Hi, glad to be aboard this Forum, thanks for the add.

I need help, I have 1.3 acres, flat in N. FL with many obstacles. I want a mower that will last, fab deck, Kawasaki, and I think better than ezt transaxles would be best, but I'm not rich. Any suggestions ? Width doesn't really matter with a zero turn of 1.3 acres in my book. Thank you, G

Hi. I'd recommend purchasing from a servicing dealer nearby. What dealers do you have near you? It sounds like you're looking for something in the estate/light commercial category. What's your budget. And deck size does matter to a point, but bigger isn't always better. For 1.3 acres I'd go with a 48 or 52 inch machine. Scag Liberty, Exmark Quest, Bob-Cat CRZ are all nice machines that come to my mind but Exmark always seems to come at a premium and the Jury is still out on their proprietary engines in my opinion, even though everything I've heard is that they're good engines. Then there's Snapper, Ferris, Ariens, Gravely, Husqvarna.

Edit: And the all important question, what's your budget?

For a mow of 1.3 acres go look at used commercial mowers.
Commercial operators seem to go 2 ways
Roll over their mowers the instant they are finished getting tax deductions
flog it to death and squeeze every minute of life out of it.

So the trick is finding a mower from one of the first group.
Nowever the worst condition totally flogged out commercial mower is still better than most new domestic mowers.

For example I resell and service every Cub Cadet 2000 series tractor I can get my hands on.
All the customers who bought one are totally happy with their mowers and a couple are on 5 & 10 acre blocks
The 2000 was a full commercial mower that came out too late to be a big commercial success as pros were shifting to ZTR's.
It got replaced by the 3000 series but looks like running rings around then for durability.

A mower with a horizontal crankshaft engine will be 200% better than a mower with a vertical engine.
There was a thread a while back about a John Deere ZTrak F620.
When I double checked my answer before posting I came a site with a lot of them for sale from $ 2000 to $ 4000 which is dirt cheap for one of these.
And one of these will last forever particularly as JD will be supplying parts for 50 years.

Fabricated decks are good but not the be all & end all.
Many good pressed decks will outlive heavier fabricated ones.

Every year, technology advances and costs rise but mower prices do not.
The magic pudding was a children's fairy tale so some thing has to give and what is getting designed out is durability particularly from the domestic end of the market.

I also have a few customers with old Great Danes, one is pro & his is still running strong with 6,000 hours on the clock ( has a replacement engine ).
When it comes to hydros, go for one with a reseviour & a replaceable filter.
They are very sensitive to oil quality and dead hydros is the usual reason for retiring mowers round here.
Got a yard full of mowers for spares, perfectly good except the hydros are gone & replacements down here are more expensive than a new mower so the customers generally make the wrong decision & buy an inferiour mower rather than fix their old one.

Darryl G said:

Hi. I'd recommend purchasing from a servicing dealer nearby. What dealers do you have near you? It sounds like you're looking for something in the estate/light commercial category. What's your budget. And deck size does matter to a point, but bigger isn't always better. For 1.3 acres I'd go with a 48 or 52 inch machine. Scag Liberty, Exmark Quest, Bob-Cat CRZ are all nice machines that come to my mind but Exmark always seems to come at a premium and the Jury is still out on their proprietary engines in my opinion, even though everything I've heard is that they're good engines. Then there's Snapper, Ferris, Ariens, Gravely, Husqvarna.

Edit: And the all important question, what's your budget?

Click to expand...

The budget is as little as possible but with durability in mind. I hate to go over $3500 and that is with tax at 7% but I am willing to listen and learn. The dealers nearby are Gravely, Husquvarna, Deere, (no) Ex-Mark, Toro, Bad Boy, Hustler and even Kubota. I found a base Hustler with Kawasaki power 52" cut for $2500 new but there is no hour meter and they are ezt trans not the 2800 or better. Also found an Ariens Ikon X 42 for $2800 and a 52" with Kawi power for $3000. Both have fab decks but both also have the ezt transaxles. I am capable of servicing but I am no hydraulics mechanic. Thanks for the above, I neglected to put the budget out there. I am ready to get either an Ariens Ikon-X, XL, or Apex, I just really want the Kawasaki and I'd like more than basic axles for durability, no hills and no towing, just a yard, fairly flat with one ditch of about 150' with 4' of 20 degree slope on either side.

Oh yes, and 52" would be about the max I would want to go for width due to obstacles as well as weight. I'd still like 3 blades to be spinning.

:welcome:

Welcome to the forum!

I'm going to move this thread over to our mower and equipment buying and pricing section.

The budget is as little as possible but with durability in mind. I hate to go over $3500 and that is with tax at 7% but I am willing to listen and learn. The dealers nearby are Gravely, Husquvarna, Deere, (no) Ex-Mark, Toro, Bad Boy, Hustler and even Kubota. I found a base Hustler with Kawasaki power 52" cut for $2500 new but there is no hour meter and they are ezt trans not the 2800 or better. Also found an Ariens Ikon X 42 for $2800 and a 52" with Kawi power for $3000. Both have fab decks but both also have the ezt transaxles. I am capable of servicing but I am no hydraulics mechanic. Thanks for the above, I neglected to put the budget out there. I am ready to get either an Ariens Ikon-X, XL, or Apex, I just really want the Kawasaki and I'd like more than basic axles for durability, no hills and no towing, just a yard, fairly flat with one ditch of about 150' with 4' of 20 degree slope on either side.

Click to expand...

Just because you want a mower that has certain criteria and have a limited budget does not mean that some one has to make exactly what you want.
I know this is not what Americans are taught. The capatilist marketing system means whatever you want will be produced just because you want it.

