When I bought my L, I spent months researching making sure I got exactly the tractor I wanted and needed. I also knew I needed a grapple immediately. For reasons still unexplainable, I spent zero time researching grapples. Dealer had three Tar River CRG72’s on the lot so I told him to throw one in the deal after looking at one from 50’ for about 3 seconds. I’m not exactly recommending it (if you compare photos you can see I had to modify the lid teeth because the gusset was too short and the teeth kept bending), but you might get a little useful info.
Mine weighs in at about 480lb. I’m pretty sure that reduces weight capacity available for cargo by about 480lb. It still carries a decent amount of weight. With loaded rears and the 525lb boxblade it’s reasonably balanced. For logs, brush, and general debris I like the long bottom. If you want to do much root raking the vertical may be preferable; don’t know. The long bottom will root rake but it has to be curled down pretty far to do it.
The 72” width may not be necessary depending on what you plan to do with it. A bit narrower would probably be fine for logs. I seem to move a lot of brush with mine so I like being able to take the biggest bite practical. Most of the time I like it being tractor width, same as the stock bucket. You could cut some weight going narrower. Clearing debris off the ground I kind of like a single swath being tractor width or a bit more.
Twin lid is a definite plus. Maybe if it was narrow it wouldn’t make much difference. Seems to really help with odd shaped logs, multiple logs that don’t sit in a neat stack, and brush that can be all sorts of uneven.
If I was doing it again, I’d probably be shopping for potentially lower weight via better steel as well as preferring greasable pins. That said, seems like the last time I was looking at a similar thread, EA hadn’t folded yet and the comparable EA many were drooling over was within 20lb. Would still go with a 72” long bottom twin lid for my purposes. I don’t hate my Tar River; still probably my favorite implement overall and no issues since modifying the lid teeth. But could I have chosen better? Probably. I hear good things about Landpride, Homestead, and Virnig. No experience with any of them.
Some will probably tell you to just use forks. I have forks. They’re awesome. There’s some overlap in functionality; kind of like the overlap in functionality between a sedan and a pickup. They’re not the same and depending on the job, one is a poor substitute for the other. If you consider a 4 in 1 bucket, check the weight. Most of them are designed for larger machines and are very heavy.
