Tractor Ownership, the true cost

[bluelou212]

Bluelou 212,
I am the OP. Have no clue how commercial enterprises apply to the thread. Only explanation is you read something I did not write.

Majorwager,
Perhaps I could have written my post differently. I was addressing what you called "true cost". For the DIY guy or hobbyist lost production time, higher operating costs, and the higher failure rates of old gear may not be so important.

 

[dragoneggs]

I enjoy fabricating or building stuff but I don’t like working on stuff.

Me too... but it is a necessary thing if you have stuff and want to take care of your stuff saving some money so you can buy more stuff that you have to take care of... now I need to build a bigger shop to hold my stuff. :laughing:

 

[BrokenTrack]

Broken Track
There is a difference between the cost a product being zero and deducting this expenditure from the net gain. Zero would apply if you installed your access road, with absolutely no investment. The "cost" was real. You calculate the labor investment, so yours and your wife's time is worth nothing. In that case I should hire you for my access road, you work for free. There was no wear and tear on the log wagon, no wear and tear on tractor to load, tractor or crawler to box out and spread and no fuel utilized. The gravel had no value, could not be used on any other project? You use the term Paid for itself, now that is accurate, the word zero, is not.

Honestly, I think it is this sort of perspective that is really killing America, and what it can be. What you are citing are not hidden costs at all, but rather imaginary costs.

The labor the wife and I put into the access road was indeed zero because there was no cost. We can arbitrarily assign our time a number, but any number given is not accurate, just justification for doing it. But we do work for free, all the time, we are farmers. We could take our gross earnings in a given year and deduct how many hours we worked to earn it, yet that number would be microscopic on a per hour basis. In fact most farmers would. But the reason we do that is because you are confused between assigning something a number and something called lifestyle. It probably is the reason why 1/2 a percent of this nation happens to feed the other 99-1/2%. If we calculated our costs as you are, we would all conclude we are losing money. The truth is, we are not, just because we are not making money, does not automatically mean we are losing it either, so the real question is, is it worth doing, and that does not need a dollar sign in front of it or not to be answered.

You are correct in that there was some fuel used, but not a lot...but to your credit some, but wear and tear I always have a problem with because time is the worst enemy of any equipment, the absolute worst thing a person can do to any piece of equipment is park it and not use it. Sure usage wears on the unit, but so does just parking it.

As for the gravel, that again was truly a zero cost because gravel is pretty resilient, all I did was move it from point A to B. It is still on my property, just not in a gravel pit, but spread out upon a road. Since it does not wear out, nor change, I could scrape it up and resell it if I wanted too. I cannot see for the life of me how that has a cost.

So in review, we have $50 spent in fuel for a $13,200 project, but that is not really accurate either because by your own strange rules, I can just say it was zero dollars because I had allocated $50 in the forestry budget for forestry operations that I never utilized. That extra fuel I used to build my road and was already in my overall farm budget.

I am not trying to be snarky here, I am just trying to show that when you get into numbers, it is very easy to manipulate them. We have to be careful of that.

 

[oosik]

Over my years I've been good at a selected scope of DIY projects. I built a log cabin, from scratch, in the wilds of Alaska. To this day it still stands and is in use. I built our house here in Ea WA in '82. I built all the furniture for both the cabin and the house.

When it comes to vehicles and associated equipment - I WILL buy what I need and seek advice and assistance if repairs are needed. I can do maintenance on most vehicles and equipment. Beyond that - repairs - I can not do and even more than that - I don't want to know how to. Its just not my bag. I have alway bought new and with careful and timely maintenance - repairs, over more than 60 years, have been extremely seldom.

As a well know man once said - - "A man's got to know his limitations".

 

[majorwager]

Broken Track

Members will either agree with your illogical position or NOT. I take one example. You were compensated monies by the government to construct a gravel path. You claim you still own the gravel, since the path was constructed on your land. At any time, you can remove the gravel, use it for an entirely different purpose, or sell it to someone else. How is it possible to have a legitimate discussion with someone who employs that type of illogical position?. As for the dishonesty aspect, it speaks for itself, Further you do not subscribe to any of the current "generally accepted accounting practices". In the USA you have the right to be misinformed,

 

[JimP]

Teaching you son to use a tractor safely and later watching him run it on his own - priceless!

 

[tomplum]

Honestly, I think it is this sort of perspective that is really killing America, and what it can be. What you are citing are not hidden costs at all, but rather imaginary costs.

