Gordon,
I have the MD 160 with stump jumper, slip clutch and chain guards on my 2910. I like it very much. Put about 50 hours of cutting on it last fall, mostly in very heavy, woody, multi-stemmed brush. Also lots of 10 foot high reed grass and cattails.
The litany of damage I did to my tractor in my brush cutting would fill a whole thread: just about every pin ripped out, FEL ripped off more than once, 3ph pins ripped out, draw bar pulled off, floor panels crushed upwards by logs, radiator grills speared by sharp sticks, flat tire, gas pedal wedged in forward and reverse by brush, etc., etc.
But the MD 160 survived and cut through it all with no damage. Yes, it is dented in the back where I constantly backed into trees, and it has one outward bulge in a side panel from a ferocious tussle with a steel fence post. (I don't think a light duty side panel would have survived.) But clearly the cutter was able to take significantly more abuse than the tractor could. Nothing broke on the cutter except the top link pin, which got pulled out and lost, like every other pin and clip.
I found that if I could drive over a woody thing the MD160 would cut it. Sometiimes I would drive over a multistemmed thing (say, 15 stems, each in in the 1" to 1 1/2" diameter range), and the tractor might be lifted 25 degrees off its front wheels, pointed skyward. I could keep powering forward until my raised cutter was over the bent stems, and would then lower the cutter on top of the bent over stems. (In these situations, I wished for a heavier tractor.) It might take several passes, but the cutter would cut down the whole clump. I really would recommend skid plate armor for this type of cutting, but fortunately I didnt rip off any of my hoses. I did this scores of times, maybe 100. I could not back over these clumps and I found that chain sawing them was much too time consuming. Also the stumps rot away faster when they are shattered than when they are saw cut.
This is the only cutter I have ever had so I dont have any personal experience with others. But I am very glad I got the medium duty, the slip clutch and the chain guards.
I have seen the newer Brush Bull, and the humped back to shed water does make sense, though I wouldnt pay a lot of money for the feature. I have no idea what the rounded back is supposed to do, except to stylistically match the Bush Hog, Landpride and other cutters that have gone to the round back. If you use it in the woods, it will inevitably end up all dented anyway.
I paid 20% off list, whatever that was. Use it with my Freedom Hitches, of course. Can't imagine struggling with 700 lbs. on a 3ph.
Finally, the Woods MD gets stuck in the mud just great. Had it on my tractor both times I got stuck and had to get towed out. Gets stuck particularly well when you go though the ice cutting cattails, and there is not only mud under the ice but a nice big boulder right under the cutter skirts.
Maybe you can get a good price deal on the older MD's now that they are being replaced.
Glenn
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by gordon on 05/29/01 09:57 PM (server time).</FONT></P>
