Takeuchi
Takeuchi TL6R
The bright segment is what Takeuchi TL6R is rated to carry; the grey run past it is the rest of its tipping load. Bar length is tipping load drawn to the same scale on every machine on the site, so a short bar is a smaller machine and not a conservative rating.
A frame just over five feet wide with a 65 hp Kubota diesel inside it: the Takeuchi TL6R is the smallest compact track loader from the company that invented the category. It's built for tight-access landscaping and backyard work where full-size CTLs simply can't go.
Suits: Tight-access landscaping and backyard work through gates and height restrictions Its radial lift path reaches furthest at mid-height, for digging, grading and backfilling.
Lifting and reach
- Rated operating capacityTrack loader rating convention
- 1,840 lbs
- Tipping load
- 5,270 lbs
- Lift height to hinge pin
- 114 in
- Lift path
- Radial Lift
- Operating weight
- 7,780 lbs
Power and hydraulics
- Engine power
- 65 hp
- Engine
- Kubota V2403-CR-TE4B
- Auxiliary flowStandard circuit
- 17.7 GPM
- Flow type
- Standard
- Warranty
- 2 yr / 2,000 hr
Fitted or available
What this machine can be ordered with. Some of these are standard and some cost extra, and which is which moves between trim levels, so check them against the quote rather than against this list.
What owners report
Summarised from the sources listed below. Nothing here was tested by us.
Access is the whole argument here. At five feet wide and just over six and a half feet tall this is the smallest machine Takeuchi builds, and people buy it because it fits through the gate into a backyard or under the roof of a low building where a mid-frame loader simply cannot go. The company positions it at owner-operator landscapers, and the work it gets pointed at is fence lines, retaining walls, irrigation trenching, stump removal and lighting installs rather than bulk dirt.
For its size it digs hard - 5,930 lb of bucket breakout and 8,650 lb of traction from 65.2 hp - and the cab is more machine than the class usually gets, with a pressurized enclosure, colour display, standard camera, suspension seat, heat and air conditioning, and a roll-up door on a heavy hinge. The undercarriage runs double and triple flange rollers and is tuned to be quiet. The hard limits are just as clear: about 9 ft 6 in of lift at the hinge pin, a short rigid track frame that rides rough at speed, and 1,840 lb of capacity that fills up fast.
The decisive question is attachments, because this model has no high-flow option of any kind and roughly 17.7 gpm is all it will ever make. Buy it if the jobs are access-limited and bucket, pallet forks, auger and trencher cover your work; do not buy it expecting to add a mulcher, because that requires a different machine, not a different order sheet. At the price it is cross-shopped against small-frame machines from Bobcat, Kubota and John Deere, so weigh dealer distance heavily - it is the complaint that surfaces most often from owners of small machines, whatever badge is on them.
What owners like
- Five feet wide and a shade over six and a half feet tall, which is the entire reason it exists - it goes through a gate, a garage door and under a covered structure that stops every mid-frame track loader. Takeuchi's own product manager describes the target buyer as the owner-operator landscaper who needs something that fits a small trailer and a tight site, and poultry houses and similar low-clearance buildings come up specifically.
- 5,930 lb of bucket breakout and 8,650 lb of traction force out of a 65.2 hp engine on a 7,485 lb machine is a lot of digging for the footprint, and the radial-lift geometry is set up for exactly that. Stump removal, fence lines, retaining walls, irrigation trenching and landscape lighting are the jobs it is bought for.
- At 7,485 lb with a canopy and 7,780 lb with a cab it trailers behind a three-quarter-ton pickup with an attachment on the deck and stays legal, which keeps the whole rig simple for a one-machine outfit.
- The cab is better equipped than the size suggests: pressurized, a 5.7-inch color display, standard rearview camera and wide-angle mirror, suspension seat, backlit rocker switches, heat and air conditioning, and a roll-up door carried on a substantial hinge rather than a swing-out that has to clear obstacles before you can get out.
