I'm looking at buying a gehl 4625 skidsteer off a farmer on Craigslist. It has around 6500 hours on it but has a Blown head gasket he said. It is blowing white smoke and leaking antifreeze from the head. He said he would take $4000 for it. I'm looking to hear people's opinions about this skidsteer. Is the head gasket going to be a somewhat easy fix? Are parts easy to find? It's a kubota engine. Do you think it's worth it?
Are there any service records, or a dealer (mechanic) they've taken it to at any point in time you could talk to? How does the rest of the machine look? Does it look like it's had decent, or any service, or been used and abused? Can't always go by looks, but, looks can be a 'marker' to pay attention to. If a bunch of things are broken and they've never bothered to replace anything, if the tires are all bald and it's all banged up, you're probably getting a machine that hasn't had much service and could be worn out. But if they've replaced things right away and kept at least some things up to spec, that counts for something in my book, because it probably means there is a reasonable chance they've lubed and changed fluids as needed too and there could be a lot of life left in it. There is also a chance it's not a head gasket problem. Guys who are risk-adverse will say to stay away from it, guys used to taking chances may say to bite on it. How mechanically inclined are you? $4k doesn't get you a lot of machine, so if it does turn out to be just a head hasket (or even a head) and you can do it yourself, you'll get a nice machine for the money ..assuming the rest of the machine is still decent. But there are a lot of 'ifs' there..
I saw the internet ad of the unit you are looking at. It doesn't look like a bad unit, at least from the pictures. If you have mechanical skills it might be a great deal for you. If it has the kind of controls you are looking for, even better. Don't wait, someone will snatch it up..