Farm excavator

[Kfarmer]

(long post) Am looking for a used excavator for our family farm. Roughly 100 acres of crop/pasture land and another 100 acres of forest. Much of the perimeter and forest road network as been neglected for a number of years.

What I want to be able to do:

1. Reclaim, maintain, and improve our roads and perimeter. In some cases, this will include creating short sections of new road. Cut some new trails. Am thinking I can do most routine maintenance with existing tractors/box blade and the occasional small dozer rental.

2. Dig/load gravel (which we have onsite) to use elsewhere on the property.

3. Do some minor clearing and stump removal. Average stumps on our place range from 12-36" (tree diameter not stump size).

4. Do some ditch/water management stuff

5. In the well established farming tradition, use the machine for a million things it probably wasn't designed for. It's a big, powerful 360 degree, 3-dimensional tool that seems like it would be great for reaching, lifting, pulling, pushing, crushing, you name it. Not the least of these is freeing other stuck equipment. Western Washington gets pretty soggy and the ground can stay soft until the end of June.

6. I won't log lots of hours, I'll be happy if I can roll up 500 before two years have gone by. I would rent but I have found we run into too many unexpected challenges that tend to add days to rentals that were planned to be just one day.

Problems:

Money. Property like this is a joy to have but keeping up the barns/buildings/roads/etc. can suck every penny you've got. We've bought some new equipment in the past year and have to be thrifty on an excavator.

What I've come up with so far:

I am thinking about a roughly 15 ton machine (mid-90's era), that may have lots of hours but appears to have been well cared for. Does this sound right for what I aim to do? A couple that appeared to fit which have been listed recently are a 96 Deere 590D and a 96 Case 9020B. The specifications (reliable?) show the Case as only a little heavier but having more lifting power.

Really appreciate any recommendations on machine size for my application, on the specific machines mentioned, or others that are best bets in used excavators.

Thanks.

 

[JTL]

I would think your right on track. A 312 Cat, 490/590 J.D. or a 120 to 160 Komatsu or Hitachi would be ideal. I would seriously look for a zero tail swing machine. A 135 Hitachi is a damn good machine. You would also want to try and find one with the little back-fill blade on it as well as a thumb. The blade might save you having to rent a dozer for certian jobs.
Check the rental sites, like United Rentals and such. They seem to rotate out thier little hoes quite regularly. I'd even check out online auction sites as well.
I have cleared off and graded entire house sites and yards with my buddies 135 Hitachi. Very handy machine to have around. Good luck!:drinkup
Jason

 

[cat765]

I bought a Kobelco SK 150 Mark III and would have to say it would be about the size you are interested in. We use it on our farm for many different jobs similiar to what you are going to do. I would also recommend a thumb if you plan on stump removal or rock nabbing and so on.

 

[pushcat]

Sounds to me like you need a loader cat. It would be better suited for most of what you want to do, except for ditch cleaning. For around half the money of a good used excavator, you don't want to buy a cheap, used excavator, trust me, you can get a good track loader that will hold it's value better.

 

[Red Bank]

I borrowed the company's Hitachi EX200 when we first got our farm, 7 years ago. Got to keep the 200 here for almost 5 years before they came to get it for a job. It did a great job, but there was times when I thought I needed something bigger, but I guess that will happen with any size machine. But I highly recommend that size, unless you are planning to transport it from one side of your farm to the other. I only have 45 acres and some places I just didn't want to crawl all the way over to it. I also have brought the mini's home too and have found several jobs to do with them. But if I had to buy one it would be a EX200, just because that's what I am used to using.

 

[Kfarmer]

Thanks for the replies and sound advice. Pushcat, I understand what you're saying about the track loader but there are aspects of the excavator such as the vertical reach and the ability to really dig (we have a creek crossing to replace and it will probably involve digging 8+ feet deep) that will help us a lot.

