farmall 350 weight

An old friend of mine in the trucking business once said, " Make sure your brakes, steering, tires and suspension are right, everything else will look after itself." How true he was.

I once was about 1,200 miles from home with my 1975 single axle highway tractor and trailer picking up some farm equipment. Drove through a little town, (one set of traffic lights) I had the green light, sitting at red light was DOT safety inspection guy. We exchanged glances eye to eye. I knew right then he was going to pull me over for an inspection. You see my 12 year old truck looked a bit shabby. I had painted some rust spots with brush. As I left town countryside was flat, road very straight. About a mile back I could see his red and blue light flashing. Rathered puzzled me as he never got any closer and there were no other trucks on the road. Finally after 10 miles I saw a nice wide flat shoulder on road so I pulled over. As he came along he was behind two ladies driving a Buick, talking a blue streak and had never noticed him. There was enough oncoming traffic, he was never able to pass them either. By the time he got to me he was not very good natured. He said,"Did you see that !@#$%^&*^&^%$%#$@!@ old woman, wouldn't even pull over for the red and blue flashing lights."

He inspected my truck very thorough on brakes, tires, steering and springs. All he found wrong was couple of marker lights out. He said, " this old truck is much better than it looks, very good mechanically, don't worry about the marker lights until convenient, you have more than regulations call for." I told him had I been in home turf they would make me fix light on roadside. He said, "Around these parts folks find good brakes, tires and suspension, tend to keep trucks out of trouble." Then he really poured out to me why he was so upset, Postal Workers were on strike and the government had he and his co-workers delivering government mail. I said, " maybe the old lady in the Buick was a Postal Worker on picket duty." He agreed if that was case she was quite effective. It was Friday and he told me all the places he had to go before night fall, plus inspect any trucks not looking up to snuff. I bid him good day and went on my way. I'll bet someone caught it from him before days end.

I will add a bit to what I've allready said about your proposed tractor hauling. 3/4 or 1 ton trucks with full floating rear ends as in big trucks will carry the load much better. Coupled with heavy springs, this allows you to put more weight on the truck, will make the load handle much better. Make sure your tires are in good condition, good air presure and have a load rating for your proposed load. Make sure those trailer brakes are working effectively.

I recently towed my 350 (with loader, wheel weights and loaded tires) behind my 84 F150 with a 302 & C6 transmission. I went 60 miles and will never do it again - with that truck. Way to much weight for the light springs and not enough braking power. Never got over 40 mph the entire time, even with the weight somewhat "biased" to the front of the trailer every imperfection in the road rocked the trailer and made the pickup sway like a ship at sea. 60 miles took a full two hours and gave me plenty of time to regret trying.

Borrow or rent a 3/4 or 1 ton and the trip will be much safer and faster. Hate to see you find yourself in a similar situation a 1000 miles from home and find you can only SAFELY travel to 35 mph, you'll get shot on any major highway travelling at that speed. I only got away with it because I drove on secondary roads used to farm traffic.

In the 1970s,I had a 20 series Chevy 350 cu in, 4 speed with 3.42 axle gears. and an 18 ft. trailer. It was inspected and okayed by DOT to haul gross 20,000 lbs. (That includes truck, trailer and load) And yes I have grossed 20,000 lbs. many times and indeed hauled some of those loads through mountain country.

Standard transmissions have a low gear for starting loads. They also have gears in between low and high for use in hill country. And that applies to uphill and downhill.

As I see it, there are two kinds of trucking advice; those who want to haul a load and drive it like a car and those who haul a load and drive it like a truck. If you've never had a standard transmission, don't try to give the latter.

My employer has a Chevy 70 series with diesel 5 speed Allison automatic and 20' freight body. He has only one leg, plain and simple the reason for the automatic. He tells me it has had 3 engines the result of transmission causing high revs. The truck has had the transmission rebuilt 5 times.

In my lifetime I've owned 4 - 20 series Chevy pickups, 2 IH pickups, 1 - 50 series and a Chevy Single axle highway tractor, probably close to 2,000,000 miles in total. All had manual transmissions except 1 - 20 series Chevy. After 3 automatic transmission rebuilds it also became a 4 speed standard. So out of 2,000,000 miles, 150,000 of it was automatic with 3 rebuilds. That leaves 1,850,000 miles of driving manual transmissions with no transmission problems and only 2 new clutches. Believe me those trucks all hauled trailers, tractors, hay, silage, grain, fire wood, etc. Many times I've had 20,000 lbs gross on those pickups with trailers.

I can take you to anyone of a number of light truck repair shops and without question, they will tell you guys pulling 15 to 24 foot trailers with automatic pickups are constantly rebuilding. I realize some guys with standards are as well, but then some folks will never learn to haul a load.

I had always known manual transmission was more efficient, but I really had no idea the difference was that great. I have since spoken with others that experienced the same. The other item I noticed, my automatic had been overdrive and with 4 speed manual I lost the overdrive. I actually had a slight improvment in fuel economy.

The other factor I should mention is much of my hauling was on the field and country roads. Hauled Cabbage and rutabagas off the mountain 4 miles of 20 mph road. With automatic one had to ride brakes all the way. With the 4 speed manual you picked the gear and let it motor along.