Am I just old fashioned?

I find that my old H is just about the right size for taking care of 30 acres of land and making a living. It is easy to work on and everything that it needs for a year is less than the price of one payment on a $20,000 tractor. I only get to keep whatever is leftover after I pay all the bills.

Why I'll bet that you have even heard of Wendell Berry and John Ikred.

Greg

My $.02

Scott

I think you are on to something here...keep the costs down, make farming profitable again...would it work...I'd like to see them bring back the old reliables, but I doubt they will...plastic breaks and high tech needs repair often...thats how they make their money.

I do like your way of thinking though..... .

If I were designing a tractor, I would probably use plastic or nylon for the wiring (insulation, harnesses/conduit, and ties), distributor cap, rotor, and steering wheel rim -- and that"s about it.

As for electronics, they would have to offer some clear advantage. If you have an on-board memory for diagnostics, that"s great -- but, again, it has to be rugged, reliable, easy to troubleshoot, and inexpensive to fix. What a manufacturer should do (but won"t do because of emphasis on short- rather than long-term profits) is provide (1) an industry-standard computer communications port on the tractor, (2) an industry-standard cable to connect the tractor port to a PC, and (3) free diagnostic software. If the manufacturer insists on controlling the engine and transmission via computer, the software should also allow the user to make all settings (timing, shift points, etc.) from his PC keyboard.

One extreme example of something electronics COULD do, is monitoring the temperatures of all main crankshaft bearings and notifying the operator when one of them starts getting noticeably hotter than the others. Would that be cost-effective? Maybe for some guys, but probably not for me.

Electronics would be O.K if done right, but nobody really does it right. For example, if my wife doesn"t tighten the gas cap on her "92 Explorer she gets a "Service Engine Soon" light. This, of course, is an invitation to drive to the dealer and spend $,$$$.$$. A conscientious designer would have provided a light that says, "Hey, Einstein, your gas cap"s loose!" A better approach yet would have been a two-line by 24-character LCD that would cost $5 or $10 and could display an appropriate message for just about anything. And don"t even get me started on the doors that lock themselves -- talk about inconvenient! The bottom line is, the more bells and whistles, the less I like it. And I"d like to at least have the option of disabling them.

For now, I like my old International 300 Utility just fine. No computers, no inappropriate plastic, no radio, no cab -- no problem. And, in the winter time here in Michigan, no sweat!

Just my 25 cents" worth.

Mark W.

Now on a beutiful day with the temperature just right and the birdies singing it can be downright nice on an old open tractor. But for all day heavy tillage work give me a cab with heat and AC, AM?FM Stereo, cupholders and away we go for all day long.