I already have 35 horsepower tractor, I have 5 acres to mow about half is lawn the other half more weeds with a gradual slope. I tried the finish mower I wasn't extremely crazy about it especially going up hills with it, always seemed to pop up in the air and leave high spots of grass, it also makes the tractor considerably longer. I like the idea of a zero turn, but not the idea of a additional piece of motorized equipment to maintain

If you have the means and your time is valuable, a commercial zero turn is the best but most costly option.

My yard is 4A, and I, like you, already have a similar tractor (JD 3039R) and I have a Woods 72" finisher on the 3-pt.. Even with a few slopes here I have no problem with this setup..

IF I didn't have a tractor, the zero-turn would be used... But ye gods, those things are expensive.. Good ones running 7 grand +++... The Woods cost me $2K....

However, those that have 'em sure love the time savings they offer.. FWIW.

Wait for Bristoe’s response.

He a pro.

Commercial 72" zero turn is fast, you will feel like you are cutting grass on a go cart it is so fast.

https://www.hustlerturf.com/

The decks are strong enough were you can run over shovels and hoes, horse shoes.

Buy the best, upgrade the seat with a seat that moves like a truck driver's seat. You will not live long enough to wear out the mower as a home owner.

Buy gas engines, never diesel.

Leaning towards a flail mower with a hydraulic shift adjust that goes side to side

Nobody ever goes back to another type of mower once they've used a zero turn.

There's some good mowers in the $5K range that should handle 5 acres for many years.

For the money, a ZT Elite looks like a good choice. It's got the Hydro Gear 3100 series transmissions and is available with the 23 HP Kawasaki motor.

https://www.badboymowers.com/bad-boy-shop/zero-turn-mowers/zt-elite-lawn-mower

Zero turn all the way. It will be alot faster and the cut will be better. If money is an issue, look for a used commercial unit. They can last thousands of hours and the parts are replaceable and widely available.

I have a flail for my tractor. I use it for mowing down down thick weeds and barberry. No way I would want to mow my lawn with it.

Many of the compact tractors have a forward facing mid mounted PTO shaft to drive mid mounted mowers.

If the tractor is equipped for it, I would certainly consult the dealer about a mid mounted mower. Probably 72 to 96 inch mowing swath, depending on terrain. If you go too wide, you will scalp the high spots if the ground is not fairly smooth, which is not the same as level.

I have a 72" flail mower and hate it. I should have bought a finish mower.

Use a JD 1070 with a 72" flail for "mowing" around the house/outbuildings and a 72" Woods rotary for cutting the full 20+ acres once a year to keep the tansy ragwort at bay. Both are fine for field mowing but if you are maintaining a lawn, 0-turn all the way.

Also, Cub Cadet recently came out with their ZT2 mower which has the Hydro Gear 2800 transmissions and the 23 HP Kawasaki motor for under $4K. They're selling a *lot* of these.

https://www.cubcadet.com/en_US/view-all-riding-lawn-mowers/zt2-50/17RIEACO010.html

google tractor house John Deere 72 mower. It is a "drive over" attachment.

Prices run $4k to $1.5K depending on degree of "newness". The John Deere 72 is apparently the same mowing deck which is used on John Deere zero turn machines. If I understood what I was seeing.

Bought a BadBoy commercial grade “Rebel” 54 inch deck first of March to mow the in-laws place. It has the 850 cc Kawasaki engine and was money well spent. Went with the adjustable air ride seat, mows fast and smooth. What used to take most of the day is now an 1 to 1.5 hour minor task.

I have a 2006 Ex-mark Lazer Z still running the original belts and blades...It has had 2 batterys and 5 oil changes and one Electric PTO for the blades...so about 300 bucks in 14 years.. I mow 3 ac twice a week....It still looks and runs like new....

I remember a pallet of no name push mowers at a grocery store many years back for $99 a pop. The SKS of mowers.

Now they cost $300 at Home Depot, have tall tires, are self propelled, and say Toro across the front.

2004 Exmark. Bought in 2011 with 700 hours on it. I use it 2 hours a week to mow my yard from Mid-March to October. Any issues have been self induced. Enough of them have been made and various varieties that all the wear parts are common across a bunch of different mowers.

So simple my 9 year old can do it-

DO you have the top link to tight.?...... it should be fairly loose as this allows the mower to move up and down and follow the terrain, obliviously within limits. Finnish mowers will give you a lawnmower type cut......flail mowers somewhere between a finish and a bush hog, depending on the type of knives you use. for 5 Ac of grassish type lawn, the Zero turn will be the best and fastest, but you should go to a commercial heavy duty type, cause it sounds like some of your lawn is almost more pasture than lawn. Everything you want to know about Flail and finish mowers got to tractor by net .com.......there is a 600 page flail mower thread. You can search there for all three

Another vote for Zero Turn. Have had a 5ft cut, 28hp, Dixie Chopper for past 15 years. Still going strong. No complaints. With knobby ATV tires on the back, and the deck up, it also identifies as a small bush hog...

