Update on mower trade!!

JDseller

Well-known Member
I talked to my middle son today. The grand daughter mowed the yard over there yesterday. He said it took her a little longer but she will get faster as she figures out a pattern to mowing with this mower. She is used to just spinning around whenever she wanted too. The yard will like it too as there will not be the divots where the mower spun around and cut the yard.

To those that replied on my earlier post thanks but here is WHY I switched mowers. The side yard at the farm is a steep side hill. At the bottom is the pasture fence. That fence is 6 strands of BARBED wire on a wooden post every ten feet. That fence is not going to move much. It is built that way to keep the cattle/steers off the road if they get out of the feed yards.

My Grand Daughter is taking after her mother in that she is a very pretty girl that will mature into a beautiful woman. So think about how you guys where saying the worst that could happen with a zero turn is you lose traction and slide. Think about this young girl going through that barbed wire fence!!!! I WAS NOT WORRIED much about upsetting. There was a roll bar and seat belt that we all used. So now you would have her tied to a sliding mower going through the fence. NOT going to happen. She would have been scarred up terribly.

This bank is usually mowed up and down with you turning in the short flat right beside the fence. I watched her mow last week. She would fly down the bank an spin like a top and back up she would go at HIGH speed. The image of her going through that fence kept me awake the other night.

I had the "new" mower out on that bank this afternoon. You can stop anywhere/any angle on that bank. The combination of the machine, tires, and weight all are just much more stable. Also this machine WILL NOT GO over ten MPH mowing. The other mower would.

I can't make things 100% safe but this is just much safer than a zero turn in these conditions. One of those conditions also is a teenage driver with three more behind her as time goes by. If I could buy a tank with a mower deck I would. Those girls are not going to be hurt if I can help it.

So that is my thinking on this. Maybe wrong but I can sleep better this way.
 
I see and understand your point, but even if I didn't, all that matters is you have done what you feel is best. You said you can sleep better knowing you made a good decision, and there is no one else to please in this situation. Job well done, and great to see you thinking of your grand daughters' safety above all else.
 
I've used a FWA Kubota B1750HSD CUT with 60" MMM to mow my irregular and steep yard with various obstacles for over 20 years. Technique and pattern are important and one learns with experience. I've changed routines several times as conditions have changed.

I expect that I would spend as much time using a ZT and would have hillside issues as well as turf damage if maximizing the maneuverability of the ZT. More importantly, the ZT is just about useless for anything but mowing, whereas I use the CUT for various other tasks.

A handy feature of my Kubota is Bi-Speed turn, which allows it to turn much more tightly in FWA without turf damage .

Dean
 
Neighbour that loves mowing traded off his new 72" cut JD 0-turn after a few close calls sliding down hills, Has a 4wd Kubota mower now.
 
JD, exactly right choice.

I used a ZT twice, just moving it out of the way in a neighbor's barn to get to some other equipment. I helped work on another (JD diesel) once. That was more than enough experience for me to say "no way". I'd rather mow 10 hillside acres around trees with my SA, than a quarter acre of same with a ZT. I'm sure they have there place, but that isn't here.
 
Just curious... did you consider whatever the latest model is of one of THESE:
<img src = "http://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=imgres&cd=&ved=0CAYQjBwwAGoVChMIyrq7soiHxwIVBtKACh3xLgTi&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.golfmachinerytrader.co.uk%2FUpload%2FProduct%2FLarge%2Fea9684e7-3499-4f3f-9caf-ed808cbe864faa.jpg&ei=jE28VcrEJYakgwTx3ZCQDg&psig=AFQjCNF1BIxRt34cKeMWGGMen1WcIyXFLg&ust=1438490380728298">

It's all wheel drive, stable (NOT a "zero spin"), and would outmow any "tractor" by a LARGE factor.

A friend gas an older one, a 1435, and I can't believe have much grass that thing will annihilate in an hour.
 
Bob the picture did not post but I assume your talking about the commercial front mowers like the JD 1445??? The only trouble with them is cost. I wanted two mowers for two locations. The Commercial front mowers would have been twice as costly as these larger garden tractors. You also just do not find them used and low houred. They are bought new by towns/cites and larger commercial mowing companies. So they do not get traded as often.

