riptides
Super Member
With three acres, I'd rent out equipment to clear and stack, then rethink what you plan on doing with the property. A smaller tractor could suffice for any remaining projects.
Yes, I would typically say so.Is raising crops still part of "homesteading? That's a lot of work.
Excellent information and reasoning passed on thank you. More and more I am going away from the bh, big expense and do not believe it will pay for itself. With other attachments I can most certainly compile what needs excavation. Working around it with what i have, tractor,loader, root grapple and rent a ditch witch. Think I am picking Kioti ck 2620. Cheaper by more than 10k over jd and can do more by a lot over the jd. About 8k cheaper than kub and i have 5 dealers within 100 miles of me. I have done a bit of shopping around, in person and internet. A less expensive machine that out preforms the other major brands sounds like a company actually doing something for the consumer. Not taking advantage like green and orange do.Unless you really plan to use that back hoe a lot; I wouldn't spend the $6500-8000 for it. It seems most other people disagree with me on that. I would save the BH budget, let the actual hoe jobs pile up a bit and rent a mini. A JD-35 mini will do approx 5-10 times the work in the same time as a CUT with a back hoe. If you let 8 hours or so worth of hoeing build up, and rent a machine for a single day; that's like $650. You could easily do that 10 times for the price of the less good CUT BH.
Nothing you described implies you need more than a larger model 25hp machine, which can be had with a loader, 3 range HST, for around $21,500-24,000 from Kioti/TYM/LS/Massey. If you got $25-30k for machine; you can add Kubota L2501 or JD of similar size. Locally, for some reason, compact Mahindras costs are on par with Kubota?
Nothing wrong with getting a grapple, but if money is tight, you might be able to get by with just forks?
Nothing you mentioned really needs high PTO HP, so loader capacity sounds like a key comparison point.
Pay for itself? No.Excellent information and reasoning passed on thank you. More and more I am going away from the bh, big expense and do not believe it will pay for itself. With other attachments I can most certainly compile what needs excavation. Working around it with what i have, tractor,loader, root grapple and rent a ditch witch. Think I am picking Kioti ck 2620. Cheaper by more than 10k over jd and can do more by a lot over the jd. About 8k cheaper than kub and i have 5 dealers within 100 miles of me. I have done a bit of shopping around, in person and internet. A less expensive machine that out preforms the other major brands sounds like a company actually doing something for the consumer. Not taking advantage like green and orange do.