On Wed, 14 Apr 2004 22:08:26 GMT, Carl Byrns wrote:
On Wed, 14 Apr 2004 03:30:05 -0400, Gary Coffman
shouted from the rooftop:

What I really wanted, and what I should have bought, was a John
Deere 48 inch front deck zero turning radius mower. That's a hoss,
tough, dependable, and able to do things you'd otherwise need a
trim mower to do (I have one up at the farm).

None of the above. Contractors around here won't use John Deere and
JD's commercial turf equipment is the joke of the industry.
Good tractors, lousy mowers.

In the 10 years I've owned that machine, it has mowed 3.5 acres weekly
(hired hand driving). In that time, one bearing in the mower deck has had
to be replaced (obviously wasn't being greased by the hired hand). I also
replaced the belts and the blades while I was at it, though they both had
some life left. Other than that, it has been solid as a rock.

I can't say the same for the Toro piece of crap I have here, which has
eaten 2 (expensive) belts and split a pulley in the 2 years I've owned
it (won't keep the damn battery charged either). The Toro (Briggs) engine
bogs on any bit of tall grass too. I can take the JD out into a pasture and
cut there. No way the Toro could.

A Grasshopper and
a Dixon were also in the running. But I Cheapistaned out and
bought that blasted Toro instead. (Wheel Horse my ass!)

Never heard of Grasshopper.

Grasshopper is a popular brand in the South, lower Midwest, and the Plains
states. You see them everywhere in this part of the country. Grasshopper has
been making these ZTR machines since 1970. They're very solidly built. The
frames are heavy wall 3 and 4 inch square tubing, decks are welded up from
heavy steel plate. No brittle castings or flimsy sheetmetal here. They use a
real hydraulic motor drive system with Ross wheel motors and Hydrogear
pumps. They use Vanguard or Kohler engines on the smaller mowers, Kubota
gas or diesel engines on the larger machines. They're fully powder coated.
Never seen one with any rust. Prices *start* at $5700 for their smallest
model (which would do nicely for my mowing needs here), and go up from
there.

As for Dixon...

Dixon has been around nearly as long, since 1974. Their machines are
more oriented toward the homeowner than Grasshopper, smaller, with
a fiberglass body shell over a tubing frame, but still good machines in
their niche.

No hydraulics on these small machines. They use variable ratio belt
drives to the wheels. A friend has one that's 15 years old, and still
going strong on the original belts (!!!). It won't keep up with my John
Deere, but it cost a lot less too, prices start at $2300 for the smallest
Dixon, the Deere cost me right at $5000 10 years ago.

The inside scoop is this: Toro and Jacobsen are the industry leaders.
Ford and Chevy. There are some other good machines out there (Stiener
and Husqvarna come to mind) but their support is small and that limits
sales. The rest are all built in a three-sided barn by a bunch of
liquored up hillbillies with a Montgomery Wards buzzbox.

I think you might be surprised if you toured the Grasshopper plant.
It is a modern 300,000 square foot facility with CAD/CAM, CNC
machining centers, robotic welding cells, powder coat booths and
ovens, etc. Dixon is a bit more mom and pop, but it is no shed either.
Both are in Kansas.

Either one of them produce machines that are light years ahead
of my Toro Wheel Horse. Hell, my 31 year old 8 hp Snapper is light
years ahead of the 16 hp Toro in what it will ride over and cut, and
in the abuse it has tolerated too.

I've seen Toro commercial turf equipment, and it is *much* better
built than *my* Toro. OTOH, put one beside a Grasshopper and it
looks downright flimsy. Grasshoppers are the Terex truck of the
mowing business.

I've had enough of this crappy Toro, I'm going to buy the small
Grasshopper that I should have bought in the first place.

Gary