How To Buy That First Homestead Tractor
J.V. Dorner shares some tips on buying a recycled workhorse.
September/October 1971
By J.V. DORNER
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The J. I. Case Model S. Note wide or ""row crop"" arrangement of front wheels. The Model SC is the same tractor but with it's two front wheels close together, giving it a triangle ground print like the other tractors illustrated here.
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Choosing a farm tractor can be a about as personal as picking traitor can be about as personal as picking a wife and—for the novice—the decision can be just as fraught with danger. It's mighty easy, in other words, for a beginner to hitch himself to an over-equipped and over-priced model that he really doesn't need, can't afford and can't handle. So easy, in fact, that I'm going to stick my neck out with some fatherly advice on the manly art of tractor buying.
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In my opinion, today's new homesteader with forty acres or less is wise to forget all the shiny new toys down at the local tractor emporium. Just like modern automobiles, most new-fashioned tractors tend to be oversized, over-priced and laden with so many "conveniences" that they're no longer easy to repair. A first-time farmer would be better advised to put his extra dollars into land instead of into such fancy cast iron.
By going back a few years and buying a good, used, medium-sized (20 to 50 horsepower) tractor, the amateur agriculturist can easily cut his iron horse investment from several thousand dollars to several hundred without any terrific decrease in productivity. Such a tractor will pull at least one sixteen-inch plow and up to three fourteen bottoms. That's plenty power for anyone interested in raising food for his family and a few livestock.
Incidentally, that 20 to 50 horsepower may not sound like much compared to the "300 HP" in your uncle's GTX/SS409 unless you know that the quoted ratings for automobiles are a fanciful "developed" figure that has little to do with reality. Rest assured that a 20 HP tractor will plow rings around any "300 HP" sportscar. And—if you have a reasonably good local source of spare parts and access to a better-than-average mechanic (every farming community seems to have one of those)—you can't go too far wrong starting your agricultural adventure with a medium-size tractor that's 15 to 25 years old.
There's a number of good mechanical work horses in this size and age bracket including several models manufactured by Minneapolis Moline, Oliver, Ford, Cockshutt and International Harvester (the older III tractors all carry the trade name "Farmall" and the Farmall F-20 and M—when in good condition—are both excellent used tractor buys). Obviously I can't cover every make and model in this one article so I'm going to limit myself to recommending the J.I. Case S series, John Deer A series, Allis Chalmers WD and—one diesel—the International Harvester 350. All four models should give satisfactory service to a homesteader if purchased in reasonably good condition and given average care and maintenance.
The Case SC is a very widely distributed tractor and its prime mover is a water-cooled four cylinder engine with a bore of 3-1/2 inches and a stroke of four inches. The powerplant develops 28 HP at a full-throttle, no-load speed of 1700 r.p.m. That's right, 1700 r.p.m. Tractor engines are big, slow-turning workhorses that seem to run forever.
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