Regardless of what you get, if it has an options for a ROPS, get it. We have had two fatalities in our little county in past 10 years due to Z mower turn overs...

Any type of mower that hooks up to your 3 point hitch will skip areas like that.

The only way to avoid it if to get the zero turn mower, or get a drawbar hitch pulled mower.

But the drawbar hitch cutters make your tractor even longer than what you mentioned.

What are you doing to make a finish mower pop up in the air?If your hills are so steep and ground rough that a tractor isn't working a zero turn might not be the answer.

Bristoe is giving good advice.
The mower he is recommending, I don't know.
However, and this is important, components make a ZTR.
Not a brand name. They all use shelf engines and drives.
All they build is the frame and deck. And some, suspensions.

You want the 3100 transmissions, or, pump and motor.
Look into any engine you buy with regards to series.
Every manufacturer makes an engine you don't want.
Every one. (Except, maybe, Honda)

And if you are going to cut high weeds and grass, 23hp isn't enough.
It will got down. If you how it often, it will do fine.

Have a coworker that has a commercial mowing business on the side, I think he is running 3 new Deere's right now. Saturday, he found out they don't make very good boats. He was mowing (not his workers) at an apartment complex. Going up a 'hill' by their water feature pond. It shifted in some mud on a bump, slid down hill, said as soon as the tires hit water it started floating out to sea. Got it shut off before it sank. I've got a picture of him standing on the seat with only his head out of the water. Ran to Home Depot for some chains to pull it out. Haven't heard the prognosis on getting it dried out yet. Said it had 35 hours on it....

The very nature of how it's mounted in the rear causes that.

NO place is completely level.

As you go over the terrain, if the front of the tractor dips down, the rear, where the mower is hooked up will raise up.

Thus the advantage of the belly attachment mower on the front facing PTO. Turn that compact tractor into an over sized lawn mower/garden tractor.

Have you ever seen a slack chain used in place of the third link. That allows the back of the implement to float.

Or a hydraulic cylinder with the control set to float. My 3 point cement mixer uses a hydraulic 3'rd link.

There are different flail mowers.
One has a larger number of more delicate
blades for a finer cut, and one that has a
lesser number of more rugged heavier blades
to cut heavier brushy weeds and light brush.


I'll say here and I don't know the particulars
of the poster, that many people tend to try
and mow too fast. You don't get as good of
a cut and your mower/ tractor will bounce
around and not cut evenly or as well as it
would if one would drop down a gear and
back off the throttle a bit.
I have a neighbor that rushes through and
bounces his tractor and shredder all over
the place and has clumps sticking up here
and there all over where his machine was
slightly airborne

Hustler Super Z with a 60" deck (minimum) 66" or 72" preferably.

Next question.

I made the mistake of buying a flail mower . . . . . .once.

Never again.

I'm on my third season of mowing 4 acres with a residential grade, EZT transmission Hustler Raptor Limited. It takes about 4.5 hours to mow the whole place, but about a third of my yard is a zero turn obstacle course.

4 acres is pushing it for an EZT equipped residential grade mower. But it's held up well. It's got a 52" deck and the 23 HP Kawasaki motor. I'm content with its ability to mow 4 acres and I plan on keeping it going as long as possible.

There's not much on it that's expensive to replace other than the motor and the transmissions and I expect that one of the transmissions will die before the motor. A new transmission is about $600, so when one of those goes it'll be time to think about replacing it or the whole mower. It will depend on how many hours it has on it when a transmission goes.

Depending on how much rain we get, I'll have about 220-235 hours on it at the end of its 3rd season. If I can that much more out of it with nothing major going wrong with it, I'll call it good. In fact, if I get 6 seasons out of it I'll buy another just like it.

But 6 seasons is a pretty big "if". We'll see.

I have a 32HP Kubota loader series tractor with a bucket on the front, and a 72 inch woods 3 point finish mower. Since it is hyro transmission, it it easy to reverse and dilly around. I have 4 acres, and I get it done in 2 hours. I do hit things like trees and the shed if I am not careful. I think it is a good solution, and even if I hit the lotto I still like the idea of less equipment to maintain. If you let things sit, that leads to problems, so less is more
I do lust for a zero turn and have the money, but resist the urge.

