What did you do on or to your LS Tractor today?

[Bearsixty7]

looking at that front axle I don't believe it would have made a bit of difference what type of tire he had on.
R1's might have dug a bit deeper a bit faster.

My experience is R1 tires work a lot better in muddy/soft terrain versus R4's. I think he would have had a chance getting out with R1's under power alone. I rented a TLB years ago and got stuck on not much more than wet grass in 4WD with R4's.

 

[sodamo]

Slightly different take on tires. I too, have lots of slopes. My two previous tractors had R4s vs R1s on current. Not only have I been stuck more with the R1’s but all too often I reach a point going upslope where I lose any traction and rather than digging in I just reverse and go back down. These are not severe slopes and majority of time make it up (mowing), but just the right amount of wet and the R1’s strip away any grass down to the slippery dirt. I can see where maybe in dry dirt they might be better, but for me and my conditions, not.

 

[Bearsixty7]

Slightly different take on tires. I too, have lots of slopes. My two previous tractors had R4s vs R1s on current. Not only have I been stuck more with the R1’s but all too often I reach a point going upslope where I lose any traction and rather than digging in I just reverse and go back down. These are not severe slopes and majority of time make it up (mowing), but just the right amount of wet and the R1’s strip away any grass down to the slippery dirt. I can see where maybe in dry dirt they might be better, but for me and my conditions, not.

Sounds like you have too much weight on the front and not enough on the back or ballast in the tires and possibly the rear tires are over inflated.

 

[sodamo]

Sounds like you have too much weight on the front and not enough on the back or ballast in the tires and possibly the rear tires are over inflated.

Sorry, nothing, not even bucket on the front, flail mower on the back, inflation proper last check, would be low if anything.

All I’m saying is type of tires just 1 variable in the mix. Funny thing is when I’d have a problem with the other tractors with R4s I’d ponder if maybe the R1s would do better. Not any more. 1st time I lost traction with R1s I was completely surprised as it was a place I’d never had a problem.

 

[Bearsixty7]

Sorry, nothing, not even bucket on the front, flail mower on the back, inflation proper last check, would be low if anything.

All I’m saying is type of tires just 1 variable in the mix. Funny thing is when I’d have a problem with the other tractors with R4s I’d ponder if maybe the R1s would do better. Not any more. 1st time I lost traction with R1s I was completely surprised as it was a place I’d never had a problem.

Very surprising results for sure. I have seen 2wd tractors with R1's go right through places you just wouldn't think they could and R4's just spin, slip or pack up and look like a racing slick in the simplest terrain.
Would be interesting to be there and see all the variables in play.

 

[ptsg]

You should see the R1 Radials. Can go even further than the R1 and provide better flotation. It's what people mainly use over here but they also do a lot of ground engagement tasks that require that kind of traction.

 

[LouNY]

It's been my experience that when you get into soft enough ground to were the front tires are over half their height in the mud,
and the rears are also in the soft stuff that you are not going to drive out of it regardless of the tires you have.
Especially when headed down a slope and needing to back up a slope to get out.
Also looking at his pictures the backhoe sub frame is still attached so he has very little ground clearance, start digging and chewing with R1's and he would have been high centered and really stuck
Oh, and most of my experience has been with R1 tires out of several thousands of hours I would say that less then a 100 have been on R4 equipped tractors.

 

[Diggin It]

Subframe stays on. It has never been off, don't know how to take it off and have no interest in doing so.

R4s are fine for their intent ... to handle heavier loads. They do squat for traction on most anything but dry ground.

And that's why I stopped trying. Didn't want to dig in deeper. I already had a couple of log chunks underneath and didn't want to try and move which might have caused damage to something. Once I got most of the pile moved by hand, I used the loader to lift the tractor so I could reach under and move those few pieces before trying to drive out. When everything was cleared, it drove downhill easily despite the low spots from trying to back out.

 

[Bearsixty7]

Finally got to disk the food plot this past Saturday. Both the disk with the 400lbs of suitcase weights added and the MT240 did great. I was cutting through a lot of the old brush that I brush hogged last summer so it did take a few passes. Once I started making the second pass I needed 4wd as the backs would slip a lot even with the diff lock engaged but with 4wd I couldn't see any slippage.

Even needed 4wd pulling the lime cart in the freshly disked dirt.

My food plot is a strip about 30-40' wide by 150 yards long between trees so I'm doing an experiment and only disked up 3 strips and left 2 undisked so I want to see how it does.

 

[Avenger]

Sounds fun!! Still a bit wet/muddy here. I still have snow in places.

But I did get out on the tractor this weekend. Unfortunately, my neighbor that I share a driveway with passed away this last week due to a stroke. The medics couldn't get up the driveway due to the mud and ruts. They had to park on the county road (blocking traffic) and in my portion of the driveway. His portion of the driveway is significantly longer and steeper than my, first, part. My (other) neighbor took this photo for me.

That's my driveway they are parked at.

My neighbor's sons, the one who passed, contacted me to inform me that their father had passed. During that conversation, they asked if they could use a pile of dirt (that wasnt dirt, it was snow that had dirt covering it) to fix the driveway since they will be going up and down frequently over the next several days/weeks. They were planning on using their fathers small Mahindra tractor.
The next morning, I offered my services to fix the driveway (they didnt get to it). I offered their father, several times, over the last several years to fix that driveway. He always declined, stating that he would get to it eventually.

So, Saturday morning, I hooked up to the box blade and started grating. I found HUGE canyons that ran down the middle and sides of the "road!" I thought my section, the first little bit of the main driveway was bad...

Washout that was at least 18 inches wide and twice as deep! I just kept going, moving dirt up hill and back down again. The road was very soft in some places (still a bit early to be doing this work), so I would go lightly over those spots. But in the end, I made it at least passable. Filled in the canyons, leveled the ruts, moved a lot of material.

I have a 'guy' coming out tonight, he owns a major landscaping company and does driveways, and is a friend/neighbor, to look at regrading and graveling the entire thing. Hopefully it wont be horribly expensive. But how can you not have emergency access for those first responders? It's worth whatever the price.

Anyway, thats what I did.