Neil from Messick's here. Today, we're out with the Kubota B-series tractor. I wanted to go through and show you some of the differences between using a mid-mount finish mower and a rear 3-point mounted finish mower and show you some of the differences in these mowers between their different construction and different applications for the varying mowing chores that you may have.
Before we talk about the construction of the mowers, we're going to show you some of the functional differences and how they work differently when you're actually operating the tractor. The first thing we're going to show is the trimming implications for having the mower beside you and underneath of you where you can see it versus back behind the tractor. We're going to start the machine up here and follow this asphalt edge right here. I'm not actually going to cut the grass, but I'm going to explain to you how trimming along, say, fence rows and stuff can be very different with these two types of mowers.
If we put on our imagination hats here, imagine with me that we've got a fence line right here along this grass between, say, where the grass is and the asphalt is. If I go to mow along that fence line with my mid-mount mower, I have a very clear sight line here from the seat where I can sit down and see the edge of my mower deck, making it very easy to track along this asphalt edge. Now, versus that 3-point mower that's back behind me here, when I look behind the tractor, I can't see nearly as well where the edge of my mower deck is. I can eyeball it, but I don't have that straight sight line to be able to see where I'm at.
I also ran into a little problem here when I go to turn. If I want to turn away from my edge here and I turn my steering wheel, the tractor in the mid-mount mower tracks away from my fence, but if you look behind me here and see my 3-point hitch mower, I've now swung my 3-point hitch mower into my fence, possibly hitting my fence post or those kinds of things because this thing being behind you tracks differently from the tractor. You just have to be cognizant of that. If you have a mower behind you, it's not going to track with the tractor because it's not within its wheelbase and it can swing underneath of things.
Now, some guys do actually like having that mower back there for fence rows. Because it's behind the tractor, you could do things like back underneath the fence row, so you want to get underneath the wire for instance. Having a little bit wider mid-mount mower can help that by buying the largest size that you can, but having that rear mower does allow you to push it back into places where you wouldn't be able to get a belly-mounted mower.
Here's another great example of that. I'm tracking along this sign right here. As I come past it, we're going to turn away from the sign. Watch my rear-mount mower. It swipes right over here right into the post. That's your application or you've got to watch when you turn away from things.
Cutting around things is easier with my mid-mount mower as well. When I'm eyeing up my telephone pole here and I approach my pole, I can easily see down to the cutting edge of my mid-mount mower and just circle around this. Even with this large B-series tractor, the turning radius of these tractors is actually surprisingly tight. You can cut tighter circles around things than what you would expect.
This 01 series also has turning breaks as well so if you want to cut it even tighter, you take your tractor into two-wheel drive instead of four-wheel, come up here and then break your inside tire and you can see how tightly I can stick around this pole. Now, when I do that, you can see I skidded there a little bit on the inside so doing that can tear your grass up a little bit, but you could do some really tight turns and very close trimming with that mid-mount mower.
Looking over my rear one over here, when I want to get up against this thing, I really almost have to get close to it and take a swipe past it and then come back around and take a swipe past it again. It almost take at least three or four passes by this thing to get close to it because I can't track nearly as close to the pole with that mower behind me.
You can see, as an operator, the mid-mount mower is just overall easier to trim with. I can get closer to things, I can see my edges a lot better, I know where my mower is at at all times. It just gives you a little bit more comfort factor in residential mowing. That said though, guys do like the rear mowers for some more commercially-minded applications where, say, fence rows, if you want to push underneath the things or get underneath the pine branches and those kinds of things, you could turn that mower up back on and back up into those areas where you're not going to be able to get your entire tractor.
Now, if you look at the construction of these mowers too, you can see that more field-oriented perspective in the way that these are built. There's just some limitations to that mid-mount mower on how heavy duty it can be. You can only fit so much mower underneath the belly of a tractor. When you look at a rear mower, you'll usually see heavy construction. When you look at, say, the size of the gauge wheels versus the gauge wheels on a mid-mount mower, the size of the tubing, the size of the spindles, the bulk of the blades. Your 3-point hitch mowers are built a little bit heavier. For that reason, they are popular with the guys who might be mowing a lot of acreage.
You're going to go out, you're going to cut a four-acre field, it's a good application for a 3-point mower. You're not doing as much trimming, you're buying a heavier duty mower and just dragging it behind the tractor where you always know that it is. For field applications, maybe worth looking at a 3-point, but for more residential applications, we always will go to the mid-mount first.
Another factor you may want to consider is what your grass conditions are like. If you look at the construction of these mowers, you look at the mid-mount and notice that the mid-mount decks aren't as deep as what the rear-mount decks can be. Again, when the mower is underneath the belly of the tractor, the deeper they make it, the less ground clearance you have so that becomes a bit of an issue. Generally, your rear-mount mowers are going to be a deeper, heavier deck and therefore able to handle higher volumes of grass better.
Rear mowers are often rear discharge as well, so when you go into that really thick, heavy, clumpy stuff, a rear-discharge mower has a much wider opening across the back and can discharge and clean that grass out a lot more quickly and a lot more effectively than a side-discharge mower does underneath the belly of a tractor.
Like all things in the tractor business, painting with a broad brush is never a good idea. One implement is never the right choice for every person that's out there, but if we generalize here a little bit, typically, we're putting mid-mount mowers into residential applications and rear-mount mower into a more commercial, industrial, agricultural-type application. Just differences being the mounting style, the ease of trimming, and back here, the volumes of grass and the durability that that mower can offer.
If you're going through the purchasing process right now, we can help. Or you have any parts and service needs for a piece of equipment that you already have, give us a call at Messick's. We're available at 800-222-3373 or online at messicks.com
