I have to get back to taking more pictures, but failed again this weekend on that count.
Really don’t know how we got by so many years without a modern tractor with loader. This weekend wife wanted to move 40 + dozen mason jars in boxes from the laundry room of one of the other houses to the basement for storage. She said, “we’ll have to carry them down the stairs”. My knees said no. Loaded up the 6.5’ x 3’ dolly I use to store the boxblade and forked the pile to the basement. My knees were happy. 20 minutes, mostly me moving boxes by hand loading and unloading the dolly. Old tractor wouldn’t do that at all.
Then used the boxblade to touch up a couple of ditches and trails a recent heavy deluge had done some damage to. With a decent 72” boxblade, 47hp tractor, hydraulic top and side links it took about 15 minutes. With the older, smaller tractors with manual adjustments on the 3 point and lightweight backblade (what I would have used pre-Kubota) it would have required hooking up the 3 shank ripper to loosen the packed gravel so the blade wouldn’t just bounce off it. Then switch to the backblade, tilt it to clean the ditches, tilt again to shape the trail. Would have taken at least a couple hours the old way. If I hooked the old tractor to the BB1572, it would struggle to pick it up, much less pull it. Almost feels like cheating with the Kubota. So 15 minutes v 2 hours.
Then hooked up the brush hog and did a bit of mowing in part of the front meadow where a few saplings were beginning to flourish a bit more than I preferred. Could have done that with the old tractor but it would have struggled with the 5’ cutter in the thick 2’ grass and wouldn’t have maintained 540 rpm whereas the L wasn’t straining at all. Didn’t save much time there but did get a better quality cut.
Next, stopped by the ABC crush/run granite road base pile and picked up about a half bucket of rock to fill a couple potholes that were starting at the end of the drive where the garbage truck turns around every week. A little back dragging with the bucket and packing with the wheels made it all good again. Another 15 minute job mostly because it’s a long way from the rock pile to the end of the road. Old way would have been a 3 point pond scoop, flat shovel, rake, and a bit of manual labor. Some time and labor saving on that job.
On the way back to put the tractor inside got to looking at a bunch of sweet gum trees about 8’ to 10’ high that have grown beside the trail to the shed. Wife and I had been discussing earlier if we like them as a sight barrier between the houses and shed/wood yard area or want them gone. We didn’t really make a decision but I suddenly developed a dislike for them and still had the rotary cutter. Thought, well it’s rated for 2” it should handle them and I think I can squeeze in between the big trees to get 90% of them. So I ran over all but maybe 3 or 4 of them I couldn’t get to. Don’t really think I could have run over a small stand of 8’ gum saplings with the old tractor, much less mowed them without choking it down. Less than 5 minutes to take out what would have taken probably at least an hour with a saw and disposing of the brush. Don’t know if the wife has noticed yet or not.
Forks, grapple, bucket, loader, SSQA, front and rear hydraulic remotes, ROPs, diff lock: all stuff the the old tractor didn’t have at all. Compared to old tractor: HST v 3 speed clutch/stick, top/tilt v manual adjust, 2X PTO HP, 4WD v 2WD, brakes that work well v not so much, 3X rear lift capacity, live independent PTO v full time on (unless you also disengage hydraulic pump) with no internal over run, power steering v manual steering.
No, I don’t think the Kubota will be running 70 years from now, but neither will I. At 295 hours I still feel a little spoiled every time I use the Kubota.
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