[AT] McCormick plow

[charlie hill]

Grant,  not much plowing at all around here now.  It's all no-til or 
conservation tillage or
done, as you said with chisel plows and big disc harrows.  Back in the day 
we were all
tobacco farmers and used small equipment.  Everything got plowed and 
everything was
planted on beds so the land had to be in really good shape to properly bed 
up the rows.
There were three issues that all tended to wear our left wheel brakes. 
We've mentioned
two, side loads and traction,  the other one, at least around here, was that 
most people
started in the middle of a big field and after they plowed out a square 
about 100' each way
they would plow across the ends and start going around and around the 
square.  Since the plows
turned the dirt to the right, the best way to make the 90 degree turn at the 
end was to make
a 270 degree turn with the left brake so that you came back in straight and 
back to exactly
where you lifted your plow so you could put it back down as you came across 
the end of that spot.
That meant you plowed a ways, lifted the plow, hard on the left brake around 
270 degrees, drop the
plow and you were back to plowing in a matter of seconds.  When you are 
plowing a lot of land
with a 1, 2 or 3 bottom plow every second your plow is out of the ground 
counts.

A lot of times if the field I was in would allow it (shape) I'd start to 
cheat at the ends and work around
so that there were eventually no corners and I just plowed in a continuous 
spiral until eventually
I got to one edge of the field.  Then of course there was a lot of wasted 
time trying to finish out the other
sides.  You needed to really pay attention to where you started out in the 
field.

Charlie

-----Original Message----- 
From: Grant Brians
Sent: Friday, August 22, 2014 10:11 AM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] McCormick plow

It is interesting to me to read that the brake wear would be from plowing.
Here in California where plowing has always been done as a means of weed or
disease control rather than primary tillage (Disc and chisel/rippers are the
primary tillage), the left brake gets more wear because nearly all offset
discs are left turn discs! Just another interesting regional difference.
     I also find it interesting that when I have done or seen plowing with a
Caterpillar tractor, there seems to be a lot less pul to the side. On our
John Deere's we get more side force. It could also be that I just have never
gotten the adjustments right! We pull a 4 bottom 18" rollover plow on the
JD6430 105hp drawbar tractor.
         Grant Brians - Vegetables, Nuts and Fruit farmer
Hollister,California

-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com
[mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com]On Behalf Of Len Rugen
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2014 1:52 PM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] McCormick plow


Odd, our WD-45 would lift the front wheels running over a cow pie while
plowing.  I think the lift on the arms from the "traction boost" just
aggravated things, when you hit a tough spot, it pulled harder AND
lifted the arms, taking weight off the front.

However, a well tuned plow wouldn't cause much side draft on the
straight and level.  You had to get it level, get the first bottom
cutting the same as the other 2 both depth and width and get the rear
landslide so it took the side draft.  I built up the TB linkage with
welds, got it all tight, adjusted things and it would plow most places
in 3rd gear.  We just tried to turn too much while plowing, we had few
square fields, with the trike front, if you dropped the front wheel in
to the furrow, the only choice was smoking breaks.  I later got a wide
front WD-45 and that made a huge difference.



On 8/21/2014 3:31 PM, charlie hill wrote:
> Greg around here you can sometimes tell a tractor that has plowed a lot
> because the left wheel brake is worn out and the right is still good.
> Allis Chalmers plows are also mounted forward of the rear axle roughly
> under the back of the transmission.  If fact A-C drawbars on the WC, WD
> and D series tractors pull from that same point (the snap coupler).
There
> are some traction advantages and also it keeps the front end planted
rather
> that the tractor wanting to rear up.  You have to really get in a tight
pull
> to make the front end start to come up unlike the N series Fords and the
> Fergies.
>
> Charlie
>
>

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