News flash!!!

First gear, TA in low, 20,000 lbs. with 16.9 x 38 radials on clay. Nothing broke!!! Sure is funny how you always read that they were a "disaster" as it is put in one of my books. Seems like IHC responding and doing the right thing had more of a negative effect on their reputation than anything. Fact is the 560 was the most abused tractor in history. Many were instantly turboed and forced to compete with the larger Deeres of the three year period IH was retooling for the 706 and 806.

You never hear of the problems Deere had in any books do ya. 720 and 730 crank problems. Early 4010"s dropping sleeves. It amazes me how reputations are easily tarnished. The 560 was a 60 HP tractor that was forced to operate as an 80-90 HP tractor through every trick in the book for its entire career. I wonder if the 720-730 deeres would have problems with them if it was possible to increase the power of them?

Mark

I've never seen a 560 that weighs 20,000 lbs. plus in the field plowing in first gear low. Thanks for dumbing it down for me though. I would venture to guess that 16 hour days in the field vs. tractor pulling would decrease the time between engine overhauls too?

Mark

To start with I never suggested anyone actually ever used a 20,000 lb 560 in the field. What I did say was, no short term hard pull ever messed up a power train on a tractor. Heat buildup over the long haul, my friend is the ture test of a powertrain. IH put together the 560 basically using Farmall M rear end and placed 15 + more hp up front. Many 560 diesels turned out 75 hp right from the factory, and it was quite easy to crank 90 hp out of one, thus there were many 560s out in the field turning twice the hp the Farmall M rearend was designed for.

I expect the 16 hour days would decrease the TIME between engine overhauls. A lot of folks running 16 hour days quite easily put 600 to a 1000 hours a year on tractors. Now, if a tractor puller went to a 150 pulls per year, we're talking less than 10 hours per year of tractor operation.

Given the fact it is quite easy to get 10,000 hours tractor operation between engine rebuilds, on the farm. By my count a tractor puller should get a 1,000 years between engine rebuilds.

I agree that the 560 is probably still the most abused IH tractor out there - loader work, etc.

He claims the 560 was the best gas farm tractor that IH ever made, used to rag on my cousin about his 656 diesel not keeping up with the old man's 560 in haying seasons. One of the ol' varmint's favorite things in life, was a call from a neighbor to come pull something out with his 560.

Never had any TA or final drive problems with that 560 gasser and that thing got a hard workout on the farm. Other than normal maintenence items, I don't think that tractor ever cost him a nickel in the ten years he worked it.