Buying a tractor

[Hilltop366]

Not sure why, but they appear to be having no problems resupplying their stock

Could be because South Korea did such a good with prevention at the beginning of covid, around here in the car lots North American manufactures are almost empty, while the Japanese brands are mostly full and South Korean brands are full. The Kioti dealer (the only dealer close by) has lots of tractors as well.  

[kantuckid]

New tractors in todays market come from all over the world-mostly Asia. My last two have been Kioti's are of course, South Korean assembled in NC. 

[wisconsitom]

Bobcat, I am told, is going to begin more stateside production, somewhere in NC too I believe.  Same place as Kioti?  They'd planned this prior to covid, which did put a hiccup in their plans, but are said to be going forward with the move.

BTW, somebody either here or in another tractor thread thought Bobcat quit making tractors.  This is correct-they didn't want to deal with the then-new tier 4 requirements.  But work-arounds have since been developed, and they're back in that market with new product.

[kantuckid]

Bobcat didn't make them, i.e. tractors to begin with- they sold re-branded Kioti's in white but only did certain models, not the entire Kioti lineup. Bobcat skid steers tyhgat they did make, had Daedong engines at one point, maybe still do? Not like I keep up with that aspect. 
I will throw out that the Kioti manuals are written by English speakers, not Koreans and seem well done.  I have the DK 35/40/45 series shop manual. 
Probably done in NC at Kioti assy plant. 

[Bruno of NH]

Bobcat is owned by Dosan now.
I'm not sure but would expect the ctl , wheeled skid and excavators are all Dosan powered now.

[wisconsitom]

When you go thru my Bobcat owner's manual, you eventually get to the warranty info in the back of the book-all Kioti.

[charles mann]

Iv got a kubota M7060 with 64 hp to the pto, 4x4, 4 fwd/rev in low/high. Even with the dpf regen, with now, 284 hrs. it has been great until a month ago when i was shredding my pasture and i started loosing power. It was acting as if it was trying to regen, with the low power i was getting out of it. 

Come to find out, the #1 injector crapped out, and my friendly field rats had gotten to the wiring harness a d chewed the insulation off the #2 injector wire, at the connector. The svc manager said a new harness was $1300, and my bill for the 1 injector replacement was $1700. After some common sense conversation with the manager, and a waiver of liability/warranty on the wringing harness, i got the tractor back almost good as new. 

When these new model things break, they are expensive

[kantuckid]

FWIW: I've got my tractor back on duty a week ago- but still thinking I might go for something new. TYM is one I'm looking at- In sizing up the specs on the T474 I noticed in the header facts they say, among that header info says that TYM acquired Branson in 2016, who is actually Kukje. 
I've not researched anything further but I know some Mahindra's say made by TM, some by Mitsubishi and some by themselves in India. 
One TYM ad online suggests google-ing Kukje with the suggestion seeming to be that they mfg. engines?  
I was talking re-gen with an OH Kioti dealer/owner and he said theirs doesn't rely on electronics for re-gen thus less likely to have a gremlin show up.
Wiring is much less expensive to repair when you splice, etc.. FOMOCO wanted like $300+ hundred dollars for a chipmunk chewing a wire leading to my carbon cannister underneath on the frame-I got away with a self splice job reusing the pigtail too. Truck was brand new, only a couple of days old so I leaped at a warranty repair notion thinking the check engine light should be looked at- was a basic wire fix job in the end. They eat lots of stuff on our place, also mice and mud daubers-all make me extra work...
 
 

[kantuckid]

I stayed in the hunt for another tractor last few months, found a kioti dealer where I was satisfied on price, no tax but like many no tractor to sell me. I then began looking again @ Mahindra ( I liked the 3560) and TYM (I liked the T494) & Branson where I liked the 3620R or 4820R.
 
This week I made a deal over the phone for a private sale 2021 Branson 4820R near Hermann, MO which I'll fetch this next Monday. 
It's probably real close to firefighterontheside location wise?
 It's got 78 hours, well set up with remotes, fluid ballast, canopy (I'll probably tear it up soon?) and similar in weight and capacity to the Kioti NX4510/NX5010 tractors.

Per the fit & finish comments above-I've talked to several dealers who opt to assemble their own tractors as they can control things being done right and save enough to cover the cost mostly. Both Branson & TYM have better overall availability than Kioti but Kioti plays favorites with a few dealers who have "some" tractors to sell. If you are in the hunt for one of those 3 brands I can possibly save you some time shopping dealers as I've wasted plenty of phone time lately going zonkers over finding my next tractor. 
A NC dealer/owner of 3 TYM dealerships says that TYM bought 100% of Branson last year but they remain separate business entities, have their own distribution and so on.
 In this world wide shortage, materials higher costs & slowed shipping senarios situation there's much disturbance going on between various mfg.'s , distributors and dealers as to who gets the goodies. 

[zippski]

Meanwhile there are tractors sitting dead right now waiting on parts and many brands affected. I saw a tractor ad recently on a web sale site the owner said it had major warranty reapirs and now a VG Mahindra but he further said he hadn't laid eyes on it in over a year while it waited for repair parts at the dealer where it was repaired and now for sale on consignment. That's one reason my tractor is dead right now-other tractors waiting on parts block valuable shop space. When a tractor is broken down it's then not mobile to sit aside out of the way.  My dilemma is to either buy a 2nd one or wait. I'm testing my patience for now...   

Tell me about that...>:(


The local dealer has been holding my Mahindra 9125P waiting for parts for some minor warranty work since the end of June.  No timeline for its return.  It's a good thing that I don't have to earn my living with it or I would have had to get a loaner.  Apparently  a large fire in their Texas parts warehouse has compounded the issue.  The strange thing is, the main backordered parts are for the loader, which is built entirely in the USA, not in India.  Then again, they are electronic parts, so that may mean they are still  shipped from overseas

Leigh
zippski

[kantuckid]

The NY Times had a recent article toward worldwide shortages, ports closed and such-it's a very long list of factors.
 I found the letters to the editor very interesting as many of our population have become over-buyers gobbling up stuff we don't need like there's no tomorrow.
People that grabbed up covid items early on-some went to jail. Nobody I've heard of is in jail for buying up all the canning lids for re-sale at crazy prices? 
 This applies to sawmills & tractors as well as placemats for people who have closets full of them. Parts are much affected by steel and other metals plus labor that's not showing up for work or lacks the skill to hold down the jobs left waiting or simply lazy and living large off USA government bucks added to covid related unemployment checks. It's a zoo of a world we live in right now. 
One lady who was at my MIL's estate sale already owns 21 sewing machines. Many buying tractors are new land owners of baby farms if 4-5 acres qualifies? One guy I read a comment from was choosing a 65hp tractor w/cab to maintain what's basically an empty few acres of mowed area.