The Other Tractor
About four years ago, we were deciding to move to western New Mexico. Well, that move has been (mostly) done for about a year and a half. I mentioned in this post about using an old 1958 Willys Jeep as a tractor as it had a really low gear ratio. It turned out that I sold that vehicle a couple of years ago. What to do?
When you live in the mountains on a farm or ranch, you pretty much need some kind of tractor to “take care of business!” That business would be along the lines of fixing driveways, moving dirt or gravel, cleaning up stumps, logs, branches and old lumber, or moving hay bales, just to name a few. Other needs might be getting a vehicle unstuck from a ditch or over a really bad stretch of road. And since many of the roads in the mountains are what most folks might be inclined to call primitive, it behooves the wise farmer or rancher to have a tractor. And since we don’t really have a 4-wheel drive vehicle, a tractor is a must!
Enter the Mahindra 4550 4-Wheel Drive tractor.
We looked at several tractors available in the local area. After having come close to purchasing a Kubota tractor, a neighbor clued us onto the Mahindra tractors. So we looked, we considered, we thought, we compared, we priced, we bought! And we saved a chunk of dinero!1
The Mahindra seemed to fit our needs perfectly, although the wife thought it was too much tractor. After I pointed out the fact we had a needed to move quite a few large piles of branches (including logs and stumps), she resigned herself grudgingly to our acquisition.
The tractor came with the front loader seen above, but we wanted to move piles of branches, so we also acquired the grabber. Both have the skid steer style Quick Connect system standard.
When carrying a load of dirt in the scoop, or a load of branches in the grabber, you really need a balance to avoid tipping forward when braking. So we looked around and found this ballast box on E-Bay that seemed to fit the bill. With a bit of modification, it appears to work fine! The modification was drilling new holes for the hairpin clips. The box comes with Cat 1 bolts, but the original holes were at the ends of the bolts. This placed an enormous amount of torque on the mounting brackets when connected to the 3-point hitch, and bent the mounting brackets. As the Cat 1 ball is 1 7/8” thick, I drilled the new holes a bit less than 2” from the inside mount. This made the mount much less prone to bending during turns or bumps. I then filled the box with dirt and placed a cover to prevent rain from soaking the dirt and making it harder to remove, if desired.
Also, the 4550 4WD series comes standard with a auxiliary lever and two hydraulic connections at the rear, perfect for connecting the needed third thumb for the grabber claws/grippers. And cheaper than a real third thumb added to the loader control lever. One thing I have noticed about the hydraulics. Working more than one action at a time is not smooth. I think that is a factor of the hydraulic flow rate and the pump capacity, rather than a defect.
As we had a low spot in our parking lot, the first task was moving some dirt to level it off. And just in time too, as the same day we received a nice downpour. And, thank the Lord, no puddle in the drive! So, now to finish this off, here is a current weather outlook. Beautiful scenery; changes every minute! BTW, there used to be a huge pile of stumps and limbs in the center of this image.
We thank the Lord for supplying our needs, physically and spiritually! Have a blessed day in the Lord Jesus Christ, our lifeline in today’s world!
Footnotes
Dinero is Spanish for money.↩︎