mo1
Platinum Member
I will shortly be moving to about a dozen-acre piece of property with about an acre of "horsey" areas that need rough cut, eventually about two acres of mowed-weeds lawn, a good-sized garden I'll till with a borrowed 3 pt tiller and the rest is trees, some of which I might clear out. I got a lot of good advice about what kind of a tractor to get on a previous thread and I thank you all for the input. The one question I came up with that I can't really find an answer to despite lots of searching on TBN is how heavy of a tractor is too heavy for finish mowing? The reason I ask is that the weight of compact 4wd tractors in the 25ish PTO HP range I am looking at range from about 1750 pounds (Kubota B series) to over 3000 pounds (Kioti CK series) for the tractor alone. I'll be getting R3s on whatever tractor I do buy as it will be required to do all of the tasks mentioned above and I'll not be doing any major ag work to require R1s. I'll preemptively strike and say a ZTR in addition to a tractor isn't an option for several very good reasons including my wife's input. I'll also be getting a loader and likely running a 72" rear finish mower as well, so add about 1000 pounds to the tractor weight. I'd probably leave the loader on to act as a counterweight to the mower on a tractor this little based on experience with larger tractors with heavier 3 pt implements. (I would scoop up a bucketful of dirt in the loader to counterweight a 3000 pound 3 pt field cultivator on a ~7000 pound 80 hp utility tractor to be able to still steer in turns when I raised the cultivator off the ground.)
So, how heavy of a tractor have you guys used and not had bad problems with lawn rutting or how heavy was "too heavy" for you for finish mowing? Mind you the lawn is mowed weeds right now and eventually I'd like to get that to "more grass than weeds" but it's never going to be a golf course-quality sodded lawn and I FULLY accept that. I also very well am aware of the "buy the next size up" advice based on my family's experience with tractors. My Dad "graduated" from a ~50 engine HP tractor to a 125 hp unit and went through another 80 hp unit somebody got a good deal on in the process. I want to know if buying that next size up is going to cause me any additional issues other than financial
So, how heavy of a tractor have you guys used and not had bad problems with lawn rutting or how heavy was "too heavy" for you for finish mowing? Mind you the lawn is mowed weeds right now and eventually I'd like to get that to "more grass than weeds" but it's never going to be a golf course-quality sodded lawn and I FULLY accept that. I also very well am aware of the "buy the next size up" advice based on my family's experience with tractors. My Dad "graduated" from a ~50 engine HP tractor to a 125 hp unit and went through another 80 hp unit somebody got a good deal on in the process. I want to know if buying that next size up is going to cause me any additional issues other than financial