Springtime equipment “fun”

denverpilot

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DenverPilot
Apparently one of the tractor front tires has something in it... went flat and popped it off of the bead on the wheel. Sigh.

Okay, let’s go fire up the air compressor and figure out if we’re doing the flammable liquid thing or the ratchet strap thing...

Wait, where’s the air compressor? Awww crap, it’s over at the hangar...

Okay screw it. Park the tractor and deal with it later. Go get the riding lawn mower which is slower and sucks, but will get the job done...

Click. Awww man. Forgot to plug it into the battery tender months ago... when I moved it to a better parking spot out of the way in the garage for winter. Idiot. three year old battery, toast.

Let’s jump start it. Pull Subaru up to garage, jumper cables...

That worked. Let’s go mow!

Mow a little around the driveway and get that done. Want to go through the livestock style gate to do the fenced part... but I have to get off the mower to take the rubber strap off of it and unlatch and open it.

Wait a sec. If I get off of this thing it has a safety interlock attached to my butt / the seat. It’ll shut down. Grrr. I could just go get a 5 gal jug of gas to set on the seat, but ...

Drive it up next to the garage just in case and let’s kill it and see if this battery took any charge at all, maybe I’ll get lucky.

Click. Awwwww **** it. I’m going inside now and making some dinner. Fix BOTH of these damned machines tomorrow.

Spent evening looking at $15,000 new compact tractors. $20,000 with new attachments. Looked at ZTRs and realized there’s a very large quality jump between big box junk and commercial.

Got over it. Well, not really. Mad. But what’cha gonna do? Not spending $20K on a tractor that mows three times a year and moves snow no more than that either. Even a cheaper-ish ZTR is total overkill.

I just need mow the area around the septic system... decided not to push it and have it pumped out next week, since it’s probably about time. Don’t really enjoy the idea of finding out that it needs pumping out, the hard way.

If I can’t get that stupid tire back on the wheel, the last time that happened the local Green Tractor Place (Deere) wanted stupid money to put a tire back on and whined about my old bent wheels. Mostly trying to sell me a new tractor, really.

Wonder what the neighbor with the $35,000 Deere would charge to mow? Might be cheaper to pay him to do it for the next ten years. LOL.
 
Nate, may I suggest:

image.jpeg

HEY! It's good for ya heart mate! :ihih::yesnod:
 
I often ponder how much of my life is spent fixing tools. And the tools to fix those tools. And so on, ad infinitum.

Having just looked at mowers, some nice ones at the John Deere dealer, with the “decent” ones starting at just over $3,000.

28639213928_429b313cf5.jpg
 
I don't love to mow that much.....I can buy two cheap ones for that price..... if the first one breaks in 5 years, just buy a brand new cheap one again. Odds are I'll be ahead of the money curve.
 
I often ponder how much of my life is spent fixing tools. And the tools to fix those tools. And so on, ad infinitum.

Having just looked at mowers, some nice ones at the John Deere dealer, with the “decent” ones starting at just over $3,000.

28639213928_429b313cf5.jpg

That little thing ain’t big enough to mow 4 acres. It’d do it, but it’d take all day. I already have a riding mower about that size. The tractor and 48” rotary just goes so much faster.

The Deere stuff also has a lot of plastic on it. Even the compact tractors. I’d go Kubota before Deere nowadays.

I’d just get a ZTR since even the decently built ones are cheaper than tractors, but that doesn’t take care of the occasional massive snow removal problem.

Was doing the math last night. I mow about three times a year and remove snow about the same number of times. Spending tractor money numbers on that is almost insane. But I may end up having to do it. It’d cost about $100 per mowing over ten years.
 
Most riding mowers with the seat pressure switch will not shut off if you engage the parking brake (and disengage the PTO mower blades) before disembarking.


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Most riding mowers with the seat pressure switch will not shut off if you engage the parking brake (and disengage the PTO mower blades) before disembarking.

LOL yeah I forgot about that since I hardly use the thing. 42” cutting deck takes a loooooong time to mow with out here. But I remembered. Mostly don’t remember it because the brakes don’t work on the thing anyway. So setting the “parking brake” by the little locking mechanism after pushing the pedal all the way down, isn’t something I do much.

Anyway got a little of the mowing done by jump starting the little one. Noticed it’s leaving a little strip of slightly higher stuff in the center so the blades have once again given their all to the rocks and gravel along the driveway. Time for new blades on that thing.

Decided it was finally time to get a 1/2” drive impact driver today to make the tire change on the bigger tractor much simpler.

Can’t believe how cheap the corded versions are now that the lithium battery versions of things are the popular kids on the block, and I have extension cords, a generator on wheels, and all sorts of ways to get AC power (even some monster old data center batteries and inverters that can handle big loads)...

So I picked one of the cheapies up at Harbor Freight. $49. I tossed in some deep impact sockets for another $40. That place is unbelievable.

