Make you a deal, Hugh

www.ytmag.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=farmall&th=217218

Getting back to tractor discussion and arguments, you shouldn't take this so serious. I have a fried here in Ontario, he has met both myself and Gene Bender. He does a a commedy monologue of Gene and I arguing about how red the red tractor is. I don't know as gene has heard it but he did it here at our house one day for all my children and grandchildren to hear. Let me assure you he kept the house in a state of laughter for a few min.

I will attempt to give you a bit about my tractor philosophy. At 65 years of age, I've yet to see what I consider the perfect tractor, in my opinion it hasn't been built yet. Going back to the dozen or so mainline manufacturers of the 1950-60s. (IH, JD, Oliver, Cockshutt, MH, Case, Ford, MM, Allis, Ferguson, etc.) I've never seen a tractor built by those companies that didn't have at least one feature I liked.

On my farm and in my lifetime I've owned 16 Farmalls, (at least one every series letter through 66) 1 Deere, 2 Case and 1 Cockshutt. 90% of these choices were geared right to the quality of the dealer in the area. Those tractors were all bought new or very close to new. We had an IH dealer with a parts inventory that was unbelieveable. We had a decent Oliver, Case, Cockshutt, MH-MF and Ford dealer. In the early days the rest were non existant. In later years Deere and Allis came on with decent dealers for the area.

Over the years I tried out in demonstrations many tractors. We (my dad and I) were dairy farmers and as early as late 40s he was looking for Independant live PTO. Oliver and Cockshutt had it, but the dealers did not have big market share. Those tractors had brute strength, but they were also a bit on tha clumsey side, just not quite as agile or nimble as a Farmall. In 1955, I tried to talk my dad into buying an Oliver Super 77 diesel rather than the Farmall 300 gas. Dad didn't listen, 3 years later the Oliver dealer was gone.

As for TA, I liked it, only ever rebuilt one with under 10,000 hours of service, that being the 300 as we couldn't get dad to remember the TA would free wheel in low. He'd be interested in his baling and forget all about his gear selection until it started free wheeling then throw the TA lever ahead. The annoying part about TA is IH could have put many more dollars into R&D on TA, they were a rich company in the mid to late 50s.

On the 1066 issue, great tractor in it's day, however I belive all 100hp+ two wheel drive tractors are inefficient. Here was my beef with 1066, and this would apply to any make. I bought it with single 20.8x38, cab and air. Those two tires will not transfer 130 hp to a drawbar pull, thus I added 20.8x38 duals. The first tires lasted 1,000 hours, the duals went well over 8,000 hours,but I had a new problem, duals like going straight ahead, thus it beat the hell out of brakes and front end. Today most tractors in that hp class are running with duals and front drive, and that front drive greatly improves turning under heavy load. Those big tractors also need the 24" front tires. Once my 1066, with duals and 25" cultivator making close to 6 mph, front wheel dropped in a soft hole. By the time the operator got stopped the front wheel and bottom of spindle were under the cultivator.

As I see it if your going to add duals and front drive to the conventional tractor you may as well go articulated. Just last year I was operating 3 different 350 hp articulateds. Those tractors are amazing in my opinion, will turn shorter on a headland than at 1066 or a 4430, and will do it at 5mph with no braking, and about as smooth as anything I've seen. I told the owner of these big articulateds, these things are just as agile and quick as my Farmall 140.

So you see I was never married to my farm tractor manufacturer, I try to look at the merrits as well as the pitfalls on any given piece of farm equipment. The bottom line was it had to make money or it wouldn't be around, or at least there wouldn't be another one come to the farm. I do hope you can see my point of view.

Regarding the TA itself, we have never had to replace one yet, and over the years our farm has had a 340, 460, 660, 806, and a 966. Based on the experience on our farm, is not a poor design or the tremendous weakspot in the driveline that so many people make it out to be when it is used properly and kept properly adjusted (although it will clean out your pocket book when it does fail, but so will any other modern transmission problem). However, the design was horribly outdated by the time the 86's came out. The powershift became industry standard already before that time. We use the TA all the time on our tractors, and would not buy one of those tractors without one. The TA on the 06 and 66 tractors certainly seems to add a wider range of working speeds (with the exception of 1st high and 4th low, which are almost imperceptibly different).

The fast hitch was a great way to get around patent issues with the three point, and in my opinion was a great hitch. We have never had to rebuild or replace any part of one, but at the same time, we don't lift super heavy loads with one either. Heaviest I've personally lifted is a bale mover with a rock on the back. It bent the tubular steel frame of the bale mover, but the 2 pt lifted it without problems.

As to the Oliver/IH debate, I can't comment on that for myself, and must rely on what I have been told. I was nowhere near born at that point in time, and Hugh has operated both, so his opinion is what he experienced, and he is obviously entitled to his opinion. Hugh is a very knowledgeable member of this board, and has worked with many different makes of tractors. That being said, my uncles and father have told me, there were 3 farms in the area that had Oliver tractors. There were 88's in among them. They pulled well to be sure, but certainly didn't walk away from Super M's. They said that they were about equal. The Super M-TA had slightly higher horsepower numbers for both belt and drawbar horsepower when compared to the Oliver 88 according to the Nebraska tractor tests I've seen, but they were within 2 or 3 horsepower, which is nothing even noticeable in the field. Also, I know enough to say that horsepower on the test track doesn't necessarily translate directly into performance in the field, so it is easily possible that the Oliver could outperform the M-TA. At the tractor pulls the 88's pull about the same as the Super M's and M-TA's. But in tractor pulling, it is just as much setup and driver as it is tractor.

I for one don't necessarily see what Hugh did that was so terrible. All he did is state that he didn't think a Super M-TA was ahead of its time. This argument can go forever, and is just futile. You can't change someones opinion. Personally I like IH. That doesn't mean that I hate other makes, or that I think any IH product can beat them. It means that they have their tractor, I have mine, and a little teasing and friendly competition from both sides is welcomed and expected.