Have a little over 1 acre of grass to mow. A 54-in or 60-in belly mower would do that quickly.
Our driveway is a little over 1/4 mile long gravel. It needs occasional scraping and to be cleared when it snows...once a year. I don't know if a front end loader is the right tool for the job or if I should go box blade all the way?
An 8N + a different zero-turn mower is a second option if the sub-compact tractor is overkill??

10/5/2018 11:05:23 AM

^^ NRR agreed. An 8N is more or less a 'row crop' tractor designed for larger fields/land, etc. You will definitely want a subcompact tractor - Dont discount the Mahindra.


Been thinking about posting, but my 2002? L120 John Deere from Home Depot has just over 400hrs on it! Replaced all the pulleys and spindles on the deck a few years ago, bought the aftermarket 'highly recommended' ones from amazon and already have one that is going bad. Other than that not too much to complain about. Have a jingle on the brake pedal linkage that I need to fix but that's for another day.

[Edited on October 5, 2018 at 11:08 AM. Reason : -]

10/5/2018 11:08:25 AM

the mowing would be much faster with a zero turn of the same size. i have a 61" and cut my acre in 30-40 minutes.

if you crown that gravel driveway properly, it'll hardly ever need attention. and why bother removing snow from a gravel driveway once a year? it'll be gone in a day or two. i had a gravel driveway when i lived in roxboro. we just drove on the snow.

but if you're set on a tractor, then there probably isn't much difference between any of the cheap asian compact utility tractors.

10/5/2018 12:43:57 PM

Driving on snow was fine in NC. Attempting that further north is just asking for problems.

I would use an angle blade for clearing snow, but you'll want a box blade too for dragging your driveway. A front end loader is only useful when you need to clear a foot or more of snow.

10/5/2018 9:33:26 PM

picked up a 1994 Simplicity Sovereign 18H a couple days ago

http://www.tractordata.com/lawn-tractors/003/0/0/3005-simplicity-sovereign-18h.html

4/3/2019 3:08:39 PM

I figured I would give a 5 year update for anyone who cares.
Purchased this junk in 2019. It did okay, but liked to run on 3 out of 4 cylinders. It would run for about 30 minutes, then if you turned it off and cranked it again, it wold struggle to crank.

Sold that junk recently and purchased this Massey Ferguson.
There are a few kinks to work out, but it seems to be 5X better than the JD junk.


Also purchased a Gravely zero-turn in summer 2022. Will post pictures for anyone who cares.

8/29/2023 10:43:09 AM