JCB is widening its compact equipment range with two new skid steer loaders, the 250 and 290, built at its plant in Savannah, Georgia, and designed for North American agriculture. The machines are meant for the everyday material handling of a farm — loading feed, stacking hay, moving pallets and cleaning facilities.

Both are powered by a 74 hp engine and accept a wide range of attachments, with high-flow hydraulic options. Rated operating capacities are about 2,531 lb for the 250 and 3,029 lb for the 290, and hinge-pin heights exceed 10 ft, which JCB says gives the reach to load feed mixers and stack seed and fertiliser.

The two models put the company's single-arm boom, an industry exclusive, into one of the most popular machine classes, and with it the side-door entry that lets an operator climb in without clambering over the bucket. Lee Tice, senior product manager for compact equipment at JCB North America, said labour shortages make every employee and machine more important and the new loaders are designed to help one operator get more done in a day.

Despite the lifting capability, the machines keep a compact footprint for working around barns, feedyards and commodity sheds where larger equipment will not fit. They sit in a new mid-size weight class for JCB, between its existing skid steers, compact track loaders, telehandlers, wheel loaders and the Teleskid.

The 250 and 290 were shown alongside JCB's agricultural line at the Farm Progress Show in Boone, Iowa, on 1–3 September.

Source: American Ag Network