me a trench down the length of the drive way that I then made into a French drain using the 100 tons of gravel. The bucket only seemed to strain when I tried to fill the bucket above the sides (heaping full). The tractor is equipped with a weight box loaded with 240lbs of sand. The tires are not filled. I had no problems with tipping but I did not take any sharp turns or do anything too stupid. I ran the loads only on the asphalt drive. I moved the 60 ton of soil when I did the repairs to my pond. The soil was a lot of clay and broken shale. Since the clay was wet, I was only able to fill the bucket about 3/4 full. If I tried to fill it all of the way, the tractor would begin to lift the rear end off the ground. The soil was in piles from what the hoe operator dug up to make my trench along the drive way. I used a 6' dump cart from Country Manufacturing of Ohio to move the soil. The cart is supposed to handle 1-ton of load but I managed to bend the frame on it and I had to have my brother weld some more steel on it to re-inforce it. I cannot see how you could expect better performance out of a 18hp tractor.

As I said before, if I could get just a little better performance on the grass cutting, me and the 4010 could grow old and gray together.

 

[trafford69]

Keeney,

Considering how I use the FEL, I could not go with the 2210 since it's FEL is lower rated.

I will have to start mowing at lower speeds and just get used to the idea of taking a little longer to mow. Right now it's taking me about 2 hours to mow my 2 acres since the four areas I mow are oddly shaped and somewhat separated from one another. I just hate to put too much time into lawn mowing since I have other things that need my time and the poor soil doesn't allow for too nice of a lawn anyway. I mean my lawn is green but it's not just grass that makes it green. I don't use much weed-n-feed since having green stuff out there is a big accomplishment and there's no point in getting real fussy about what's green.

If it gets to be too much of a burden, I can upgrade to one of the new compact tractors that come out this fall in the 24hp range depending on what the prices look like.

 

[creeper]

You mentioned the mechanic suspected a hydraulic problem.The relief pressure can be adjusted with in reason.
Most replies have not felt it could be hyd problem and probably have mixed feelings about adjusting relief pressure, but there are some threads on TBN that cover this. Just a thought , good luck with it.

 

[bigpete]

It is just too much to ask of even a more powerful mower to cut 6" of plump grass down to 3" in a high-speed, single, 4 1/2' pass. I would bet that even your old GT wouldn't do well with that--and I'm guessing it was not as large or heavy of a deck. I could be wrong, though.

I had a few weeks last summer when I could not seem to find time to mow except when it was raining. My grass reached 6" often and I knew I could not get a quality cut with one pass, so I always did it in two passes. The first pass cut it down to 4-4 1/2", and the second pass cut it down to 3 1/4 which is my preferred height. For my 4 +/- acres I can get a full pass done in 90 minutes. Sometimes I would simply cut two days in a row at decreasing height when it got that bad. Even the pros double cut with their high-tip-speed decks when their clients' lawns get over 4 1/2".

 

[JDFANATIC]

<font color="blue"> 2 hrs to mow 2 acres?</font> If a new tractor is not in the cards, and one can see how reluctant you might be to do this, you might want to consider modifying your landscaping to include more beds of woodchips or mulch so that the cutting time is reduced. Other than that, I would think the 54" deck wouldn't tax the 4010 that much. I used the same deck on my old 425 and it worked fine, though not nearly as well as the 2210/62C combo. The 425 was rated at 16 PTO hp. Perhaps for some reason your machine is not making full hp? /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[JDFANATIC]

Yipes,

Just did some checking, the 4010 is rated at 14 PTO hp! I remember that deck on my 425 and can't imagine less hp to run it with. Dutch probably nailed this just right; under even moderate conditions, /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gifthis is just too much demand for that level of power. Short of trading up, or down to the 2210, you may just have to slow everything down.

 

[keeney]

Are you mulching or side-discharging?

The blade choice on the deck can also make the HP requirements go up or down. High-lift blades are designed to help with bagging, but they move a lot more air, using even more power.

What aboput your mowing pattern? Are you frequently re-mowing the discharge?

I do agree that 14 HP for a 54" deck at high speed in overgrown grass is going to feel under-powered.

A rule of thumb I have heard for consumer residential lawn mowers is 2 to 3 HP for each foot of cutting width, but that is for walk-behind grass cutting speeds of 3 to 4 mph, and the recommended cutting-off of maybe an inch or so of grass per pass.

A high-end commercial mower will have a ratio of perhaps over 6 HP per foot of width and be designed for cutting speeds of maybe "up to" 10 MPH.

- Rick

 

[jd110]

Hi, I hope you can stand one more point of view on your situation. I am afraid that installing a larger pump would make matters worse. The larger the pump the more drain there is on horsepower. You are comparing similar horsepower engines, but when you consider the deere is probably carrying around three times the weight of the cub and also driving extra hydraulic pumps and a larger deck, there is no wonder you see a difference in power. Do you remove the loader when mowing? If not, you might try that because that would lighten the load by a couple hundred pound or so. The loaders come off so easily, I cant see why some people refuse to get them out of the way when not needed. You might also jack up the rear wheels and make sure the brakes aren't dragging. I have seen some brakes out of adjustment that cause alot of power loss. I hope some of this makes sense.