 

[kaveman]

I'm a complete newbie, but I just went through this and came to a completely different conclusion. Just bought an older, low time Kobelco in decent shape for pretty cheap and so far it's working out well. I'm using it for some placer exploration on a property I own and it's my first piece of really heavy equipment. I do have a digger derrick and backhoe that were bought for the same purpose a couple of years ago, but they weren't up to the job and I had to go bigger. I knew from the start that I was going to end up with the excavator, but I needed a couple of years to learn and become comfortable with the idea.

I was really looking for a 300 size machine, but when this 220 came up locally at a good price I figured it would be more than enough to get started with and it would be a good machine to learn on. I found that like shop lathes, the best deals were always with the machines that were larger than most people would initially be drawn to. My Kobelco is a 55k pound machine and its only drawback seems to be that it's more expensive to transport than a machine of under 20 tons. I don't ever expect to have to move this one again, so that's not much of a consideration.

My Kobelco is 20yrs old but runs great and has a ton of power. It is slow according to friends who know HE and are used to newer machines, but I'm not worried about getting anything done fast,...........I'm more concerned about keeping it running. I'm glad this thing runs at lower pressures than the newer machines and that it isn't turbo'd. The non-turbo engine in this machine is exactly the same as what Kobelco put in the 300-330 size machines except that it's governed at 1800rpm. To me that means it should last a long, long time. It's got less than 4000 hours on it and other than the old hoses, I really don't expect to do much with it other than normal maintenance. $16k and I've seen a dozen like it for similar amounts in the same area,......OR/WA. After two years of looking at/for excavators, I'm convinced that you can't get a deal on a 200 or under,.........at least not on a machine that doesn't need to work a 40hr week. We considered rentals too, but this machine might sit for months and then work hard for a couple of weeks during vacation, or dig for an hour or two every other day for a month. There's just no way to make a rental work for us.

It did take the better part of a year to track down all the manuals I wanted for this thing, but in the end I was able to find them for next to nothing and I've even been able to put some nos parts on the shelf for very little.

 

[Iron Horse]

Realisticaly , you need to buy the first available excavator that comes along with a bit of life left in it at a price you can afford .

 

[IH560JL]

Look for ebay listings in your area, found very valuable in past and deals can be had there, dealer sales give you someone to gripe too in major failures, but most dealers have a as is clause in used machines and it is all still out of your pocket. Ebay buys are generally 25-50% less than a dealer so you are already money ahead. Jim

 

[roddyo]

If it was me

If it was me I would spend little more and get a better excavator. Once you get an excavator in the neighborhood people are going to have jobs for it if you want to do them. 2 or 3 weeks work a year will go a long way on a payment.


Just something to think about if it's an option in your area.

 

[Red Bank]

If it was me I would spend little more and get a better excavator. Once you get an excavator in the neighborhood people are going to have jobs for it if you want to do them. 2 or 3 weeks work a year will go a long way on a payment.


Just something to think about if it's an option in your area.

I tend to agree, I got my trackloader to play with on the farm, and now I have two jobs waiting on me and winter to be over Didn't really want to do them, but can't pass up the chance to learn and make money.

 

[pushcat]

If it was me I would spend little more and get a better excavator. Once you get an excavator in the neighborhood people are going to have jobs for it if you want to do them. 2 or 3 weeks work a year will go a long way on a payment.


Just something to think about if it's an option in your area.

Don't forget to update your liability insurance, big time. Hit one fiber optic cable that the landowner swears isn't there and you won't have to worry about making excavator payments any more.

 

[dayexco]

too bad you're not a little closer, i have a GREAT running 690elc deere i'm wanting to sell.

 

[CM1995]

Don't forget to update your liability insurance, big time. Hit one fiber optic cable that the landowner swears isn't there and you won't have to worry about making excavator payments any more.

Good advice and always call for a utility locate - Diggsafe, OneCall or whatever it is in your area. It's free and if they don't locate it, you are not responsible for it. It's also a good idea to take some pics beforehand of the paint/flagging just in case.

 

[Abirmit]

To a carpenter everything is nail. Talk to a excavator operator and there is nothing an excavator cannot do. For what you are describing maybe consider a tracked loader CAT 955L to compare with a CAT 312.