Buying Advice Which tractor? How much to pay?

[MossRoad]

Re: Quest for Wisdom -

Until you settle on a bare tractor weight, you will not be comparing apples-to-apples at different tractor dealerships.

And you shouldn't think about weight until you decide what tasks you want to do.

 

[teg]

...small enough to fit in tight spaces and powerful enough to pull logs, move large rocks and unload pallets off of trucks...

So how tight of a space, 5', 6' or seven feet (or smaller :shocked Also, the biggest deal (deciding factor) is how heavy are the Pallets!!! That will dictate a bunch of the rest of the stuff.

 

[jeff9366]

I live out in the country on 20 acres. I farm small fruit and have a large greenhouse for growing vegetables. Also, have a variety of animals.

My land is mountainous, so there are nearly no level spots. Absolutely have to have four wheel drive to get anywhere or do anything even on a dry summer day.

I need a tractor that is small enough to fit in tight spaces and powerful enough to pull logs, move large rocks and unload pallets off of trucks.

Budget wise I would like to stay under $30,000

How much do your "large" rocks weigh?

Do you need to move round hay bales, which can weight from 700 to 1,600 pounds?

What is the total weight of pallets you need to unload from trucks?

How long will the road be?
How much rain do you have annually in Spokane?

Have you had experience operating a Three Point Hitch tractor?

FEED US HARD DATA WE CAN WORK WITH.

 

[MacBlueBerry]

The pallets are between 500 to 2500 pounds.

I went by a Kubota dealership and looked at the size of the tractors. Most any size would be fine, the larger tractors would just require me to make some changes around the property.

So how tight of a space, 5', 6' or seven feet (or smaller :shocked Also, the biggest deal (deciding factor) is how heavy are the Pallets!!! That will dictate a bunch of the rest of the stuff.

 

[MacBlueBerry]

Also, I was just driving a neighbors tractor with a snow blower on it. It was not heavy enough to keep the tractor from getting stuck. Ended up just using a walk behind snowblower. So the weight of the tractor is definitely something I will be thinking more about.

 

[MacBlueBerry]

How much do your "large" rocks weigh?

Do you need to move round hay bales, which can weight from 700 to 1,600 pounds?

What is the total weight of pallets you need to unload from trucks?

How long will the road be?
How much rain do you have annually in Spokane?

Have you had experience operating a Three Point Hitch tractor?
.

RE: Rocks, I have no idea how much rocks weight. There are many rocks that just one rock would fill the entire loader bucket. How much would that weight, I have no clue.

The first road will be about 3000 feet. Total after all is done, I will have about a mile of my own road to maintenance.

How much rain? I'm not really sure what that has to do with tractors. However, my location gets a bit more precipitation that does the average Spokane area. Reason being is most of my property is on two sides of a mountain with a large stream running through it. Last winter there was about eight feet of snow total. Spring is difficult because there is flooding some years, and lots of mud. During the summer it is fairly dry. That is why I have to irrigate. So, need to be able to move large amounts of snow in the winter.

Yes, I do move hay. However I just hate those round bales. I know that many of my neighbors like them, but they also have 12000 head of cattle. When you have a few sheep, horse and a cow or two, those big bales are a pain in the butt. So I only use small bales of hay that a person can pick up.

 

[MacBlueBerry]

The HST transmission honestly frighten me. I envision lots of expense because of repair and maintenance. For my trucks I choose to only use manual transmissions. Every pickup I have had with an automatic transmission, I have had to replace and repair the transmission, transfer case etc. I would appreciate comments and suggestions, thoughts by anyone with experience with the different transmissions.

 

[MacBlueBerry]

Yes, I have a bit if experience running smaller tractors. Yes, I can fix my own stuff but, just am running out of time. Got so much stuff around here that needs to be repaired, I could spend a few years just fixing stuff. 20 acres

 

[4570Man]

Lifting 2500 pound pallets takes no slouch of a tractor. I don't like tractors that big. They're made for field work and aren't good for general maintenance or loader work at least IMO. A 4000 pound base tractor seems in line with most of your work IMO. HST transmissions have proved to be fairly reliable. Sure there's some junk skid steers laying around with bad drive motors, but they're usually old machines that were worn out anyway. You don't usually see shiny new machine with tons of life left with junked transmissions.

 

[bcp]

I think the lower limit on the tractor will be set by the need to safely handle 2500lb pallet loads. I'm guessing you will need near 3500lb loader lift capacity for the fork weight plus the pallets, with a safety margin.

Bruce