[Farmall] insider info.

[Chuck Bealke]

On 3/13/2011 8:17 PM, john hall wrote:
> I can't remember who was studying the others tractor, but I remember seeing
> a book once where either IH had a John Deere H or Deere had a F-12. Of
> course that still goes on today. I've got all the old Remington and Mall
> chainsaw literature from where dad worked. While looking through it one day
> I found some Homelite and McCullough stuff----they never sold either, just
> gathering information to compete against them with.
>
> John
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Al Jones"<farmallsupera at earthlink.net>...
>
>
> John have you ever seen the "Operation Takeover" literature from the
> 444/656/756/856 timeframe?  They compare and contrast every tractor in
> their respective size range, mainly Deere, MF, AC, Ford, and Oliver with
> the comparable IH tractor.  Pretty intersting stuff and I will admit in
> some cases it looked like IH was 'grasping at straws' a little bit!
>
> According to the data though, JD added over 5,000 lbs of extra weight to
> their 4020 tested at Nebraska.  This was the only way their numbers are
> anywhere close to the 856.  A 4020 and a 756 is almost a more fair
> comparison, weight wise.
>
> Al
>
> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: john hall<jtchall at nc.rr.com>......
>>>
>>> I imagine every major manufacturer is always spying to see what the
>>> competition is up to. Last night I found out to what extreme IH went to
>>> against John Deere. While sorting through a bunch of literature left over
>> >from the IH dealer dad retired from, we found a "training" manual for
>>> salesmen. I briefly looked at it and found some memos IH had sent to
>>> dealers in the mid/late 70's. The first was about a price increase Deere
>>> was having on combines and corn headers. Included in the memo was Deere's
>>> dealer pricing. I found another for tractors that showed pricing, but with
>>> it broken down into $ per hp. Also there was a note about Deere increasing
>>> rear axle size. I couldn't help but laugh at this one. IH pointed out that
>>> their axles were still bigger---a gigantic 1/16 of an inch.
>>>
>>> John Hall
Y'all,

This reminds me of the IH dealer nearest us in Missouri about 53 years 
ago.   He got word of Deere's coming switch from two to four and six 
cylinders way before it happened.  This gave him thus a good while to 
gloat and test those that owned a two-banger or were leaning that way.  
He'd tell them that after decades of chanting that lower engine speeds + 
fewer cylinders and moving parts = more reliability, longer life and 
fewer replacement parts, JD was getting ready to switch to the same 
basic engine designs they had long vilified as inferior.  Some of his 
hearers were doubtful that Deere would ever make such a switch.

Chuck Bealke
Dallas