Should I buy another compact tractor or something entirely different?

[Too many Kubotas]

I've wanted a unimog for many years. I almost went this route but talked myself out of it.
Very nice set up

Thanks. You probably shouldn't have talked yourself out of getting one, though. They're fun and quite capable.

That was the first one I bought, but I suspect that the one tacticalturnip referred to is one I bought later, for parts, which turned out to be better mechanically than the one with the snowblower.

Better yet, that "parts car" was only $5K.

 

[stevem5215]

How long is your driveway to clear ? A mile ? Two ? With that thing you could clear my whole township road system !

 

[LouNY]

I have a long driveway on a steep hill, it is 14 to 16 degrees of slope or 24-26% slope.
In my area we get a lot of very wet heavy snow, this type will pack down into ice easily when driven over.

I have tried to plow and or blow snow while traveling uphill. All that will do is wear out your equipment faster, use more fuel and cause more breakage and down time.

Using the Euro patterned studded tire chains traction is not an issue. I can drive through 12" or more with no problem.
A couple of times we have gotten 36" or more in a single dump. When we get that much it is usually a lighter flufflyer snow which is not hard to drive through.

I have used trucks and plows, tractors with plows mounted on the FEL, tractors with rear mounted back blades, tractors with a pull type blower, tractor with the rear blower that you back up using.

My favorite is the back blade, pulling it while driving forward for 90% of the time. Then spinning the blade around and using it in reverse for the last 10%. Hydraulic angle on the blade is a big help as I cast the snow to different directions in different areas of the driveway. This is because depending on were you are in the driveway one side is a bank and the other is a drop off.
Normally I will pull down the drive to the first curve, reverse and just back right up in the path I just cleared, at the top move over drop the back blade and start my next pass down when I reach the area were I left my blades pile and backed through it I'll drop the loader bucket and shove that pile over the drop off, then raise the bucket and rear blade and repeat. I work my driveway in 4 sections that way.

When I have bladed at least one time and the driveway has stayed frozen so no large rocks have freed themselves I may switch to the inverted blower. I run it in much the same way all though at times I will run the length of the driveway, then turn and dead head back up and drive down blowing again. When I get to the bottom the first time, I stop blowing and pull out turn around and and pull ahead a few short runs to clear out the driveway opening to the road. I also often back up a hundred feet or so on the road and clear the snow off the road so the plow trucks don't make a plow wipe in the end of the driveway.

There are a multitude of options available, it all depends on what you can and will spend. Front blades mounted directly to a tractor which work very well. Front blades mounted on the FEL's which have not impressed me much at all. Rear blades pulled or pushed which work fairly well for me. Rear blowers facing rearward which will do a good job. Inverted blowers used while driving forward, which are handy and work well.
You can get larger tractors with front 3 points and pto's which would be able to use the "conventional" rear mount blower on the front as a forward driven blower which would be very handy I expect. You can get front mounted blowers that are powered by a driveshaft powered by the rear pto to the front. There are also front mounted blowers with there own power plants to run the blower, in my mind most are way under powered to work well unless they are extremely large heavy and powerful.

Now this if it had a front pto or the rear to front pto drive would make a snow eating beast;

 

[Too many Kubotas]

How long is your driveway to clear ? A mile ? Two ? With that thing you could clear my whole township road system !

Ha! It's only a 1/4 mile, and practically flat.

But there are other places near buildings and such where it's useful, plus I occasionally clear parts of the "horse roads".

My main reason for using a snowblower is to be able to put the snow up to 60 feet away, where it won't be in the way, and on the (slight) downhill side so the spring runoff doesn't affect the driveway, buildings, etc.

Ended up getting a used skid steer, which is what that snowblower is intended for, but that's really a love/hate machine. Mostly hate.

Visibility is crappy, it's miserable to get in and out of, and the minuscule ground clearance makes it very easy to get stuck. Okay, the latter is mostly driver error, and at least I have Unimogs to pull it out with.

On the positive side, in the winter it doesn't tear everything up when turning.

