Needs to be able to get in and out of narrow openings like gates.
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Define "narrow". And, my 2520 machine will fit through any gate that a riding mower with a 54" cutting deck will fit through.
I don't have $20k for a tractor
like your 2520
I would say that you're biggest concern here should be whether or not the machine you're interested in has a hydrostatic transmission or not and what condition it's in. Older ones that are heavily worn / abused have trouble climbing hills when the fluid has warmed up. A rebuild (at the cost of about $350 for parts) or replacement (at $800 and up) would be in order to restore it to proper working condition.
by Hydrostatic do you mean automatic if so that spells out POS to me. Every Craftsman lawn tractor I have in my hard has a busted trany 2 of them Hydro/Auto and 1 a six spd and all 3 have busted Transaxles.
I had a "smallish" riding mower that could pull a cart with just about a half yard of materials in it easily. I don't see an issue here except as it could relate to the transmission issue listed above.
could it back it up hill from a street into your back yard through the side gate up a decent grade?
Have you considered just getting a separate tiller for this? It's a small enough area that you could do it with a purpose-built machine and very likely keep your costs down significantly over an attachment (and getting a machine to run it). Unless you're tilling a garden plot for 30 people every year, a dedicate machine might serve you better.
My biggest issue w/the tiller is my bad Back and so on. I have a regular Craftsman Tiller and it beats me up ever time I use it. I love to garden but don't like being bed ridden for a few days to a week after tilling the soil.
I think the key here is *how MUCH* dirt? Folks use things like the Johnny Bucket with great success to scoop and lift materials in smaller amounts. As long as they aren't trying to ultimately move 50 yards of material in a weekend, they're fine. You have to evaluate the total amount of material to be moved to understand how many trips it will take with a particular capacity bucket. Then you factor in how far you're moving it to determine how much seat time you'll need to put in moving it around.
I honestly don't know the diff between a FEL, Johnny bucket and so on so I'll have to look into these options as well as the cost to fab up my own FEL etc.
A lot that size is VERY common, and any size machine will do it. You have to consider what the actual terrain is like, too, though. If its very hilly and the hills are somewhat steep (you'd be surprised at how small of an angle something would be called "steep" at, too), then you don't want to be mowing on a tall machine with a high center of gravity.
No I don't want a very tall seat and high center gravity machine where I have to use weighted extentions on one side to keep the machine stable on cross cuts.
Go back and look at this one again. Use my previous comments to understand whether this is a *common* task for the machine or not. If you need to do it with regularity, you just landed squarely in the CUT category of machines. Get out your wallet as these machines will set you back $20,000 or more for a new one without batting an eyelash.
I was just thinking I may end up starting my own small business and this type of tool would make any fence project much easier and quicker to finish.
I like your attitude, but the truth is that it doesn't need to be. Depending on the model of machine you buy and its age, you could well be buying something made by a different company and simply branded with the Green paint.