[AT] Too many tractors

[Herb Metz]

Dean,
Your summarizing the historical development of universal 3pt hitches is 
appreciated by myself, and probably by many others.  My only contact with 
farming, from early 50's  to early 90's, was when I spent every  two weeks 
vacation (from GE employment) at home helping Dad (until 1968 when he 
retired).  He appreciated it, so did I , and our four boys loved being on 
the farm.   Later I got interested in antique farm tractors, and eventually 
bought a 1958 Allis D-14 with hydraulic snap coupler 3pt.  Cross and Saginaw 
both offered 3pt conversions, $450 and $650 respectively; like most 
conversions, each are much less than ideal.
The Ferguson System brought a huge, advancement change to farming; it 
provided hydraulics for the farmer and in many situations it eliminated the 
equipment operator.  In our area most of the farmers laughed at the neighbor 
farming with the small Ford tractors; half dozen years later almost every 
farmer had a Ford (or Ferguson).  And the 'tractor carrying the implement' 
improved the feasibility for much larger implement.
Your " nasty exceptions that can be really interesting and frustrating"; I 
need to remember that when hooking up the bushhog <grins>.  What I really 
need to remember is unhook where it is level, and back up straight when I 
prepare to hook up.
It sometimes helps to hook up one lower link, then the top link, then adjust 
the top link until the other lower link can be hooked up.
To your point, my 2 bottom moldboard plow, 10' tandem disc, 8' tandem disk, 
7' Taylor-Way disc, 5' landscape box, single bottom middle buster, 5' 
rototiller, 7 shank plow, 6' bushhog type mower, none are Allis Chalmers but 
they all readily mount using the 3pt conversion system.
Herb(GA)


-----Original Message----- 
From: Dean VP
Sent: Sunday, March 26, 2017 10:06 PM
To: 'Antique tractor email discussion group'
Subject: Re: [AT] Too many tractors
Herb,
Interestingly, the famers kind of pushed (demanded) that the major tractor
manufacturers, in those days, quit offering proprietary hitch implements and
wanted a universal three point hitch after the Ferguson System patent
protection went away in 1952/1953, so they could use common implements on
all tractors. Turned out it was a good idea but there was much more to it
than just making the three points similar.     There was a lot of
coordination amongst manufacturers  to try to get some standardizing through
the ASAE organization which was accomplished but the whole PTO
standardization never really got fully accomplished properly.  Then there
was a lot of aftermarket manufacturers also offering three point hitches for
tractors that never had one from the factory.  It really became a complex
issue that we antique tractor guys still struggle with occasionally.
Actually I am still a bit amazed that so many different manufacturer's
equipment mostly works on  a wide range of tractors, hitches and PTO's.  But
there are nasty exceptions that can be really interesting and frustrating.

As a side note ......  that I am more familiar with, JD was forced into
offering a three point hitch hookup on tractors that had no provision for an
active top link. I'm referring to the 50, 60 & 70 series tractors.
1952-1956. In 1953, much against the opinion of some of the JD management,
JD went into panic, urgent development of a three point hitch to put on the
50, 60, 70 that JD never contemplated putting a three point hitch on.   The
JD powers to be were convinced they didn't need a three point hitch on the
50, 60 & 70 because 70% of the weight was already on the rear axle. No need
for load and depth control to improve traction they thought.  Then the
farmer demand hit them over the head demanding interchangeable implements
among the tractor manufactures.   So they were forced into the panic
development of the 800 series hitches which were first announced in 1953.
They didn't have a conventional single top link and were not really
compatible with other manufacturers implements because these hitches had two
top links(Upper Links) that required an Evener Bar between then and a
proprietary Mast bracket to be compatible with conventional three point
implements.  They were surprisingly well accepted and then in 1955 JD
introduced the 801 version of the 800 Series hitches that still used the two
upper arms but used mechanical sensing of the load to provide "Load and
Depth" control with advertised traction improvement of up to 40%.  IMHO this
particular invention was quite amazing in that they were able to accomplish
the same thing as the Ferguson Patent did with hydraulics. Most people,
especially non-JD people look at these 800 series hitch as a "Rube Goldberg
Contraption". IMHO the 801 hitch was an extremely valuable step forward
given the limits the JD designers were under.  In 1956 JD came out with the
20 series tractors that all had an option for a conventional three point
hitch. The JD 40 came out with a conventional three point hitch in 1953 but
that was due to the fact that it was light in the rear end lind the Ford and
Ferguson. The 50, 60 & 70 were mostly row crop tractors with the engine much
closer to the rear of the tractor.  The next time you go to a show and see
an 801 JD hitch on A'S B's, G's or the 50, 60 and 70 take a closer look at
it and try to overlook all the gangly levers. arms links and brackets and
learn how it accomplished load and depth control mechanically.  I have
learned to see it as very ingenious design and whoever the designer was
needs to be recognized. I don't yet know who it was. Maybe it was a group
but in any case it is a major accomplishment in the agricultural products
industry. And to top it all off all the implements that JD designed to be
used with the 800 series hitches (between 1953 and 1956) were instantly
compatible with the conventional three point hitches that came out with the
1956 20 series without modification.  JD did some really good design
planning to make that happen.

PS:  In the unstyled JD tractors there were multiple size PTO shafts used.
It took JD a very long time to come up with one PTO size shaft on all
tractors.  Those different sized PTO shafts were a complete PITA when I was
young kid on the farm. When adapters were used it upset the length of the
PTO system drive train to the implement resulting in some nasty results.
All was not nice and tidy on the old farmstead.
Dean VP
Apache junction, AZ