Buying Advice Starting to look for a tractor

[hammick]

The wife and I bought 38 acres of remote property in Carbon County, Montana. We put up a 2400 sq ft. barn with a small living quarters and hope to retire up there down the road. Property is at 5100 ft and is small sagebrush. Area is a very dry climate and ground is very rocky. We did 2x6 construction on slab rather than post frame because of the rock concern.

I would like to get a compact tractor with a loader and other attachments. I have a fair amount of landscaping to do and would like to move the rocks that are piled up from our foundation dig. Would like to scrape in a driveway that wold be approx. a mile long and spread gravel. A set of forks for lifting things including my 900lb diesel generator.

I would also like to use an auger for fence posts. Below are photos of some of my neighbor's holes that were hand dug/chipped. Each hole took an average of four hours. I also attach a photo of the foundation before concrete so you can see the soil/rock. I would really like to use a PTO driven auger but not sure any tractor could get through that rock.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I'll probably still get a tractor even if I have to figure out a different way to dig fence post holes.

Thanks.

 

[SARG]

The only opinion I can share from experience is to be cautious not to buy too small.
I did ....... and now I have two.

 

[hammick]

The only opinion I can share from experience is to be cautious not to buy too small.
I did ....... and now I have two.

Good advice. Forgot mention that there will be no farming activity. We may put a garden in down the road. I may also want to dig some trenches for electrical wiring.

 

[sea2summit]

I think a backhoe would serve you much better than a PHD in that type of soil.

I also went small and am on my 3rd tractor

 

[GrumpyJoe]

Lets start with this. What dealers are close to you?

 

[hammick]

Lets start with this. What dealers are close to you?

Not sure at this point. I have Billings, Montana and Cody, Wyoming as the two biggest cities/towns. I have heard of Yellowstone tractor in Belgrade, MT that does LS and TYM. And Billings Kubota. I have spoken with a guy at Big-Little Tractor - www.biglittletractor.com They do refurbed gray market tractors, mostly Yanimar. He was on vacation so we didn't get into drilling into rock.

 

[dickfoster]

Maybe it would be better to use metal posts and pound them in if digging is all that hard. Someone here made his own post driver that worked off the front end.

Thing to do is to read a lot here and shop for a good dealer, then buy what they sell. No matter what you buy if the support isn't good, you won't be happy with it. If you have a bit of trenching to do you want a backhoe but they aren't cheap. If the ground is uber hard then a ripper tooth for the hoe would be good, those aren't so much.

 

[Luke'sScreenName]

Seems like for what you mentioned so far a compact tract loader (skidsteer) might be a better choice.

Is all the "rock" compressed aggrigate like in your pictures?

 

[hammick]

Maybe it would be better to use metal posts and pound them in if digging is all that hard. Someone here made his own post driver that worked off the front end.

I will research driving metal posts. All I know is that I cannot get a piece of rebar or small stake in the ground with a hammer. Maybe I need a jackhammer followed by a normal PHD.

 

[hammick]

Seems like for what you mentioned so far a compact tract loader (skidsteer) might be a better choice.

Is all the "rock" compressed aggrigate like in your pictures?

I'm not sure on the rock conditions on the entire 38 acres yet. I know the people at lower elevation (closer to the highway and with power) don't have these issues. I believe they are glacial deposits but not sure. My builders said the labor for going post frame would likely exceed the cost of the foundation and slab.

One of my builders is a farmer/cattle guy with about 300 acres. He has some pretty big machines, including the loader that dug my foundation. I'll ask him what he thinks about digging fence post holes.

I'm guessing a loader on a compact tractor probably wouldn't get through the rock either for digging trenches.