The FAE BL0/EX and Kubota KX040-4: A winning combination for clearing trails in New England
Released November of last year, the BL0/EX is the smallest in our line of excavator mulchers.
Designed for 2-to-4-ton excavators, the versatility and compact size of the BL0/EX has made it a popular combination with mini-excavators. Spencer Schwenk, Townline Equipment Plainfield Sales Manager, sold a BL0/EX to a customer in the spring of this year for use with a Kubota KX040-4. I spoke to Spencer to learn more about the customer and his experience with the BL0/EX.
Spencer explained that the customer first purchased the KX040-4 a year before the BL0/EX was released.
“With the smallest mulcher [at the time] being the BL1/EX 75, the base weight of that mulcher was a little bit too much for the KX040-4s to handle up here in New England with the slope and terrain that we have.
We hadn’t been putting mulchers on KX040-4s. We were pretty much stuck with a KX057-4 or larger. With this customer, he had bought a KX040-4 from me the year prior to the BL0/EX coming out, and he's in the landscaping maintenance world of things. I told him how the BL1/EX … was going to be too large for his machine on the trail that he was trying to work on. When the BL0/EX came out, I reached out to him and said, ‘Hey, they're making this new head. It's a similar rotor with similar construction, but we've shed some weight. Do you want to try one out?’”
It ended up being just what he was looking for. As a private contractor in the landscaping industry, the compact BL0/EX was perfect for his needs. Spencer explained the types of jobs that the customer typically does.
“Think about trails, right of ways, field edges, ponds, that sort of thing.”
He shared some of the feedback from the customer.
“His feedback, you know, he loves it. Right now, he's doing some trails on his own property, and he's been able to go out there and feel like the machine is stable and not tippy and whack the edges back, which would take a lot of man hours if you were doing it the old-fashioned way with a string trimmer or a [rotary cutter] up behind a tractor.”
It’s not just the customer who loves the BL0/EX. Spencer explained his personal impressions as well.
“We've now gotten to run the BL0/EX75 and 50. The BL0/EX, since it shares the same rotor as the BL1/EX, is pretty much, you can call it fantastic. It's nice to see that even though it's a smaller mulcher without a piston motor, it still produces the same cut and finish. It's a good fit for those KX040-4s, which we didn't used to have a mulcher for, and, certainly, the weight difference between the BL1/EX and BL0/EX makes it so a KX040-4 can be effective in New England, where we have steep terrain and uneven surfaces.”
As we wrapped up our call, Spencer shared a final benefit.
“The other item that's useful to share with people is the fact that the BL1/EX and any carrier that you would put that mulcher on, by the time you try to transport it, you are most likely in a CDL requirement, whether it's a B or an A. With a BL0/EX, you can now put it on a small enough carrier that you're not near CDL requirement. So transporting a track carrier with a BL0/EX is much more convenient and doesn't require a CDL or permit.”
With the early success of the BL0/EX and the support of partners like Townline Equipment, we look forward to many more stories like this to come.
