There is a lot to think about when choosing a tractor, especially when you know nothing about tractors and have never driven one!
How Big? If we want to do our own hay we would need over 50 horsepower. That is getting into a lot of $$$$. We decided that we are fine with a farmer taking care of our hay, we just needed something big enough to move a large round bale.
What Brand? For us, that came down to service and $$. We did not want to pay the premium for green paint. One of the other dealers could not be bothered to give us a quote. The dealer that was most responsive, Parkland Farm Equipment, sold CASE and Kioti. The Kioti gave us what we needed at a price we could afford.
What Attachments? The Kioti comes standard with a quick attach system on the front end loader. That makes it really easy to get new attachments as we need them.
Cab or no cab? I really wanted a cab… It gets pretty cold here. But with the price differential we could not justify it. I can buy a lot of warm work cloths for $10k.
I did a lot of internet research, and talked to some people in the know, and finally chose the Kioti CK3510SE. We got a front end loader with a bucket, and a pair of forks.
We can shop for other attachments as we need them. More fun to look forward to 🙂
