Renting BH or buying a BH for my 990

[brandon07]

I recently bought a JD 990 and been doing some clean up work on my property where they clear cut and thinned some pines. Now I need to remove stumps and make about a 5 acre field. I was wondering if it would be easier to buy the BH for my 990 or Renting one and using it. Of course I am sure the one I rent will be larger and more powerful. The pines range anywhere from 8" to 12" diameter and the occasional larger one or two here and there. How powerful is the BH available for the 990? Is it capable of digging those stumps? I could use it for many other things after I get done with the stumps so it would be a definite plus. I just dont know whether or not its worth the wear and tear on my new machine versus renting a used BH and taking that route. Let me know your opinions/experiences.
Thanks Brandon

 

[Dutch445]

If you have a lot of those stumps, you may want to rent
a larger machine, or even rent a mini excavator. The 8B backhoe will do the job, although I think it will be very time consuming if you have a lot of stumps.
A couple days rent of a larger machine should be 800-1000, vs 7-8000 for a backhoe.
examples of breakout forces.. on the 8B,
boom and bucket breakout forces are roughly 2200/3300,
where on a 50D excavator they are 5400/8200...
even the 110 TLB has 3700/5700 lbs of force..
that could make a big difference in how much time you have
to spend on each stump..

 

[AKfish]

I've got a model 8A BH on my JD970. I put about 80 hours on the back seat this year trenching in a buried water line (~300 ft) 7' deep to avoid freezing for the horse corral waterer. I also buried the power line to the barn (3'deep) that ran about 350 feet from my shop. Given the delivery costs and hour-time for an excavator I figure that my 'hoe saved me somewhere between $1,500-$2,000 dollars this year. Had to knock down and dig up a fair number of trees this year, as well. We don't have real big trees in this part of Alaska -- a big, big Spruce will be 24"-30" in diameter. Cottonwoods can get considerably larger; but they're soft wood. The 8A did a fine job digging up the stumps that I removed. As mentioned, it's slower and you have to take your time tackling one side of the stump and then the next side until you've loosened the stump enough to yank it out. I have plans to clear another 5 acres or so in the next couple of years. Dozer time and excavator time would likely be several thousand for that work, too. For my needs, having a backhoe makes sense. The hoe will pay for itself ove the next couple of years and the JD hoes hold their resale value quite well, so if I decide to sell it after finishing my projects, I'll come out OK on that end. It really comes down to deciding if you have enough projects and available time that the $7-$8K investment will payoff. It does for me. (And I can go outside -- whenever the mood strikes -- and dig something up!) /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Oh, and my operator manual indicates that the bucket roll force is yup -- 3,200 lbs. But the bucket pry-out force is "in excess" of 6,000 lbs. If you don't watch what you're doing, it'll drag your tractor all over the yard! My 3 cents. AKfish

 

[gizmo]

I have removed probably 50 stumps with my 8B. Even the larger ones such as a 20" pine only required about 15-20 min. of digging. Stumps without tap roots come out fairly quick. I thought about renting a machine, but my problem was that I had never operated a BH before and I didn't want to learn on rental time. Although the cost was a bit steep, I have really found a number of uses for it now that I have it. I welded a chain hook onto the bucket plate and it makes a really handy crane.