- Undercarriage uses double and triple flange rollers with a quiet-ride design, and Spin Turn Assist helps it pivot cleanly in the confined spaces it is bought for rather than scrubbing the tracks around.
What owners complain about
- There is no high-flow option for this model at all - not an expensive box to tick, simply not offered. The standard circuit of roughly 17.7 gpm at about 2,988 psi is the ceiling, which puts forestry mulchers, cold planers and larger snow blowers permanently out of reach. It is the only track loader in Takeuchi's line in that position, and a buyer who expects to grow into a mulching head has to plan on the TL8R2 instead rather than upgrading this one later.
- 1,840 lb of rated capacity is genuinely small. Full pallets of block, wet spoil and heavy landscape material reach the limit quickly, and contractors who bought it purely on access have found themselves double-handling loads.
- Maximum lift comes to about 9 ft 6 in at the hinge pin, well short of vertical-lift competitors, so loading anything with high sides means careful spotting or building a ramp of material to drive up.
- Radial lift is the only geometry offered at this size - there is no vertical-lift version of this machine, and Takeuchi's answer to wanting one is to move you up two sizes.
- The track frame is short and rigid, so ride at travel speed is noticeably harsher than on suspended-undercarriage machines. On a small site that hardly matters; crossing a large pad repeatedly, it does.
- Takeuchi's dealer network is regional rather than national and remains thinner than Bobcat, Deere or Cat across the Plains and Mountain West. For an owner-operator whose entire business stops when the machine does, parts turnaround distance is worth checking before the price is.
Drawn from compactequip.com, takeuchi-us.com.
What buyers ask
Can the TL6R run a forestry mulcher or cold planer?
How narrow is it really, and what will it fit through?
What can I tow it with?
Is 1,840 lb of rated capacity enough?
How does it ride and how is visibility?
Should I be worried about the smaller dealer network?
Put the Takeuchi TL6R against
Machines in the same range
The rest of the Takeuchi line
Takeuchi
Takeuchi TL8R2
$72,000
- Engine
- 74 hp
- Aux flow
- 20 GPM
- Weight
- 9,182 lbs
A ground-up redesign of the TL8, this mid-frame radial-lift track loader comes from the company that invented the CTL. The TL8R2's 74.3 hp Kubota V3307 avoids DEF, the reinforced undercarriage carries Takeuchi's reputation for track life, and the R2 update added a roomier quiet cab, a 5.7-inch multi-function display, creep mode for attachment work, and an available 33.8 GPM high-flow package - keeping the dig-first radial geometry that made the TL8 a favorite of dirt-moving owner-operators.
Full sheet & owner reports
Takeuchi
Takeuchi TL10V2
$78,000
- Engine
- 74 hp
- Aux flow
- 18.8 GPM
- Weight
- 10,270 lbs
Built heavy at over 10,000 lbs with a 74.3 hp Kubota diesel, the Takeuchi TL10V2 is a mid-frame vertical-lift compact track loader from the company that invented the CTL. It sits between the TL8 and TL12V2 for contractors who prize Takeuchi's tank-like construction and undercarriage.
Full sheet & owner reports
Takeuchi
Takeuchi TL12R2
$88,000
- Engine
- 111 hp
- Aux flow
- 23.3 GPM
- Weight
- 12,590 lbs
Land clearing, forestry mulching, and hard digging are what the radial-lift version of Takeuchi's large-frame track loader is built for, rather than truck loading. The TL12R2's 111.3 hp Kubota V3800 turbo-diesel feeds an available 40.4 GPM high-flow circuit, bucket breakout tops 8,200 lbs, and the heavy 12,590 lb frame with Takeuchi's stout undercarriage keeps it planted on slopes. Where the vertical-lift TL12V2 chases lift capacity, the R2 trades reach at height for a simpler, stronger boom that attacks the ground.
Full sheet & owner reports