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Two Letters Re: Walking Tractors and Similar Powered Farming Implements
James,
I just wanted to respond to the recent article on small tractors. In
1981 my wife and I bought 12 acres and started market gardening, selling
produce locally. I grew about 3 acres of produce each year and put up hay
for animals.
Our first big investment at the time was a BCS 725 machine with the tiller
and sickle-bar mower attachments. We used that machine, and used it hard.
Today it's 2009 and I just finished cutting hay and putting in my green bean
patch, using that 725. It's still on the original engine, which has never
been rebuilt, only annual oil changes for the last 27 years. It no longer starts
on the first
pull, these days it starts on the second pull each time, but guess I can't
complain too loud about that.
In my life I must admit I've made very few incredibly good investments, but
that Model 725 is definitely one of them. It's saved me untold labor and
has just simply worked for 27 years without a bit of trouble. It's like an
old
Ford
8N, it just keeps running and doing what it's supposed to do. Old farm equipment
was made to last forever, the BCS machines are farm equipment, not cheap
consumer toys. The price reflects it, but from my opinion they're a bargain
in the long
run. Highly recommended. - Bobalu
Hello Mr. Rawles,
Regarding the recent letters on micro-farm tractors, I have another viewpoint
for your consideration.
In addition to the Troy-Bilt Horse rear tine tiller and other tools scaled
for 1-2 acres, I have also purchased a larger farm tractor to better suit the
conditions in and around my retreat. The recent letter mentioned Ford 9Ns
and Farmalls. While these are still very common and many 9Ns are still
in service, they are of 1940s-1950s vintage. My personal choice was a
Massey Ferguson 100 series diesel tractor (135 or 165, for example). These
were built between the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s, and have decades
of excellent service history with much information available online (for you
to save on paper now).
There were several factors leading me to this decision:
I obtained the tractor from a seller on Craigslist for a bargain price. This
allowed me to retain a budget for maintenance rather than blowing it all up
front on a new machine. While the peripheral systems needed attention, the
engine and transmission were rock solid. The Perkins Diesel engines are renowned
for reliability and durability. My updates and repairs serve two purposes:
Restoring the mechanical soundness of the machine and its systems, and forcing
me to become familiar with the repair and upkeep now. This is a mechanical
restoration only – it needs to work, not look good. Surprisingly, every
part that my 40 year old tractor has needed was both in stock and relatively
inexpensive. While it’s comforting to “gear up”, eventually
you will have to repair what you buy. Two years after TSHTF is not the ideal
time to start the learning curve on your life-sustaining equipment. An old
tractor you have mechanically zero-timed before the world comes to grief will
give years of reliable service, and you will have the experience of your earlier
work to guide future repairs.
While a larger tractor is overkill for a few acres, it is compatible with most
all the equipment on surrounding farms. 1960s and 1970s tractors
will have modern 3-point hitches with the ability to add additional hydraulics.
The Massey-Ferguson 165, at 53 horsepower, can run a myriad of equipment that
might overtax a smaller tractor. In addition to your own needs, you will have
the option of volunteering to help your neighbor prepare his field or bring
in his crop, using your extra muscle and standard 3-point hookups. That would
be a Grade-A trade for food, fuel, or assistance when you need it, as opposed
to showing up with a shovel and asking “what can I do to help?”
A larger tractor will also turn and disk your two acres in a hurry! I have
collected smaller 3 point hitch equipment, like a two-bottom moldboard turning
plow and
a disk harrow, very inexpensively. The equipment is old, but made of such heavy
steel that it still has decades of life left in it. Another barter option is
to quickly prepare ground for other small-scale neighbors that may have purchased
less durable equipment. Attempting to till up hard, fallow ground, even with
a rear-tine tiller, is tough on the equipment and the person. Your tractor
with plow and harrow would make short work of that fallow ground, allowing
the rear-tine tiller to finish much more quickly and without the mechanical
abuse.
The other posts mentioned diesel-engined ATVs.
I respectfully submit that this may be a case of can rather than should. While
you can pull a disk
or maybe even a small all-purpose plow, the machine simply does not have the
tractor-like durability to stake your family’s future on using the ATV
as a tractor long-term. By the time you have bought a rare diesel ATV with
ATV-specific implements, you might as well have bought an older, real tractor
with standard 3-point implements for the money. Remember, from a duty cycle
perspective (if I may anthropomorphize), I’d want my tractor to think: “wow,
that was only two acres” as opposed to the ATV thinking: “Wow,
that was two acres!”
On the issue of noise, I agree that a stock machine can be heard a ways off.
However, the noise can be significantly reduced by using non-standard exhausts.
If your goal is to prevent advertisement of your activity, it is time well
spent to install a series of mufflers which will deaden the roar of a working
engine. That slight drop in horsepower might be worth the relative quiet. This
is true of your rear tine tiller as well as any other equipment. As an example,
I have an old Onan generator with a high volume double muffler that some guys
at a muffler shop helped me rig up. I can stand right next to the thing while
it’s running, and carry on a conversation with only slightly raised voices.
Thank you for your efforts, Mr. Rawles! - J.I.C.
