[TrickyDick]

Okay I know there's no perfect answer to this but I'm curious what everyone's opinion is. If I'm going to buy one piece of equipment what should it be? It needs to be able to do some digging and grading, move material around, load and unload trucks carry pallets and pretty big plants, etc. We do installs on mostly small to mid sized properties. Last year we planted a lot of 4-6000lb trees, moved hundreds of yards of material and rented a fullsized backhoe for about four months but I think that is the exception rather than the rule. It seems like the smartest idea is a good sized skid steer with a few attachments but what about digging holes and trenching?

My partener and I argue about this all the time with him wanting to buy something and me wanting to continue renting exactly what we need which is more expensive but entails less trying to do work with the wrong tool.

What do you think?

[HRLand]

I started with a skid steer because I could rent/buy attachments as I needed them. I thought I would be buying the hoe attachment but ended up getting a mini-x for digging instead.

[PSUscaper]

I'd go with a skidsteer / mini-x combination over a rubber tire hoe. A track loader would be the best, but depends on your application. A T250 will take care of most of the heavy lifting, though 6000lb trees could be a problem, but there's always the option of renting for those occasional heavy lift jobs.

I just believe a skidsteer/ mini-x is the fastest, most versatile set up there is. A mini-x will dig circles around most rubber tire hoes, and allow much more accesability and movement around tight landscape jobs. Same with the skidsteer.

[Pelican]

I was in your position just a couple years after I started up. I was renting a machine for bigger jobs and doing smaller ones by hand. It wasn't long before purchasing a machine made sense. I bought a 2000lb skid steer and started collecting attachments to do the various jobs. It's the smartest move I've made.

When you are weighing the expenses of rent vs. own, don't forget to account for the time you spend picking up and returning the machine, the scheduling conflicts that occur between your hours and the rental center, and the availability of the machines you need. I would schedule a job for a certain day only to learn the machine I needed would not be available for a few days, sometimes even a week which would leave me scrambling to move to another job for the waiting period.

[familyguy]

You are a lucky guy to have such a brilliant business partner trickydick. He sounds BRILLIANT.

[John Palasek]

.





Buy a heavy duty skidsteer.

I have a '97 Bobcat 873 and I think it's the most useful tool ever built. I can do anything I need to and there are very few things it can't do. The skidsteer is the Swiss Army Knife of the landscape industry.


Buy a wheeled version. Track loaders have limited value unless you're constantly operating in wet soil or on sandy slopes.






-JP





.

[Bill Schwab]

4-6000 lb trees...One piece of equipment that will grade, dig, and lift that weight tree? Cat 904-906 articulated loader with rear PTO and 3 point hitch, or, a Ford 545D 4x4 tractor with an 8x8 shuttle shift tranny. Either piece of equipment can't be killed. But then, thinking about your request for one piece of equipment. Will you have enough truck/trailer to pull what you will ideally need?

[synner]

We've used a Kubota R520 a fair bit. A real tank of a machine for the heavy lifting but not as universally useful on site as a good skidsteer.

[scott C]

Depends on the soil conditions and lot sizes you work on.

When I started my biz in its first location soil was nothing but rock, and clay. and job sites were mostly open. skidsteers w/ attachments wasn't productive, TLB wasn't the answer either. What worked best was a mini x. Ran with just the mini for almost 2 years renting a skid steer only when mats. couldn't be delivered close to work area.

When we moved locales soil was mostly sand and smaller lots a skid steer can out produce the mini x.

So it all depends

[TrickyDick]

Thanks for all the input. This forum rocks.

It seems like a heavy skid steer is definately the most versatile machine out there (though I've got one vote for tracks and one for wheels). My hesitance is because we do a pretty good variety of jobs. We work on 1-3 acre properties and move big material sometimes but we also have a small urban type properties where we need something small and manueverable. I don't want to buy something and end up either trying to do jobs with with an inappropriate piece of equipment because I'm paying for it or renting the right piece of equipment for the job and have my shiny new skidsteer sitting at the shop half the time.

As far as the rest of our setup...it needs to be pulled by a 1 ton and if it's a skid steer it will get a new dump trailer to live in. I don't have, or want, any bigger trucks for now.

Any other specific model reccomendations for a heavy duty skidsteer?

[capt_met]

ok i'll be the bad guy here and stick up for backhoes. i run a B300 bobcat. it may not be the best but for the money it has worked out great. to get a skid steer mini-ex combo with the same lifting breakout capabilities would have easily been twice as expensive. also the area i work in is far from urban. most yards are minmum 1 acre. plenty of room to move around. there are times that i would like a mini-ex but i think that can be said for all equipment. there is always that time that something else would work better. also i work solo. can't be in 2 machines at the same time might as well run one that does both. the occasional times i need something diffrent i rent it. most of the time the B300 is just fine.
good luck on your decision,
metin

[Dale Wiley]

There is no one perfect piece of equipment. If there was, I would have invented it, had Bill engineer it and we would both be sitting on a South Pacific Island, sipping tall fruity drinks with umbrellas and racing cigarette boats.



It all depends on your work. We have the Vermeer S 600 compact skid loader package, with tiller, bucket, trencher, float augers, forks and all. That works great in our current situation. The dump trailer has added to our abilities as well. This works in our residential and municipal work.

We are moving more to sports field work, and will be adding a 34,000 GVW dump truck . We had thought about any older Peterbuilt, but our sports field work will require us to roll out some miles, so the smaller dump with a 28 foot 3 axle trailer, and a 25 foot goose neck for our F 350 look to be in our future. We have to haul about 7 pieces of equipment, have dump capabilities, and do it all efficiently, 100 miles from home in some cases.

Take your time and think through every aspect of your intended/proposed application. My first idea is usually not the best, and after some thought, observation and asking my employees, we usually come up with the right application and need.

[Paul]

Dale as soon as you and Bill get it figured out I want in on the ground floor!

Tricky only you can figure out what you need. You know what you are doing most of the time moving material, grading, placing stones,ect........ People here wondered why I had so many differnet peices of equipment, 5 skid steers, two tractors, two mini-exes, 9 ton roller, hydroseeder , on and on. As you get bigger you will add on equipment as you see what fits your work. We did, iron is nice you only pay for it once, the returns on it can be great as long as you have need for it.

[cutntrim]

What piece of equipment do you rent the most now? Likely, that'd be the piece you oughta buy.