[AT] David Brown

[James Peck]

The Ferguson-Brown Type A displayed in The Henry Ford (Museum) in Dearborn does not, if I remember correctly, have a PTO. Yet the PTO was already available in other tractor lines. That tractor is on steel. It supposedly is the one that plowed against a Fordson with a trailing plow in the famous plowing contest. Clearly Harry did not anticipate what the three point hitch and PTO combination would become.

Did the Ferguson-Brown that you scrapped have a PTO? It may have been an option.

I had not thought about having a PTO shaft that does not run in oil so it has fewer power losses.  Did that good idea originate with David Brown.

Toyota was famous for letting other companies try out innovations. Toyota could then copy the successful ones with low costs. That is just the opposite of the NIH (Not Invented Here) approach. Is this a way in which Deere is like Toyota?

Thomas Martin AT List Member (tmartin at xtra.co.nz);  <snip> The drag of MF & Ford having the PTO shaft running in oil, was detrimental when getting maximum % of flywheel HP to the PTO output shaft. SAME scored well for the same reasons as DB. <snip>