L4701 struggling to lift a 1,900lb pallet of parts out of a delivery truck.

[mcmxi]

I enjoy the YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@squatch253 . He has an L4701 with the LA765 FEL and it was interesting to see him and his dad have to work together to offload a pallet with about 1,900lb of Caterpillar parts on it. He doesn't feature the Kubota much on his channel, just uses it on various projects.

If you like this sort of thing I highly recommend the channel. He does great work and is one sharp cookie. Just a cool guy working on some really interesting projects such as overhauling and rebuilding dozers and tractors, plowing, tree felling etc.

One of the most interesting projects he's done is clear a large area for a future shop build. He used the L quite a bit on that project.

 

[#40Fan]

Simple math will tell you why that was going to be a problem.

765 x 2.2 =< 1900

 

[NCL4701]

Yeah, a 1900 lb pallet is really pushing the limits of a L4701. Most of the heavy stuff I’ve picked up with mine I don’t know for a fact what it weighs other than a lot (logs, old millstones, etc.). The only pallet I’ve picked up that pushed it’s limits that I knew for a fact what it weighed was 1950 lb. I didn’t expect it to move it but it did lift it about 1” off a flatbed trailer (at WOT) and later picked it up about 6” off the ground so I was able to move it but it couldn’t really “handle” it to any reasonable degree. I couldn’t have put it back on the trailer if I had to. At the time it took the pallet off the trailer I considered taking a picture or two but thought if I took my fat butt off the seat the whole thing might tip forward and was concerned if I set it down it wouldn’t pick it back up so I just drove 100 yards with it REALLY slowly. Not recommended.

If I could have moved up one size to the MX5400, I would have just to get the additional loader capacity, but as has been discussed here before, sometimes there are hard limits on size and the L4701 was the absolute biggest model that fit several pinch points on our place. Still an improvement over the smaller L’s and a night/day improvement over the antiques it replaced. No complaints but it certainly does have limits. I guess they all do. Sometimes it would be nice if the limit was somewhere north of 2000 lb but it isn’t.

 

[rc51stierhoff]

Yeah, a 1900 lb pallet is really pushing the limits of a L4701. Most of the heavy stuff I’ve picked up with mine I don’t know for a fact what it weighs other than a lot (logs, old millstones, etc.). The only pallet I’ve picked up that pushed it’s limits that I knew for a fact what it weighed was 1950 lb. I didn’t expect it to move it but it did lift it about 1” off a flatbed trailer (at WOT) and later picked it up about 6” off the ground so I was able to move it but it couldn’t really “handle” it to any reasonable degree. I couldn’t have put it back on the trailer if I had to. At the time it took the pallet off the trailer I considered taking a picture or two but thought if I took my fat butt off the seat the whole thing might tip forward and was concerned if I set it down it wouldn’t pick it back up so I just drove 100 yards with it REALLY slowly. Not recommended.

If I could have moved up one size to the MX5400, I would have just to get the additional loader capacity, but as has been discussed here before, sometimes there are hard limits on size and the L4701 was the absolute biggest model that fit several pinch points on our place. Still an improvement over the smaller L’s and a night/day improvement over the antiques it replaced. No complaints but it certainly does have limits. I guess they all do. Sometimes it would be nice if the limit was somewhere north of 2000 lb but it isn’t.

2K is a great general number when you look at what a pallet of xxx weighs…block / feed / IBC Tote, etc. 1900 - 2200 lbs is not uncommon. MX really isnt the solution (IMO) either if you need to move very far on a bumpy / non level surface, much less lift and move.

 

[NCL4701]

2K is a great general number when you look at what a pallet of xxx weighs…block / feed / IBC Tote, etc. 1900 - 2200 lbs is not uncommon. MX really isnt the solution (IMO) either if you need to move very far on a bumpy / non level surface, much less lift and move.

Yeah, I’d agree with that.

The L4701 to MX5400 is a pretty good jump in loader capacity; about the same on 3 point and incremental in HP. If I needed something to routinely move 2000 lb + over rough ground I probably would have leaned more toward a skid steer or CTL. Looked at those as well when I bought the L, but overall they weren’t a good fit.

Of course if I bought the ideal machine for every job I’d need a bigger shed and I’d have to defer retirement a few more years.

 

[NCL4701]

I enjoy the YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@squatch253 . He has an L4701 with the LA765 FEL and it was interesting to see him and his dad have to work together to offload a pallet with about 1,900lb of Caterpillar parts on it. He doesn't feature the Kubota much on his channel, just uses it on various projects.

If you like this sort of thing I highly recommend the channel. He does great work and is one sharp cookie. Just a cool guy working on some really interesting projects such as overhauling and rebuilding dozers and tractors, plowing, tree felling etc.

One of the most interesting projects he's done is clear a large area for a future shop build. He used the L quite a bit on that project.

I kind of feel like I hijacked your thread and got off topic. Sorry about that.

Watched a few of his videos. A lot of the “tractor and outdoor” stuff I see on YouTube the people come off as being as ignorant as I am. Guys that take the approach, “I got a new tractor and chainsaw, let’s see what we can tear up.” Which isn’t very interesting because I need no further education in how to flail around messing stuff up and breaking things. I mastered that before I graduated high school.

The real professionals who know what they’re doing are rarely running CUTs or SCUTs. Watching some highly skilled operator muck out a pond with a D8 may be interesting but it doesn’t often translate to running my little machine. Although I saw a guy doing exactly that a couple weeks ago in a video and did learn something. (Keep the sloppy mud in front of you and run the machine on the solid ground underneath if your machine has the grunt to get to it.) I’d never thought of that but was able to put it into practice with my comparatively weenie tractor clearing out a mud hole recently.

This guy seemed to be competent using equipment that’s realistic for non-commercial landowners, so it’s likely I’ll be watching him some myself.