That made taking the wheel off literally a four minute job and one minute of that was guessing the lug nut size. Haha. Of course it’s a tractor so it has a built in jack and jack stand... the bucket. Haha. Up and over with the bucket, hit the reverse on the impact driver and all the lug nuts were off in 60 seconds. Nice.

Couldn’t get the tire bead back on, so I’ll drag the tire and wheel to the tire place and see if they can get the bead back sealed up. I may need to hunt a new front wheel for the old tractor. This one has some bent rim edges in a couple of spots and that probably isn’t helping the bead problem.

Anyway. Partially mowed (all the tall stuff and it’s been dry so much of it never got tall) and just need to get that Ag tire back on that rim and the old Ford will be back in business. While I have it “jacked up” on the bucket I probably should take the grease gun to all of the grease zerks while they’re easy to get to, and check the trans fluid and hydraulic fluid and such. Also need to check the lube in the drive gearbox on the mower deck and probably figure out how to flip it up so I can see how that blade is doing. It may be overdue for a new blade also, or at least taking the one that’s on there to the grinder to sharpen it up.

It’s a beater tractor but it keeps running... and after looking at new prices I think I’ll just keep fixing it! Good gravy the new ones are outrageous.
 
LOL yeah I forgot about that since I hardly use the thing. 42” cutting deck takes a loooooong time to mow with out here. But I remembered. Mostly don’t remember it because the brakes don’t work on the thing anyway. So setting the “parking brake” by the little locking mechanism after pushing the pedal all the way down, isn’t something I do much.

Anyway got a little of the mowing done by jump starting the little one. Noticed it’s leaving a little strip of slightly higher stuff in the center so the blades have once again given their all to the rocks and gravel along the driveway. Time for new blades on that thing.

Decided it was finally time to get a 1/2” drive impact driver today to make the tire change on the bigger tractor much simpler.

Can’t believe how cheap the corded versions are now that the lithium battery versions of things are the popular kids on the block, and I have extension cords, a generator on wheels, and all sorts of ways to get AC power (even some monster old data center batteries and inverters that can handle big loads)...

So I picked one of the cheapies up at Harbor Freight. $49. I tossed in some deep impact sockets for another $40. That place is unbelievable.

That made taking the wheel off literally a four minute job and one minute of that was guessing the lug nut size. Haha. Of course it’s a tractor so it has a built in jack and jack stand... the bucket. Haha. Up and over with the bucket, hit the reverse on the impact driver and all the lug nuts were off in 60 seconds. Nice.

Couldn’t get the tire bead back on, so I’ll drag the tire and wheel to the tire place and see if they can get the bead back sealed up. I may need to hunt a new front wheel for the old tractor. This one has some bent rim edges in a couple of spots and that probably isn’t helping the bead problem.

Anyway. Partially mowed (all the tall stuff and it’s been dry so much of it never got tall) and just need to get that Ag tire back on that rim and the old Ford will be back in business. While I have it “jacked up” on the bucket I probably should take the grease gun to all of the grease zerks while they’re easy to get to, and check the trans fluid and hydraulic fluid and such. Also need to check the lube in the drive gearbox on the mower deck and probably figure out how to flip it up so I can see how that blade is doing. It may be overdue for a new blade also, or at least taking the one that’s on there to the grinder to sharpen it up.

It’s a beater tractor but it keeps running... and after looking at new prices I think I’ll just keep fixing it! Good gravy the new ones are outrageous.

I'd pay the $100 three times per year. ;)

I have a blade for my quad to clear snow off the driveway. If it's more than a couple of inches I pay a contractor $80 to do it in 1/5 the time I take. :)

Mowing lawn is a complete waste of life. I have some over my septic system I cut with a 25 year old electric push mower. I refuse to have any more than that. :p

Other than the quad I really don't want money tied up in machinery that is seasonal. Too high an opportunity cost imo. Although I enjoy wrenching on stuff, I am at the stage the airplane and the pickups are enough machinery to manage for one lifetime.
 
I'd pay the $100 three times per year. ;)

I have a blade for my quad to clear snow off the driveway. If it's more than a couple of inches I pay a contractor $80 to do it in 1/5 the time I take. :)

Mowing lawn is a complete waste of life. I have some over my septic system I cut with a 25 year old electric push mower. I refuse to have any more than that. :p

Other than the quad I really don't want money tied up in machinery that is seasonal. Too high an opportunity cost imo. Although I enjoy wrenching on stuff, I am at the stage the airplane and the pickups are enough machinery to manage for one lifetime.

I hear ya.
 
Bobcat Skid-Steer with attachments. Mow, bush hog, plow, dig, and split logs.
 
Bobcat Skid-Steer with attachments. Mow, bush hog, plow, dig, and split logs.

Yeah I love the idea but that’s another $10,000 above a brand new compact tractor, if you buy it well used. And I have no logs to split. I only have two trees. Ha.
 
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