Help me understand the Bs (educate a city boy: what's the diff between 23/26/29 hp)

[newbury]

<snip>
- DIY pallet forks ( Homemade pallet forks for tractor on BX25 Kubota - YouTube )

Is there any other 'must have' implements I've missed?

I would highly recommend a set of 3pt hitch pallet forks, like

or some other "carry all" for the 3pt.

I slide a pallet on my rear forks and a large box and I've a carryall.

Generally your 3pt can carry more than your FEL.

 

[Fallon]

Go to http://www.everythingattachments.com and look up box blades & rear scrape blades. They have good videos too. A box blade is heavier, digs better & levels better. A back blade is better at scraping snow or other material to the side.

Generally I find a box blade more useful.

 

[TripleR]

What some consider a "luxury", others find if not a necessity a very, very useful feature. I have extendable and non extendable lower lift links, hooking up is much easier with extendable, same goes for adjustable stabilizer bars over turnbuckles, optional SSQA and then there is the quarter inching 3PH that you cannot "set and forget", I m sick of bumping them up all the time. My brother and I co-own several tractors and recently he went to buy a "retirement machine" he could trailer around for different jobs, after looking at the Kubotas, he bought a Kioti with all those "luxury" features and paid less for it.

Fortunately we all have different needs and someone makes just the right tractor for all of us, enjoy your new tractor. I have replaced the turnbuckles with stabilizer bars from Stabilworks (StabilWorks), well worth the money.

 

[JOHNTHOMAS]

I bought my first tractor about 10 years ago after purchasing 5 hillside acres on which I planned to build my own home. I bought a BX2200 FEL MMM from Barlows to be my life time mower with a high priced wheelbarrow on the front since there was no interest, no down payment and a long time to get it paid off.
My hillside acres has plenty of rocks, trees, red clay dirt, briars and some fescue field grass and a slight to deep gully or two.
The BX2200 MMM FEL did so much more than I thought it would and I did so much more with it than I thought I would that I become a tractor lover......well a tractor liker and appreciater. I went back to Barlows a year later and traded that tractor to 2 more tractors. A BX1500 MMM (it's still working over in W Va now) and a B7800 FEL. 3 years later after getting them paid off I went back to Barlows and traded for 2 more different tractors. A L3240 HST FEL and a BX22350 MMM.
After that I've bought, sold and traded several more times. I also bought about 5 flat acres of rental property with 6 septic tanks that service the 21 rentals (house and mobile homes that came with the acres.
I've bought/traded 17 Kubotas. They trade/sell/buy similar to cars and trucks which I've done over 160 times, I'm old. I've also bought/traded and sold several implements/attachments.
My needs have changed as well as my experience, attitude, income and priorities and of course my age which brings it's own reasons/needs for change.
Many people on TBN believe they bought the perfect implement/attachment/tractor because.....they bought it and recommend every one else buy the same thing. I've felt that way many times. Front forks, tiller, rear finish mower, Pats, post hole digger, grader blade, landscape rake, fel bucket teeth, Ratchetrake, back hoe, boxblade, SSQA, position control, 1/4 inching control, extendable arms on 3ph, different than Pats QH's, 2 different rear finish mowers, 4' Rotary mower (bush hog) Ferguson overseeder, big round fertilizer spreader, single bottom plow, 2 bottom plow and other stuff I can't remember.
I tried all of the different attachments and implements and the 17 different Kubotas (2 of the 17 was/is a F2680 that I traded and bought back a year later). They all served a purpose and I got some use out of them. Some of them were very handy and some were very back saving and made using them easier. Most of them came and went just like a lot of other "stuff" in my life and I'm always looking for something else to make life better or easier and believe I always will.:cool2:
Don't get to bogged down with getting every attachment/implement that everyone tells you that they have and that you need one or two also.:thumbdown: Same goes for the tractor, size and HP. If it's not right you can sell/trade it after a year or two and get by for a reasonable cost for using a land tamer. I plan for almost everything to have some cost for use but I also research, usually, for quite a bit before buying. Not always but most of the time.
Looks like you've come up with some reasonable/usable attachments to start with. If you don't real use them after you try them, then sell them or trade them for a different attachment and consider the cost as the cost of education just like most all education costs money/sleep/skin/back pain/headache.
My most used tractor was the B7800 FEL because I had it longer than any other tractor and at the point of time that I was doing the most landscaping/taming of my hillside property. My best tractor mower was the BX1500 MMM since it was the best hillside clinging tractor. My best Kubota mowers are my F3080 4wd (home hillside) and the F2680e (flat rental property). My most missed tractor is my BX25 because of size, FEL and Backhoe (Won't be without a BH again after using the BX25). My biggest tractor was a L3240 HST and was my least used tractor except for a B2320 gear drive. As long as I live on a hillside I'll never own another tractor bigger than a B and as long as I live I'll never (unless it's so cheap and can resale it) own another regular gear drive.
My most used attachment(s) are the FEL, BH and Ratchetrake. I've sold and traded all of the others, except the 2 bottom plow which I have for sale. Do have a set of ebay cast metal quick hitches but nothing to attach to them.
I currently have a B2620 FEL BH, RTV1140, F3080 6' rear discharge deck, F2680 6' side discharge deck, (prefer the rear discharge deck way, way, way over the side discharge deck) and recently bought a B7100 54" MMM that was a deal and it's for sale.
Sure your age, needs and location are different than mine so you need, and it looks like you have, to determine your needs, income and wants and then go forth and buy a new tractor. Yes, I'm a believer in buying new unless you want this 1100 hours B7100 HST 4wd that I have for sell.:drink:

