I have not moved much dirt/gravel with my FEL. I did do a good amount of grading of my road this weekend with the box blade which went real well. I will eventually have a 500 foot driveway and I have 1200 feet of real road 400 feet or so that is shared. I'll likely end up maintaining the whole shabang. If you get a heavy enough box blade it should be able to grade the road without a problem. My box blade is a medium duty implement and weighs around 650 pounds or there abouts. I really wanted a heavy duty box blade that was around 1,000 pounds but it was a bit more money. I knew a light duty box blade I would destroy pretty quickly but the Dirt Dog seems like a good compromise. With as much driveway you have to maintain I would think you would need a t least a medium duty box blade.
Back to the FEL. The only thing my FEL has failed to do is lift a 24 inch pine stump that has a root ball 5 feet in diameter and is still attached to the ground. I don't think it would be fair to call that a failure!
On the other hand, the tractor and FEL has moved similar root balls by sliding them and lifting them around to get into a burn pile.
The 4n1 bucket has allowed me to grab pieces of timber that are 12-16 feet long and 20+ inches in diameter and move them anywhere I want. I'm just a wee bit happy with that!
You can ALMOST always take smaller load with the FEL if it can't handle the wieght. Just takes you more time. A bigger tractor, i.e., more money will do it in less time. Which do you have more of, time or money?
Which is more important to you?
Traction is pretty simple, wieght and MFWD. If you have an FEL you want MFWD. The only problem I have had with traction is trying to move the above mentioned stump/root ball. I don't have enough traction!
The thing to remember with a FEL with a load is to keep it close to the ground especially on uneven/hilly ground.
PLEASE be careful with the pond and banks. Rick aka TiltMeterMan lost a friend who rolled a tractor into a pond,
got pinned underwater and drowned. While is wife stood by helplessly. I forgot which thread had the story but it was ugly.... 8-(
The 3010 may be what you want if you only have to cut 1 inch saplings but the rotary cutter specifications will tell you how many PTO HP you need. And that is going to depend on the brand. The box blade specs will also tell you how much PTO horsepower is required as well.
I have a JD 4700. The Grand L 4610 is a pretty close comparison. The 4700 is just a bit better!
I have a bit more tractor than the 3010 so keep that in mine when looking at my examples.
I did notice that Grainger sells JD Green paint. Must be to paint those non green tractors!
Hope this Helps...
Dan NowDuckingAndRunningBackToDeereLand McCarty