Been using finish mover for over 20 years,gets the job done,then haul hay with tractor in winter time,switch to bushhog when need to mow pasture,,zero turn only can mow,and probley cost more then a tractor

Finish mower be best!

While having the zero turn is another motor to maintain, you don't have to monkey with anything like you might have to do with a tractor that is used for mulitiple purposes. Before I had my current combo of a a 45 hp tractor and a zero turn, I had a Kubota BX with a MM mower deck. It did a decent job of mowing, but it was a pain to take the mower deck off if I needed to so something back in the woods were I need the ground clearance.

I would go with the zero turn mower.

Used a regular for years and my back would really hurt and it took a long time because it was ruff.

Now with my Kubota mower it takes me about 35 minutes to mow the same places.

They cost more but the ones with a welded deck will last a long time.

No matter what brand you get make sure there is a good dealer that you can turn to if you have problems or need parts.

Id get a push mower and hire Renegade50's wife. Looks like she does a hell of a job.

Irving D: I don't care what anyone else says the huge John Deere "zero turn" extra wide deck with power clipping pick-up attachment was the best tool/implement I have ever invested in!
PERIOD!
Used it today in fact and only curse myself for not getting one earlier in my life (had it 2 1/2 seasons now!).
Buy American.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Off topic but funny - I bought a Craftsman pusher around 18 years ago for 199.00. Got it home, assumed it had oil, started it up and made about 2.5 passes and it stalled. No oil. Oops. Put oil in it, turned it a few times via the blade, pulled the rope and it started. Still using it and it starts on the first pull and no, ive never changed the oil.

Most of my customers are using higher end or commercial zero turn. The other option for a tow mower is a rough cut mower instead of a finish cut. An upper or top height adjusting position is your best bet unless you enjoy repairing your mower deck.

Sincere question for anyone-
How the hades does one tear up a mower deck?
I used this one out back here that was bought new
in 1994 from wally world ( not a top drawer by any
stretch) to mow this one acre here, and it's never
needed quills or spindles, and the deck isn't cracked
or dented or welded.
Now, I have seen a bunch that were barely suited
for scrap, and they got that way from the user
running over sh*t, not paying attention to what they
were doing, etc. etc.
What gets me is when they price it
as a nearly new whatever it is

depends on what you are mowing. my property is tough on my deck. bumps, roots, rocks, stumps, etc.

I'd clean it up so I wouldn't have to run over that mess

If its doing it a lot there's something not right I mow some pretty steep hills even mow some stuff I probably shouldn't with a finish mower and I don't really have any problem with it skipping places.On the mower the lower hookup and the top are hinged.When the mowers down all that pulls it are the lower arms it would have be a heck of a hill crest before the back would come up.

[/quote]

Got a self propelled Honda mower back in 97. Just changed the oil last year for the first time. Starts on the second pull every time.

This part just popped up in my feeble mind late last night... You must have your mower connected to the top link... Don't. A finishing mower has wheels front and rear and is meant to travel off the top link..

I installed a hydraulic top link about two years ago and have it on the JD Quick Hitch.. When I hook up the Woods and lock the bushings into the 3-pt arms, I move the top of the Quick Hitch fully in towards the tractor and that keeps the top of it away from the mower's tower area where a top link normally goes.. That way the mower floats over all the grounds and none of it affects the tractor's front end weight...

FWIW.

Interesting and timely topic. Would like to hear more from Bristoe regarding the gearboxes on the various zero-turns.

Right now I have my eye on a SCAG. They're build 15 miles from me and I know a couple of guys that work there. Hoping I might be able to buy one through them at an "employee discount".

It ain’t ‘Murcia if you’ve went a whole week and not seen a 300 pound 11 year old kid on a Lowe’s Hustler with his little mantitts and side gills jiggling. The most calories he’ll burn all week.

A company called Hydro Gear makes the transmissions for about 90% of all the zero turn mowers. Their page lists the different models. Click "Products" at the top of the page. They're have them broken down into residential and commercial models. The residential transmissions they list are the ZT-1800, ZT-2200, and the ZT-2800. But many mowers that people are using for residences have the more heavy duty transmission that Hydro Gear lists as commercial.

https://www.hydro-gear.com/

A mescan.

+1


I got too much hunting and fishing to do to mess with cutting grass.

It's unbelievable what folks try to do with mower decks. I've been in the business for well over 25 years and I still see new ways to destroy stuff.. The majority of the time, it's using them for ground engagement equipment. Leveling dirt and landscaping projects, instead of cutting grass and smaller weeds..

Classic....made my day! Enjoy the 4th!