 

[Bill_B]

Thats pretty cool.
Like I said I was pretty much ready to go this route but after doing some research and talking to owners of older retired model unimogs I decided against it for the following reasons-
1. Unimogs are like an SUV or a Swiss Army knife of equipment. They can do all kinds of things but don't do any of them that well. (As told from owners)
2. Parts cost and availability now and in the future. If you buy a second parts rig then maybe this isn't an issue but if not then you're left to search for expensive NLA parts.
3. It's not a tractor. It is similar in some ways but it doesn't perform tractor type tasks like a tractor will.
4. It is an old piece of equipment. So all the rubber parts, etc. Are old at this point. The controls and creature comforts are outdated. (I wouldn't trust my wife to use an old unimog on our steep driveway but I have no problem letting her use an HST tractor)
5. Depreciation. Most tractors hold thier value very well but I don't forsee that happening for old military equipment used hard on a regular basis.


I may still get one someday. They are really cool.

 

[stevem5215]

Nice country there ! love the backdrop outside of the house.

 

[Hoss710]

Thats pretty cool.
Like I said I was pretty much ready to go this route but after doing some research and talking to owners of older retired model unimogs I decided against it for the following reasons-
1. Unimogs are like an SUV or a Swiss Army knife of equipment. They can do all kinds of things but don't do any of them that well. (As told from owners)
2. Parts cost and availability now and in the future. If you buy a second parts rig then maybe this isn't an issue but if not then you're left to search for expensive NLA parts.
3. It's not a tractor. It is similar in some ways but it doesn't perform tractor type tasks like a tractor will.
4. It is an old piece of equipment. So all the rubber parts, etc. Are old at this point. The controls and creature comforts are outdated. (I wouldn't trust my wife to use an old unimog on our steep driveway but I have no problem letting her use an HST tractor)
5. Depreciation. Most tractors hold thier value very well but I don't forsee that happening for old military equipment used hard on a regular basis.


I may still get one someday. They are really cool.

did you ever find the tractor you were looking for ?

 

[Too many Kubotas]

1. They can do all kinds of things but don't do any of them that well. (As told from owners)
2. Parts cost and availability now and in the future. If you buy a second parts rig then maybe this isn't an issue but if not then you're left to search for expensive NLA parts.
3. It's not a tractor. It is similar in some ways but it doesn't perform tractor type tasks like a tractor will.
4. It is an old piece of equipment. So all the rubber parts, etc. Are old at this point. The controls and creature comforts are outdated.
5. Depreciation. Most tractors hold thier value very well but I don't forsee that happening for old military equipment used hard on a regular basis.

1. No, they're not nice to drive on paved roads like a car. But then, neither is a tractor.
2. Parts aren't any issue, yet anyway. There are a few places just here in the USA that do nothing but sell parts for them.
3. Agree. Most tractor tasks a proper Unimog will do better.
4. Yes, they do lack touch screens, auto headlights, rain sensing wipers, and many other modern things. Instead, there are fully functional levers, switches, and buttons.
5. Depending on what you buy, they don't depreciate any more. If anything they seem to go up in value. The ex-military ones with a loader/backhoe, for example, cost about half of a comparable backhoe, and has maybe 10 to 25% as many hours on them.

There are, of course, newer models with passenger pampering cabs and accoutrements, but those do cost as much as a really nice tractor, if not more.

But for tractor use, the MB4/94 is a better candidate, especially when optioned with front and rear hydraulics, PTOs in both ends, and the so-called work gears (2,000:1 reduction), plus a rear 3-point. There was a mind blowing amount of options available, many of which were farming specific.

I picked this one up for $7K, and everything worked just fine on it. That the (rubber) tires were old didn't bother me, as they were bias ply with plenty of tread.

 

[Bill_B]

did you ever find the tractor you were looking for ?

Yes I bought a new 40 HP Kioti cab model

 

[Bill_B]

Thanks for all of the advice guys. My tractor got delivered Thursday. So far I love it and the snowblower is awesome.