A retired friend of mine, who is a highly experienced operator of anything yellow was clearing for his new two car garage. I offered him my mini-ex (JD15), which I have lent him before. He declined my offer, saying that his neighbour offered him the use of a tow behind backhoe. After using it for a couple of days, he told me all about it, and that he should have taken me up on my offer. But, he's retired, and has the time... He said it was ponderously slow digging with the tow behind, as it was a single pump, and lower powered engine. He said it worked, but was just really slow, and did not have much oompf.
I've been very fortunate to always have decent equipment to use, both four stick and two stick, but with enough power and commercial design to "flow" as you operate it. For those here who do not have hoe experience, particularly two stick, once you get "on" the machine, your mind operates the bucket, not your hands. I can watch my bucket dig a very satisfying trench, while seeing my hands moving the levers all over the place. What my hands are doing is entirely unimportant to me if the bucket is digging the trench I want.
A single pump, or two stage pump machine is unlikely to ever get to that level of operation. Yes, you may be command more than in function at a time (as I did on the four stick Case 580), but if the next function suddenly steals hydraulic flow/power from the one that's already moving, you'll be forever chasing it, compensating for discontinuity in motion.
Now, a small grader.. VERY satisfying! I built one out of my 1970 MF14 Garden tractor. A center blade on the hydraulic lift, which also had down pressure. It worked so well, several local landscapers hired me to finish some topsoil and driveway work for them. Sadly, the Kohler engine gave up, and the tractor moved on. It has been replaced by a 1920 Adams tow behind grader on the three point hitch, which also works great - but that's thread drift for another topic!
