ATV for Farm Stuff - need direction from y'all

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

Brought this home today. It's been 20 years since I have been on one. Wow, this is fast and powerful. Absolutely going to help me get stuff done faster

 

[wyoDreamer]

You will get so much use out of that beast!
We absolutely LOVE our Polaris ATV's. Maybe not as fast as some of the ATV's out there, but so much handier. I use mine all the time on the property. Our is a 2-Up though, and has a small dump box on the back. They do not make our model anymore... It is rated to haul 300 pounds in the dump box.

 

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

We have Polaris Sportsman ATV's.
Our first one was a workhorse - 6-wheels, 4'x4' dump bed on the back, part of the dump bed could be changed into a seat for a second rider. Oh, and it had 4 wheel drive and Turf mode. It could carry a second rider and a couple of coolers for trail riding, or 800 lbs on the back for packing out an elk. Problem was that it was not fuel injected, so driving it the mountains was not good - the poor carberater couldn't breath. so we traded it in towards a Polaris 700 with fuel injection.

WE now have 2 of htem, a 700 and a 800. Both have 2-up, winch and dump bed.

For a workhorse that will double for fun, I highly recommend these.

Something like this: https://atv.polaris.com/en-us/sportsman-6x6-570/

Seems like a JD Gator, but a bit different. Maybe a bit more back country versatile

 

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

Yes, that is it. It was about 13 years ago that we bought our first one, so it was sorta simliar to that but they have changed it up alot I see.

We were so disappointed to have to trade it in because it was so useful, but if it couldn't run at our new place which was at 7200 feet, then we really couldn't use it where we hunted and cut firewood, which was closer to 9000 feet..

The Sportsman that we have now are regular 4 wheeled ATV's.

The Gator is a bench seat UTV, isn't it? so sitting side-by-side instead of sitting behind the driver like the sportsman..

Damn I miss the mountains. Went to my first three years of highschool in western Montana.

 

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

i've used and worked with both ATVs and UTVs i would highly recommend going with a UTV and you can find good ones used if you can bump your price up another 750 it makes a difference on whats available plus there is always room for negoiations with cash in hand. ATVs are great if you are doing light work but they lack a bed and seating is sparse. UTV are also good for light to medium work (snow plowing) they tend to be heavier, have a bed, bench seat and a canopy (very nice add on). i used a polaris 400 in mid 90s to work on my Dads farm while it work well sometimes it just sucked pulling a trailer with up the hills (steep) and the truck couldn't get there either. while stationed in MS i used UTVs (cushmans) for equipment and ppl transport from the repair facility to the ships at the piers and we dogged these machines and they held up to Navy abuse well. for a while golfcarts were the thing to have on base but the UTVs have just out worked them (we killed the golfcarts). YMMV we have had Polaris, cushman, Gators, and Mules.

My neighbor bought a Polaris Ranger. It is nice and the bed is actually bigger than it looks, but it seems a bit beefy for what I need, plus it's not exactly small or even mid-sized. I feel if I was going that route I should just go look for an old Willy's, especially considering the price. He said the base was 11k or 12k and then after adding on everything he wanted it was another 11 or 12k, so at that point you're buying a damn car.

I've used Gators before when I worked at a campground, and they're good for general hauling of people or tools and using a harrow, but yeah, I wouldn't think to take them into any truly bumpy terrain or attach a blade or whatever to them.

It's sad that vehicles (cars and trucks) and these smaller vehicles have all gotten so sporty and feature driven that they get stupid expensive. I saw this ATV listed on k-bid a week or so ago when it was still under 1k and laughed thinking "oh, that's nice, but it's going to jump to at least 5k"

Anyways, guess I have more homework to do. Maybe this is a "pay off debt and then maybe next year you can think about this" type of thing.

 

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

We love our Zero-Turn - it turned 3 hours of mowing into 45 minutes!! We did spend more than we should have, but DH likes to get the best and bought a commercial grade one. Now he is looking for a bagger attachment for it, and they do make one, lol.

I bought a bagger for my mower. Cost me $350 but was so worth it

 

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

Sometimes it is what will be the best INVESTMENT. Like with you deciding that if you are going to finance, get what you want. Then if you can, pay it off early. The saving grace to that is the rates for borrowing money are so low right now, it makes some sense to use someone elses' money at the low interest rates. So I agree, if you are going to do it, and borrow, get what you want as it will be a long term investment.
As far as my little 4x4 ranger..... yeah, it suits me. Got about $1500 in it now as I had the top half of the engine redone about 4 years ago.... had it probably 8 years.... I can haul the water tank with about 150 + gallons of water on it when I need to, and go most places in the fields. Nice thing is the heater works in the winter.....4 wd works......looks like a real RED-NECK truck and I am not making any sort of payments on it.

I really wish I didn't have to take a loan, since I'm trying to get out of some credit card debt from car repair ****, but if I don't do this I think I will regret it and I don't want to wait since product quantities are already low and with Covid it might get worst if we have to go into another lockdown and I want this for plowing in winter as well as just random work now

Having no car payment is nice. Our Outback is paid off, but that thing is about to cost us another $1000 with some repairs it's in the shop for right now

 

[SprigOfTheLivingDead]

You will get so much use out of that beast!
We absolutely LOVE our Polaris ATV's. Maybe not as fast as some of the ATV's out there, but so much handier. I use mine all the time on the property. Our is a 2-Up though, and has a small dump box on the back. They do not make our model anymore... It is rated to haul 300 pounds in the dump box.

They still make the 6x6 ones, but I think they start at 11k or 12k and though I could see that being really useful I didn't think it was right for my needs or economically smart, but I can totally see the worth.

Once I got home I realized my main trailer can't hook up right away, so I need a 1 1/4" towing drawbar with a slight (1"?), 2" ball and then a 2" coupler for my trailer. Always the small things that'll get you in the end . I'll run off to get that this afternoon, which will of course require stops to 3 or 4 stores to find it all since it won't all be in stock at a single place 😩