 

[newbury]

<snip>
Don't get to bogged down with getting every attachment/implement that everyone tells you that they have and that you need one or two also.:thumbdown: Same goes for the tractor, size and HP. If it's not right you can sell/trade it after a year or two and get by for a reasonable cost for using a land tamer. <snip>

John - a lot of that "sell/trade" depends on your location and market. You live about 2 miles from Barlows, do they charge $500 to deliver a tractor to you? Does it take a 2 hour drive for you to just go look at the dealership?

The OP apparently lives where used tractors are rare, so the easy buy/sell you have is not easy for him.

<snip>
As for used tractors, well... I'd love to buy a used one, but they are as rare as an honest politician in these parts. I live on Vancouver Island (bigger than Vermont, population 1/2 million people), mostly mountains and trees. I've been watching for a used tractor for about 6 months, and very few appear. Even the local dealer has few, and a mid-80s Kubota sells for ~$10,000..<snip>

And similar goes for implements. I "ballpark" the cost of driving my truck at $1/mile. I try to take that into account when buying implements and my woodworking tools. A real nice bargain on a $2,000 implement needs to take into account either shipping or hauling it myself.

And I suspect many of us are not the salesman you are and comfortable with the selling portion.

 

[Paystar]

I like my new B2620. If you go with one Dochokin, I had the dealer add rear remote with control lever and front and rear work lights. I also had them replace the dynamo with the 40A alternator.
I went with the fel, 60" mm drive over mower, 51" rear Kubota blower with hydraulic chute rotation and a 60" Land Pride box blade.
Will be adding a Weber-Lane Super-Tilt hydraulic dumping trailer, a Wallenstein BXM32 chipper/shredder and a Lucknow 50" gear drive reverse rotation tiller.
Only complaint is Kubota still has some poor quality paint. Not real bad, but I have sen better.

 

[oldballs]

Well as long as we are spending the city boy's money, he did say that he wished to garden. Thus a tiller could be in order. A tiller is useful in leveling rough areas or small excavations (along with the FEL) as well as gardening.

 

[GPintheMitten]

You don't need to get all those implements at once. I sure didn't. I just wanted you to be aware of what's around. But I bet you will eventually get most off them.

 

[ronjhall]

I have what is considered a Luxury featured B tractor. I see many threads here on TBN that owners are updating to pin type 3ph lower arm adjusters. Others are adding Pat's Easy hitch and other items that make putting 3ph attachments on and off a tractor easier. If you are going to be changing attachments very often you will soon wish you had these features. Go to a dealer and ask if you can hook up attachments to a tractor with the added Luxury features. I recently had a opportunity to hook up a 3PH attachment to a tractor with chain adjusters. Got it done but took much more effort than with my pin type adjusters. Horse power means being able to run PTO operated attachments easier.

 

[rScotty]

Tractors are rated by HP, a practice that probably came from an earlier era when America was rural and most everyone already understood that the capacity of a machine to get a job done isn't HP, it is just as likely to be a function of another 3 things: weight, traction, and ability to use attachments.

Generally as you go up in HP you also go up in in weight, traction, and ability. (and cost!). Those are what you are buying as well as HP, so check them carefully. If the exact same machine is offered with different HP ....well, that is rare in tractors....so look carefully to make sure it is not just an advertising advantage.

What it sounds like you want on your land is what most of us want. So you'll want a FEL, 4WD, probably power steering, a very sensitive and accurate 3 pt hitch, and for the transmission the choice between hydrostat or gear shifter depends on if you will primarily be using the machine as a FEL "chore" machine or for plowing/mowing long stretches at constant speed. Either would work. I used to prefer gear; now prefer hydrostat. A hydrostat with some sort of cruise control would be an awesome compromise, but I wouldn't let that dictate the rest of the tractor.
A few companies also make transmissions with fingertip Hi/low and Forward/Reverse controls - called "reversers". These fingertip controls - generally on a stalk mounted on the steering column - are a very nice compromise and common in larger machines but now rare in the smaller tractor sizes because making that sort of transmission is expensive.

Balance wise, what you want for land with grass and trees is a lot of weight down low for traction and stability without sliding or digging in. Generally that means a wider tire with less aggressive lugs. Tires come in Ag, Turf, and Commercial. Each requires a different rim, so changing your mind after purchase is not a casual thing. New machines can be set up with either, your soil and weather will dictate which one to go for.

Whatever you get, I urge you to do a couple of things: One is to try the machine. Rent it for a week or month...or rent something similar. Tractors are expensive and changes in design are rare. Barring the unforeseen - like the two tractors I just lost in a flood - the chances are whatever you get will easily last your life. Buy all the options you can afford. You'll be glad you did ten or twenty years down the road.
Secondly, save money for attachments. A tractor without attachments is kinda helpless and one with lots of attachments will really blossom. Keep in mind that used attachments are likely to be half the price of new ones and sometimes less. Attachments are rugged and their condition is easy to evaluate.
Hope this ramble has helped.
rScotty