My family has a ranch in south Texas and we recently bought a bobcat 873 -1700hrs runs flawlessly with 2 buckets, (smooth and toothed), fork lift attachment, boom attachment, and backhoe attachment. Post hole auger (Got a steal on it for $12k with a 20' lowboy with I think 8000lb axels. I have about 3 hrs on it and feel pretty comfortable with it. Did some tree clearing, junk cleanup, and dug a few holes. My question is: do you guys have any helpful tips on efficient ways to operate a skidsteer? There are a few things I'm looking to do. 1) dig a small pond. I've seen swimming pools dug with them, and have been told that you can dig well, if you know how. I played around for 15 min or so starting a pond but didnt get very consistent full buckets. The "road" in/out of my"pit" got pretty rough as well. Should you scrape thin layers or take bigger bites? Should you keep all 4 wheels on ground or transfer weight to the rear wheels. Do I use the float for the arms, and bucket tilt to control the bite, or keep the arms in a set position. Oh, ground is fairly hard pAcked dirt/clay. Kinda like gumbo but not quite as bad. 2) scrape ground for clearing. Seems like float the arms, and keep the bucket flat works well for this. 3) Smoothing roads. Not sure how to do this. I have a kubota tractor with front end loader, and a grader blade I've been using for this. Maybe I should just stick with it(plus it has AC) I searched youtube/google and have t really found anything that helps with how to operate one correctly. There is a lot of knowledge/experience here and I'd like to tap into that. With the ultimate th g being a YouTube Instructional video. I'll probably make a few next weekend when I go try out the techniques. I did find that if there's a mesquite tree that is encroaching on your road, the bobcat makes very quick work of it. Just raise the bucket to about eye level, run I to the trunk so that it bends the tree over a bit, then drop the bucket. Snaps it off at the ground, and easily pushes out of the way. Works for mesquite between 1.5" to about 7". Smaller stuff just bends, and a quick bucket dance on top snaps it.
The problem with skidsteers is they're too versatile, jack of all trades master of none. Maybe people are reluctant to answer because there isn't a great way to do these jobs with a skidsteer? 1 In hard clay, either use another machine to "scarify", like a "quack digger" behind the kubota, and scrape up thin layers, or else work a face by running into the loose material at the base, tilting the bucket full up and scraping the face to fill the bucket. 2 Yes 3 Read the thread titled "Road grading with ctl?" a page down in skid steers.