Every year the cost of materials goes up, the costs of insurance goes up, the cost of employing people goes up ( not necessarily wages ) but people expect that the price of what they want will go down.
It can not happen, something has to give and what gives is durability.
Thus the mowers look pretty & strong & powerful which they all are but in 5 years most will be ready for the scrap bin & you will be doing this all over again .
I have only been repairing mowers for the past 5 years but even over that short a period I have seen a drastic drop in the quality & durability of what is on offer.

I suggest very strongly you go & haunt consumer complaint web sites & consumer review sites and look at all of the problems people are having with brand new mowers.

More & more new machines come in with low hours failed hydros.
Down here they must last 12 months by law but more than one has spent the majority of the 12 months in a workshop.

When locals ask my opinion they get told $10,000 is about the minimum to expect to pay for a long term durable mower ( in Aust monopoly money )
There is currently a YTH2648 in the workshop with 550 hours of easy residential lawn cutting on a 1 acre block with a totally worn out tranny.
To make life easy on his mower he fitted the 42" fabricated deck yet it still died at 550 hours and it will be a $ 2000 repair ( AUS)

BEfore you open your wallet, go read this rather long thread about EZT trannies https://www.lawnmowerforum.com/showthread.php/26680-HydroGear-EZT-Transaxle

Note that quite a few of them were failing in as little as 200 hours ( around 4 years on your property ) .
There is a reason that all the low price mowers fit EZT's, they are the cheapest locally made tranny you can get.
This of course does not preclude one lasting for 5000 hours but nless you believe in winning lotteries then EZT's are best avoided.

There are 2 ezt transmissions, right, the 2100 and 2200? I heard that the 2200s had a much lower failure rate and something about the shaft diameter of the 2100s being a huge issue. I also heard that heat generated during prolonged use was much of the culprit in their destruction. I'm no expert or mechanic. My machines either have the dual wheel pump & motor setup or the 3400 transmission and I've never had to perform any repairs on them other than a blown hose due to chaffing.

I'd recommend steeping up to the $4 or $5K range to get into a machine that will hold up with a lower likely hood that you'll end up calling it scrap in 4 or 5 years. You can often get free or very low % financing if you don't mind taking on some debt. I couldn't resist 4 year zero % on my Bob-Cat. Toro has some nice machines but I think all of them in your price range have their proprietary engines in them. I'll also ditto Bert's earlier comment about finding a used commercial machine with low hours that's been well cared for. You may even want to consider skipping a zero-turn all together and go with a used commercial walk-behind with a stand-on sulky...but I realize you may have ruled that out for personal reasons.

Check out the new Cub Cadet Ultima series. The ZT2 models have the 2800 hydro's as well as a Kawasaki engine. The ZT2 50 is ~$3700 which is close to your price range.

I've been heavily researching zero turns over the past few months and I'm in a similar situation.. Go with the EZT's (Bad Boy MZ Magnum, Toro MX, Cub Cadet ZT1 - these are the ones in my area) or something that is serviceable like the 2800's or 3100's (Scag Liberty Z, Ferris 400S, Cub Cadet Ultima ZT2, Bad Boy ZT Elite, Toro Timecutter HD - these are the ones in my area).

Let us know what you end up choosing.. I'll do the same when I purchase within the next couple months.

bertsmobile1 said:

Just because you want a mower that has certain criteria and have a limited budget does not mean that some one has to make exactly what you want.
I know this is not what Americans are taught. The capatilist marketing system means whatever you want will be produced just because you want it.

Every year the cost of materials goes up, the costs of insurance goes up, the cost of employing people goes up ( not necessarily wages ) but people expect that the price of what they want will go down.
It can not happen, something has to give and what gives is durability.
Thus the mowers look pretty & strong & powerful which they all are but in 5 years most will be ready for the scrap bin & you will be doing this all over again .
I have only been repairing mowers for the past 5 years but even over that short a period I have seen a drastic drop in the quality & durability of what is on offer.

I suggest very strongly you go & haunt consumer complaint web sites & consumer review sites and look at all of the problems people are having with brand new mowers.

More & more new machines come in with low hours failed hydros.
Down here they must last 12 months by law but more than one has spent the majority of the 12 months in a workshop.

When locals ask my opinion they get told $10,000 is about the minimum to expect to pay for a long term durable mower ( in Aust monopoly money )
There is currently a YTH2648 in the workshop with 550 hours of easy residential lawn cutting on a 1 acre block with a totally worn out tranny.
To make life easy on his mower he fitted the 42" fabricated deck yet it still died at 550 hours and it will be a $ 2000 repair ( AUS)

BEfore you open your wallet, go read this rather long thread about EZT trannies https://www.lawnmowerforum.com/showthread.php/26680-HydroGear-EZT-Transaxle

Note that quite a few of them were failing in as little as 200 hours ( around 4 years on your property ) .
There is a reason that all the low price mowers fit EZT's, they are the cheapest locally made tranny you can get.
This of course does not preclude one lasting for 5000 hours but nless you believe in winning lotteries then EZT's are best avoided.

Click to expand...

Yes, I know I'm cheap. I didn't mean someone had to make what I wanted, rather I wanted to know if anyone had a model or make that offered these items. I've talked to mower shops, big box stores etc... and I seem to get a different answer to each question, no you don't need those fancy transaxles, the ezt's are just fine. I don't want something for nothing, I'd just like to buy a mower one time. Hopefully it will outlast me. Thanks for the thread to tell me what is what on the trans axles. Thanks, G I appreciate all that everyone has posted for me and others, it really helps get through the "maze of mowers"