That's why I wondered, do I even need that extra power?
Right now, I want to get a snow pusher on the front maybe 7' or so and go from there.
(I have been plowing with a POS plow truck with a 7ft straight snowdogg for the past few years and it works ok, but the truck is literally falling apart, and everything is so rusty and rotted its near impossible to work on, its time for something new like last year)
But maybe a snow blower on the back of the tractor also. We get alot of snow up here and we are kind of on top of a mountain. (Asked above Im not exactly sure what our elevation is, how can I figure that out?) Size wise I have no idea...but when it snows here, it can really dump.
But with the plow truck, especially last year I had pile problems as the winter went on and with how our land is I cant go too far out in certain spots out as it dips down and then the truck gets stuck, especially at the end of our driveway. So to me a big plus is the tractors ability to either push or blow the snow out farther than I normally can plowing. Last year our piles got to 7 feet tall on some, about 9 feet on others. So I need something hefty to deal with that. I do the driveway, and a pretty big lot in front of our one building and off the the side of that building as well. The lot lines the road so I get lots of town plow dump off snow. So if I do also get a blower, its going to be working.
The other things we need it for are loading and unloading a few pallets from a semi maybe 2x a month, so a strong loader is a must. Weight of pallets 1000 lbs or less on average, but has been 1200 lbs. And I wouldnt mind a little wiggle room in there too so say up to 1500 lbs. This is also another reason why we landed on the NX4510 or NX5510, there is a video on youtube of a NX4510 lifting a 2000lb pallet off a truck. Sold me on that! We have a old fork lift but its a smooth small tire, so anything other than dry perfection and its basically worthless. My plan is to get rid of it once we have another solution here.
Other than that, we need to fix our driveway and lot, its kind of a mess. After a bad run in with a local contractor who did meh work, we just want to do it ourselves. So I need to rip up a tailings driveway and move that material over to the lot and smooth it out. After winter I'll get a load of run and crush for the driveway and have to spread that out too.
There is other various other things we have to do around here where the tractor will be very useful. But as it stands we only have about 3 acres here. But, we think of moving, alot, and will always want land, likely more. So hard to tell what the future uses for the tractor may be.
And thats where I debated 45 hp, or 55 hp. Seems like 45 hp would work fine to me. But I dont know, and I dont know what the future holds. And if we can swing it, it sounds like its safer to go for it than not and regret it later on.
I also had seriously thought of a skid steer also. But after looking at 3 of them, 2 were in need of repair, and the 3rd which had 1100 hrs, was much nicer but still was the price of a brand new tractor with 6 yr warranty. Plus, I realized I would much rather be in a cabbed tractor vs a enclosed skid... and I would much rather work on a tractor than a skid steer.