Tractor Sizing Tractor Recommendation - 10 acres, mountains, VERY steep driveway

[jeff9366]

JENKINSPH is much more of a tractor authority than I.

 

[dadster4]

You seem to be in the same position I was when I moved to TN (just north of you in the Cherokee Nat'l Forest) three years ago...1/2 mile gravel drive with 2/3's being an 18% grade. Bought a new 4wd F-150 first, then a Honda Foreman ATV and small cart for hauling wood, woodchips, and debris, but also great for getting the mail, riding trails, and visiting neighbors, then my tractor for the same reasons as you. Any less than 35 HP and you will not be able to pull a full 5' boxblade uphill, mine struggled the first few times through until I removed most bigger rocks buried just under the gravel. I am at 2400 feet elevation and snow is only a problem a few days a year, I don't think a plow is even necessary, if it snows so much that you can't get down, then the roads are probably too dangerous to travel on anyway, ask a neighbor what they have experienced in the past. I set up a firewood processing area where I can drag trees to, cut into logs, use a standalone splitter, and stack on pallets. I used to load the cart and use the ATV to bring logs up to the cabin, but it took several trips every few days, and required too much handling. Now I bring up a loaded pallet with the tractor (forks)...no more lifting...SSQA makes easy work of switching from bucket to forks. Reedy Creek Equipment is very close to you and I highly recommend them, and Kioti.

 

[motownbrowne]

An l3800 HST with a FEL will be a very nice machine. Not as nice as a grand L, but if you've never used a grand L, then you won't know what you're missing .

You can definitely add wheel spacers to that size tractor (they actually use spacers on huge ag tractors for some applications). Does this tractor you're looking at have R4 (industrial) tires or R1 (ag) tires? Even on the basic Kubotas, at least from that generation, the ag tire/rim setup allows you to move the rears out to a pretty wide configuration. I think there's about 4 different positions possible. The owner's manual will detail these positions.

One good thing about a tractor like you're describing: unless you destroy it, or plumb wear it out (you'd really have to try hard to do this), it won't lose hardly any value.

 

[RalphVa]

I agree with Poopdeck. I sometimes wish I had a Ventrac on my property with its 100" drop down to the creek in the back.

Think smallest diesel you can get in it is 30 hp.

Ralph

 

[TripleR]

I really don't see how adding fluid to your rear tires causes added stress to your axles under normal operating conditions, many of us have fluid in addition to wheel weights. My dealer added both to my tractor and it really helps traction and stability. You might want to check with your dealer on how wide you can go worth spacers, I read some manufacturers who once recommended and offered them no longer do so, but I don't think it was Kubota, "seems" like some JD CUTs, worth checking.

 

[jeff9366]

Before considering wheel spacers, the rear tractor wheels should be spaced as wide as the factory design allows. The wheels will still be fully supported by the tractor axle through the wheel hubs.

Spacers are spacers; the tractor axle does not go through spacers. Axle does not support the spacers, spacers do not support the axle. Big stress on the spacers.

Below is a LINK to Bro-Tek in Canada.

Bro-Tek offers spacers for the L3800 but only 2" per side. You should not expect much additional stability from 4" wider total wheel spread on an L3800. Two inches per side is less than the difference between R1/ag tires and wider R4/industrial tires.

I speculate Bro-Teks's 2" limit has to do with stress on the unsupported spacers beyond Bro-Tek's control; re: filled tires and wheel weights.

LINK: Bro-Tek

LINK TO T-B-N THREADS ON BRO-TEK SPACERS: bro tek wheel spacers - Google Search

 

[zambien]

It's been a couple years and we just moved here permanently so here is an update and some questions.

First things first. I measured our driveway and the slope grade goes from 25% to 40%. The 40% grade is the last 50 feet or so at the very top. The rest of the grade is between 25 and 35% (no less than 25% at any point). The private road including the driveway is about 9/10 of a mile long. Our driveway (the steep part) is less than 1/10 of a mile. The rest of the private road is much less steep with a maximum grade of around 20% but mostly less than that. The driveway is steep enough that unless you have 4WD you cannot drive up it even when it is dry.

We ended up getting a Honda 4x4 ATV in 2016 and last year I put an 18 inch x 5 foot plow on it. We felt that was the better purchase prior to moving here as it can get us in and out and we use it to go to neighbors houses and other stuff. I use it to move my firewood around as well.

As far as plowing goes we had 2 feet a couple months ago over 24 hours. I had to put chains on all 4 ATV tires and I did plow twice. Once when a foot was down, then again when the next foot dropped. Took around 5 hours total. Having lived here through most of a winter and some of last winter we've learned that unless we get more than 6 inches of snow not to bother with plowing most of the private road. We just plow our driveway. Since it's gravel I never scrape all the way down so there is some ice/snow left over. We can get up and down just fine with the ATV or with our truck with chains. So what we do most of the time is park the truck or SUV at the bottom of the steep part and take the ATV up and down or if it is really cold put chains on the truck and take that up and down. I got the peerless auto-tightening chains for the truck so it only takes a few minutes to get them on.

With the snow, there have been a couple times where even with chains on my ATV I got a little too close to an edge of a hill and had to be very careful getting back to flat ground. I don't think I would want to use a tractor in the snow on my property. The rest of the private road is less steep.

Now we are seriously considering a tractor purchase but I'm concerned about the grade of my drive. I'm still considering a L3800 4wd hst filled rears with a fel and also a backhoe. There is a lot of maintenance that is necessary on our private road and I'll be solely responsible for it soon. I'll need to be able to:

* mow the grass on the road
* add and spread gravel for the road
* do other road maintenance... cut the hedges and such on the sides, take care of fallen trees, clean out drainage areas, etc.

The good news is we have an area at the bottom of our property that is before the steep driveway. It is a large enough area that I could put a carport and park my tractor there. But I'd like to be able to maintain my driveway as well. Right now what I think I'd do is load gravel from the FEL into my truck bed and then just take the truck up some gravel at a time to drop it. Question is, do you think with widened/extended tires and filled wheels I would be wise to try taking the tractor up my driveway? The grade is just up and down, it is pretty flat otherwise. If not, I can use my ATV and plow to spread the gravel.

Thanks!

 

[Garandman]

Bro Tek spacers for L3200 (same chassis as L3800). Surprisingly easy install.

Rear R4 with spacers installed. We did it for tire chain clearance.

Thread.

My similar starting thread.

Our driveway is only 750 and we usually have it plowed, but we Average 10 of snow per season and got 14 last year. We use the FEL bucket with Edge Tamers. We grooved the R4 for better snow traction, and recently got logging chains.

 

[cathy liebchen]

we used to do our own firewood, but it has gotten so cheap it makes much more sense to just have someone come dump the oak and hickory split in our driveway. It is $100 a full cord, seasoned and cut to whatever length we want. Then all we have to do is stack it in the barn

 

[dodge man]

Yes a tractor with 4 wheel drive will climb a steep hill.