The JD 728 garden tractors qualify for the JD employee rebate program. The commercial mowers do not. So there are usually one year old low houred garden tractors available to buy. That is what I bought. They are two year old units with under 200 hours on them. They still have five years of factory warranty on them and where about 20% cheaper than brand new.
 
JDseller,
You know you did the right thing and that's all that counts.

I wouldn't have a ZTR as a gift, back issues. Well is someone gave me a new ZTR I guess I would take it, then sell it.

No way would I trade my smooth riding, perhaps the first ZTR, 1950 Farmall C, for a dixie.

When it comes to mowers, each of us has our opinion what works best.

When it comes to YT there is always people who say you did the wrong thing. Sorry that's how it is.
 
This week a 59 year old man in Floyd Co. Indiana (SE corner) was mowing a pond bank with a zero turn mower. Somehow ended up in the pond with the mower on top of him. Trapped him and he drown.
 
I've seen then in a ditch before and also heard the same thing too. County worker dies with ZTR on top of him in a lake.

People get killed all the by farming accidents, yet those who belong to the ZTR club ignore the dangers. Almost like a biker club, I've ridden my Harley for 20 years with no helmet and I'm still alive. Guess that proves Harleys are much safer to ride.
 
ya did the right thing.
young people are fearless....
us too, we just know how annoying broken bones and dripping blood all over is......
besides, tractors are more fun anyway..even little ones.

reminds me of when my son was younger. I came home from work and he was mowing the lawn with our lawn tractor....going way too fast. I didn't care about the machine, whatever breaks, I could fix...but I didn't like the air I could see under a front tire when he turned.
I told him to drive it into the garage and I welded a plate over the shifter slot so it wouldn't go past third gear.
(I had told him to mow in third...but ya know how that goes)
 
Two or three weeks in NKY a commercial operator overturned a ZTW and was killed. He was not found for several hours until his supervisor checked up after he did not report for his next job.

Dean
 
Of course it could happen with any kind of tractor or mower. However, a ZTR is much harder to control on a side hill, and even more so on a damp surface.
 
Like I said in your first post I completely understand why you did what you did. But with that said ZT mowers are really getting hammered down on here. Growing up in the 80s when I was being taught how to run a riding mower I was given STRICT orders on what to do and not to do and was told story after story of how so and so got killed in a lawn tractor roll over or so and so lost a their fingers in a mower deck and so on. So accidents as such were not invented with ZT mowers and like everything else you have to be smarter than the machine you are running. I know of two cases where gentleman were killed in lawn tractor roll overs, in both cases both were not using their head and were mowing in a way they shouldn't have. My own Grandfather who preached me safety tipped his mower twice on a bank in his yard. One time getting some good bruises. Since he passed we don't mow that bank except with a larger tractor with the wheels spread out and a Rhino mower to keep the weeds down. Not worth it. As of this moment I cannot think of a person killed in this area operating a ZT but can recall some injuries. ZTs are like everything else too. Use the correct machine for the correct application!!!!!! A smaller narrow machine with out a roll guard is not for a hilly area.

Also like I said in the previous post I switched to ZT last year and will not look back. Same mower deck as the rider and it cut 2 hours out of our mowing time! We have a lot of trees and obstacles so a ZT is a natural fit. We have one bank that I mow up a down with that isn't that large and as I also said I have my old trusty 712 AC if I do need to mow in areas not desirable with the ZT or if both my wife and I are mowing.

Also as I said in our mower sales are 9 out of 10 are ZTs. But with that said if a person is mowing a lot of banks as in your situation we show them a machine for their application. Actually the best machine we had for ditch banks we can no longer handle, New Holland had a great front cut machine that was AWD, that mower sticks to the hills like nothing I have never seen! But NH in their infinite wisdom decided to drop that supplier and go to another ending up with a inferior compact tractor and no commercial mower for us to offer.

So like I said everything has a place, find what works best for you, which is exactly what you did with your AWD lawn tractor purchase and is what I did with my ZT mower purchase.

Jim
 

We sell tractor parts! We have the parts you need to repair your tractor - the right parts. Our low prices and years of research make us your best choice when you need parts. Shop Online Today.

Back
Top