Buying Advice John Deere 2305

[Coyote machine]

See what the current owner knows about the year- get the serial number and any repair/maintenance records he might have, etc.
Check it out thoroughly before you purchase to make sure it is not one of the 'bad case' series.
If it checks out OK then buy it.
Good luck.

 

[rtgt]

As others have said, have a JD dealer run the serial number and see if it has the upgraded rear end / transmission case. If it is the newer case, the money the seller is asking is inline with what most sell for. If it is an older / weaker case, the resale value isn't as good (to an informed buyer)

I have a 2010 model 2305 and when I recently bought a rotary cutter I found out about the transmission "problem". Not the hard way, but by posting my purchase, others enlightened me.

If you are going to consider using a rotary cutter, tiller, post hole digger, etc, I would suggest you would be better off with a different tractor. If you are just going to finish mow an established lawn, plow snow, etc, the 2305 is a fine tractor. Use the PTO with some common sense and you'll be fine.

I have put 300+ hours on mine, mowing and moving snow and it has done well. I an going to start using a tractor for a little more harder work (i.e. bush hogging) and before I start that I am going to upgrade the tractor to a more suitable model. I don't want to risk lunching the transmission using a rotary cutter.

 

[johnwilldo]

Yelbike,

I am curious to know if your brush hog had a stump jumper and a clutch. Do you store your brush hog out in the elements? I have heard that the plates of the clutch get rusty and do not protect your tractor as they should. I know that I can test mine by attempting to rotate the blades with the tractor off. I store mine in a heated garage. My 2305 has just turned over 400 hours and I have at least 100 of those hours using the brush hog for brush and field mowing. The horror stories that I read about the case cracking cause me concern so I try to make sure that I do not try to tackle large brush items or small trees.

 

[yelbike]

Yelbike,

I am curious to know if your brush hog had a stump jumper and a clutch. Do you store your brush hog out in the elements? I have heard that the plates of the clutch get rusty and do not protect your tractor as they should. I know that I can test mine by attempting to rotate the blades with the tractor off. I store mine in a heated garage. My 2305 has just turned over 400 hours and I have at least 100 of those hours using the brush hog for brush and field mowing. The horror stories that I read about the case cracking cause me concern so I try to make sure that I do not try to tackle large brush items or small trees.

I don't have nor have I ever had a brush hog. Sort of on my wish list, I don't know how much I really would need or actually use one.

My failure happened with a tiller, it did have a brand new slip clutch as the tiller was only roughly two weeks old. I'm not 100% sure of the real cause but the tractor did stall from striking a buried object. The slip clutch had been adjusted as best as I could. The clutch had slipped before and has since but that time did not I suppose. Sheared the stub PTO shaft at the designed weak spot. The broken parts alone were just over $500 plus the case and 45-50 hrs labor at jd stealership rate. Insane!! That tractor does almost no PTO work anymore. Mower( and some have had failures using the MNM also) and BH use only. That's why I got the 2320.