The labor the wife and I put into the access road was indeed zero because there was no cost. We can arbitrarily assign our time a number, but any number given is not accurate, just justification for doing it. But we do work for free, all the time, we are farmers. We could take our gross earnings in a given year and deduct how many hours we worked to earn it, yet that number would be microscopic on a per hour basis. In fact most farmers would. But the reason we do that is because you are confused between assigning something a number and something called lifestyle. It probably is the reason why 1/2 a percent of this nation happens to feed the other 99-1/2%. If we calculated our costs as you are, we would all conclude we are losing money. The truth is, we are not, just because we are not making money, does not automatically mean we are losing it either, so the real question is, is it worth doing, and that does not need a dollar sign in front of it or not to be answered.

You are correct in that there was some fuel used, but not a lot...but to your credit some, but wear and tear I always have a problem with because time is the worst enemy of any equipment, the absolute worst thing a person can do to any piece of equipment is park it and not use it. Sure usage wears on the unit, but so does just parking it.

As for the gravel, that again was truly a zero cost because gravel is pretty resilient, all I did was move it from point A to B. It is still on my property, just not in a gravel pit, but spread out upon a road. Since it does not wear out, nor change, I could scrape it up and resell it if I wanted too. I cannot see for the life of me how that has a cost.

So in review, we have $50 spent in fuel for a $13,200 project, but that is not really accurate either because by your own strange rules, I can just say it was zero dollars because I had allocated $50 in the forestry budget for forestry operations that I never utilized. That extra fuel I used to build my road and was already in my overall farm budget.

I am not trying to be snarky here, I am just trying to show that when you get into numbers, it is very easy to manipulate them. We have to be careful of that.

This does seem rather ideallic and I don't believe that you are out of bounds with your statement. It sounds like you and your wife did a project together and the satisfaction was reward enough for you. Yet the next man might say well, I make 30$ an hour at the mill so if I can pay Joe's Grading to do it, I'm money ahead and I can spend my time doing X.

The "but" that comes with this when you amortize an item such as a tractor and implements or many business decisions for instance, you know that nothing lasts for ever and very little in this world is actually free. The land plane, blade etc. wears down and needs reinforcement or replacement as it is used up. It takes tools and supplies to do so. As what I think the OP was eluding to is how many of us do that or is that another pay for play expense. Tractors much the same. Production farmers know what their rigs cost per hour to run in their machines expected lifetime including maintenance, fuel, repairs, insurance.

 

[marchanna]

It's an interesting thing how different companies/individuals cost and budget these things.

I've spoken with a number of owner/operator truck drivers. It seems nowadays, they are not interested in doing whats best for their truck because they intend on replacing it every 5 years or less. They perform the minimum amount of work required to maintain their warranty and that's it. Now I'm not saying this is universal, but rather seems to be the growing trend - they are trading the cost of maintenance for the cost of depreciation. I think a lot of businesses run this way now, primarily because of predictability of outcome. Unfortunately, manufacturers seem to be hopping on the bandwagon and are only building equipment/trucks to operate reliably in the short term. It's a pretty wasteful model in my opinion. I prefer to keep things for a long time and be diligent in preventative maintenance and repairs. I do most of the work myself, and will farm it out when I either don't have time or the tools.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Sometimes analyzing the true cost of things can take the fun out of them. Like what one trip in your boat, snowmobile or RV REALLY costs. On the other hand, pretending the costs aren't there is a bit stupid. A friend buys old junk, puts lots of time and money into it and then sells it at a slight profit, and thinks himself ahead. He has owned a bunch of "junk" tractors that always fail to perform when he needs them, and he only has precious little time for such things. Yet, he thinks he has made money on all of them!

He is handy, has welders and tools, plus resources at his disposal. Yet, I think he would have been further ahead to buy a good slightly used tractor and get about doing what he wants to do. Even, if he had to borrow it. He is like so many people that have the money to endlessly piss away in small amounts, but claim they don't have the money for bigger, good stuff.

My city neighbor is like that too, having had a string of old, worn out tractors that never work when he has the little time to do something. He would be farther ahead with none, because at least they didn't tie up his time and frustrate him.

 

[marchanna]

Sometimes analyzing the true cost of things can take the fun out of them. Like what one trip in your boat or RV really costs. On the other hand, pretending the costs aren't there is a bit stupid. A friend buys old junk, puts lots of time and money into it and then sells it at a slight profit, and thinks himself ahead. He has owned a bunch of "junk" tractors that always fail to perform when he needs them, and he only has precious little time for such things. Yet, he thinks he has made money on all of them!

Agreed. Sometimes ignorance is bliss, other times it's bankruptcy.