Penny Wise, Pound Foolish?

Truly a handsome piece of equipment, seemingly well worth the price quoted.

I believe to receive full benefit from the machine, an accessory is required. Available from LynDoor^® Industries is a matched pair of Perpetual Motion sources, thus:

There are other suppliers of these invaluable Perpetual Motion sources, but none can match the activity level of those pictured. When properly installed and tuned, the anticipated 15 years per house foundation can be reduced to a mere decade!

I think the Perpetual Motion sources are the things I misidentified as "operators" in my neighborhood. Until now, I was puzzled by the small size of the "operators". Also puzzling was the large head size relative to body size, the lack of "five o'clock shadow" at the end of the day, and the odd tooth spacing: certainly, these sources are "humanoid" but probably not "human".

Reducing digging time from 15 years to 10 is definitely a step in the right direction! I will take your advice and order a matched pair.

Beware. Those perpetual motion machines take a break after thirteen years. Then they sleep until noon, are grumpy all day, and stay up playing video games all night. It's truly an amazing transformation.

They still make the growling noises though.

Too funny. Your experience with that outfit is quite similar to mine.

Through my job and hobbies, I often purchase light equipment and small hand tools. The few purchases I have made through Northern have ended with me returning the item(s) for a refund.

Northern tends to stock sub standard products when it comes to the tools and equipment that I have purchased. The price always looked too good to be true and consistently was.

Northern is great about prompt refunds but as far as I am concerned, it's not worth the time and hassle of returning equipment/products or the delay of a project.

Don't get me wrong, Northern does offer some good quality products but when you compare the pricing of quality, name brand items that Northern caries with other suppliers, Northern is usually higher on cost.

You can most certainly try to learn the various noises that other operators make. Maybe you could then boost your productivity to 4 to 6 pounds of dirt per hour.

I know grunting, gurgling, snorting, even mooing like a bull chasing a cow in heat works for me when I am trenching with a hand shovel!

Your Northern experience brings on a rant:

Your experience with Northern Equipment is somewhat like my recent experience with Home Depot. I purchased 4 Johnson levels (made in USA) and three of four were defective, not passing the standard test for a level in which you measure the same surface twice, with the orientation reversed. Three were about half a bubble off in one orientation and "level" in the other. They could not have been QA'd at all.

... Latex and nitrile gloves called "one size fits all" but which were in fact sized for a five year old, and would rip when putting them on my not-very-large hands...

... A doweling kit with a drill that drills oversized holes...

... etc etc. In one two-week period, I returned about 10 items.

When I buy stuff at Northern, I often grit my teeth and hope, but I've been pleasantly surprised frequently -- but then I avoid the many things that scream "junk". I have a Northern power hacksaw, the castings for which are identical to the castings used on a Hitachi saw, and it has served very well. Even the blade has given remarkably long service.

Thinking back... I bought a Chinese drill press (from a place like Northern) more than 20 years ago, and at the time it was about half the price of a Craftsmen press of much lighter construction. It has performed flawlessly.

Jet (and to a lesser extent) Grizzly have gained a reputation for pretty good quality while some (most) standard brands seem to have gone downhill. I have a lot of Dewalt tools which are, in general quite good, but I often find corners cut. Delta used to be a good brand, but they now make a few good things and a lot of trash. I have a Milwaukee right-angle drill that really works well, and a good Porter Cable sander, but my brand new Milwaukee circular saw has a warped base plate, and shows several signs of cost cutting, such as riveting together of assemblies where bolting (to enable easier parts replacement) would be more appropriate.

I wish there were a brand of tools (or a store that selected and sold just good stuff of various brands) in which I had complete faith. Porter Cable is the only brand that comes to mind with which I have had consistently good luck -- but I don't have a lot of their tools, and their range of tools is limited. Snap-On hand tools are another solid brand, but some of their stuff is incredibly expensive.

There seems to be a lot of pressure in conglomerates like Black and Decker to cheapen otherwise (or historically) good brands. (The angle lock screw on my Dewalt saber saw required an impact driver to loosen, and was just barely grade 3, with corners on the slot that could be rounded by a good fitting screwdriver held firmly down -- the blade was not camming out.. the metal was failing in compression. Spending a couple cents more for a grade 8 socket head screw would have made the tool (otherwise quite good) not shout "cheap" so loudly. Such things have made me view Dewalt with skepticism, whereas I used to trust them in the way I have trusted Porter Cable. I will not be surprised if I eventually buy a Porter Cable dud, because they, too, are part of Black and Devil.

There... I feel better now. Or not.

Work, Work, Work.....is that all you think about?

For a few more bucks you could have been cruising around the neighborhood on this self propelled beauty, while your buddies were still playing in the dirt.

http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_200371964_200371964?cm_sp=Upsells-_-Top%20Sellers-_-Product%20Page

What was I thinking??!!!

The only reason I work is to impress my wife. I could have taken a much more direct route buy following your advice. Imagine how thrilled she would be to ride on the back of this, feeling the full thrust of the whirring18 watt motor!

I'm not even gonna risk replying to that one. My mind is heading off into inappropriate land.

I would not recommend descending steep inclines with the tractor, as the tiny pedals rotate a terrific pace far exceeding the reciprocative rate limit of the human leg assembly.

I also received a stiff fine from OSHA for lack of a ROP's and no hard hat (which flew off, not to be found).