I have been around skid steers since 1972, and never even saw a 4-in-1 combination bucket on a skid-steer on any job site. For site clean-up--rocks, broken blocks, dirt clods, bushes, etc., it was most common to have to push against something to pick these up, have a laborer or two pick up and toss that stuff in to the skid-steer bucket, or worse, jump on and off the machine to do that yourself. My Bobcat dealer loaned me ("demo'd") a combo bucket to me, and after about 3 minutes I knew I had to have one-- $ 2,800 or whatever it was suddenly seemed cheap. I can slick a work site up without ever leaving the seat. As a pure grapple, a small 4-in-1 is not a substitute for a true grapple bucket. I have one of those, too. The 4-in-1 will grab and pull up fence posts, bushes, and small trees. I have ripped out hundreds of feet of farm fence in what seems like a few minutes with the combo--open, grab, pull, and continue down the line. Never get off the machine.
Like the guys say, it depends on what you are doing. For small construction site lift-and-carry, you need a skid steer--you can't lift and carry with a mini-ex. Get a standard tooth bucket for digging and a smooth-edge 4-in-1. If you are around tree limbs and brush piles, get a grapple bucket, too. With the proper technique, you can grab and carry huge piles of tree limbs in a single swipe. The grapple bucket allows my Bobcat 773 to drag huge trees around, in minutes--grab the tree by the butt or stump, lift it a few inches (and never mind if the rear tires come the ground), and back up. Instant log skidder.
On the farm, we have installed a mile or so of water line. I have a 36" x 6" trencher for the skid. It's good for my soil type, and I can stand it more or less straight down and carve out square holes to set valve boxes. We hired a tractor-loader-backhoe to dig through the rocky areas and to install the larger culverts in the creeks and ditches.
The main attraction of the mini-ex's is their versatility, size and weight. The smaller ones can ride on a 10,000 or 12,000 lb trailer behind a 3/4 ton pickup. But their size is a disadvantage, too. That's why some of the guys put more hours on them--for bigger jobs the bigger backhoes are 5x faster. The jobs we thought of using (renting) the mini-x, we were far ahead to hire the backhoe man and pay him by the hour.
