What does "take it to the dealer" mean for you?

CliffordK · 2025-10-18T01:44:05-0400

Most of my equipment is very far out of warranty, and I have no doubt if a project is too big to do myself, then it would cost a fortune at a shop, likely several times the value of the piece of equipment.

Fortunately I don't think I have a single tractor that actually has a place to plug a computer in, so there are no issues with "right to repair", or proprietary software.

Mom decided to buy a little Kubota, and within a couple of months it blew an oil seal near the PTO. I offered to take it to the dealer, but she was able to get them to come out and pick it up for warranty service, and then to bring it back. I don't know if there was an extra surcharge.

WinterDeere · 2025-10-18T08:59:56-0400

CliffordK said:
Mom decided to buy a little Kubota, and within a couple of months it blew an oil seal near the PTO. I offered to take it to the dealer, but she was able to get them to come out and pick it up for warranty service, and then to bring it back. I don't know if there was an extra surcharge.

Classic "bathtub curve", known by every engineer and service manager, nearly all failures are either "infantile" or "old age" with very little in-between.

My Deere 3033R also blew a seal when just a few weeks old, but unfortunately it was buried so deep that even removing seat, I couldn't find the source of the leak. Dealer came out, picked it up, repaired, and had it back to me within 3-4 days... no charge. They said it was a factory assembly error, but I'd had some dealer-installed hydraulic options added to the machine the prior week, so I debate whether they were just covering an error on their end.

mx842 · 2025-10-18T11:25:01-0400

Rob REECE said:
So my 2009 John Deere 4320 started to run rough. I couldn’t figure it out so I took it to the dealer. They drained all the diesel out I had just put in and put more diesel in. They called me a couple days later and said they couldn’t figure it out and they called the John Deere techs and they said they wanted to run a bunch of tests. I asked how much it would cost. All they said was it is really expensive. I just went an picked it up and brought it home after paying a $719 dollar bill for basically nothing. It was a joke.

I feel your pain.