OK, We're in Maine and have a commercial vegteble farm and I need something I can use to do close cultivation of vegitable crops with.

I'm thinking mid mount cultivators on an A, Super A, 140 etc. may do the job but I don't want to get the tractor and then not be able to get the cultivators that fit it or be able to put spiders ( Bezzerides Cultivator) on the cultivator bar.

I don't really have time to tinker on this in the spring. I do have some time this winter.
So how easy is it going to be for me to get set up? Can I still find cultivator bars etc. if I get a tractor or am I going to be left hanging?

Thanks for the help

(quoted from post at 13:45:04 12/30/09) OK, We're in Maine and have a commercial vegteble farm and I need something I can use to do close cultivation of vegitable crops with.

I'm thinking mid mount cultivators on an A, Super A, 140 etc. may do the job but I don't want to get the tractor and then not be able to get the cultivators that fit it or be able to put spiders ( Bezzerides Cultivator) on the cultivator bar.

I don't really have time to tinker on this in the spring. I do have some time this winter.
So how easy is it going to be for me to get set up? Can I still find cultivator bars etc. if I get a tractor or am I going to be left hanging?

Thanks for the help

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Dell

https://photos.yesterdaystractors.c...utton=on&db_id=362923&query=retrieval

I used a cub with a set of mounted cultivators in my 1/2 acre garden this last summer and it did a fine job. I'm going to do a much bigger garden this coming year, and am curious to see how well I will do with just a one row set up.
I had no problem getting the cultivator set up. $550 for a set of complete belly and rear mount with disc hillers and shields. I think The Super A would be a minor improvement over the cub, but could see how stepping up to a C/ Super C with two row capability would come in handy for higher production. They seem to be fairly common.
I am unfamiliar with the Bezzeride cultivators you mentioned, but would think anyone handy with a welder could make almost anything adapt the the Farmall frames.
I'm trying to design a flail mower to mount under my Cub to top potatoes prior to digging them...

Good luck.

Ben

You will be very happy with a 140 for cultivating if you want a 1 row set up. You can do just about any thing as far as putting on spiders. I live in the tobacco vegitable area of Ontario and there is lots of that kind of stuff availible here. You should be able to find cultivators and 140 tractors in the north and south carolina and Virginia or Florida. But i have what ever you need in cultivators if you want to come to Canada. A cub is nice but not enough power or speed. Erik..

Hugh MacKay used to cultivate vegetables with a 130 or 140, he had a tool bar and he could cultivate 2 or 3 rows at once. A 2 row tractor would be better suited for wider rows like corn.

I use a Super C with a wide front for cultivation. The Super As, 140s, etc. are too much money for getting see that you are plowing out both rows. If your cultivator is set up accurately both side will work the same. You just have to look on the other side to make sure the depth is right over there.

It has been easy to find cultivators for the SC, but most of them are worn out or bent. I suspect the SA/140 equipment will be in the same condition.

I have had good luck with Buddingh Basket weeders and have not tried the Bezzerides spiders. People say they work great.

Greg

Greg

I have stoney ground Bezzerides spiders work well in stony ground. I can use Buddingh Baskets but they don"t take the rocks as well as bezzerides.

A wide front end C would be good because I think they are higher off the ground. I can find tractors around here. It"s the cultivators I"m having trouble with.

DOWN HERE IN KENTUCKY 140'S, A'S, EVEN CUBS WERE SET UP FOR 1 ROW CULTIVATION. TOBBACO GROWERS USED TO BE SMALLER OPERATORS : 1,2,4,10 ACRES AND A LOT OF THEM USED TO USE 140'S. MY NEIGHBOR USED A CUB ON 10 ACRES OR MORE AT TIMES. I LIKED MY 140 BETTER BECAUSE OF POWER AND TRACTION. YOUR ROWS NEED TO BE 42-44 INCHES FOR A 140. I QUIT TOBBACO AND SOLD MINE;A LOT OF SMALL OPERATORS QUIT AND THERE ARE A LOT OF THEM FOR SALE.BIGGER OPERATORS USE 2 ROW TRACTORS:C'S,230'S AND SO ON.
MARK

There was a veggie cult for the A and SA used tool bars belley mount. Would do up to 6 rows 15 on center dont know if ther was one for the SA and models following. Real neat setup one sure could be made from the standard type cults.

You didn't mention how many acres or what crops are involved. If you need to reconfigure for different crops, going with a 2-row tractor may create more work than it eliminates.

Cultivators for a Super A (or even a Cub) are probably easier to find than ones for a C. Best deal is to find a tractor with a cultivator. Probably save some money and better chance of getting a complete cultivator. I had to take a look at the Bezzerides web site to see how they mount, but their tools should go right on any of these cultivators.

If you need to do multiple narrow rows (like 12" carrot rows), you should find a tool bar type vegetable unit. They were made for all three of these tractors and the newer models, but are pretty hard to find. Earlier this year, I threw together a reasonably presentable tool bar set-up on a Cub using the universal mounting frames and a couple planter parts.

Front axle clearance isn't much different on the various models: Cub 20 3/8, Super A 21 7/8, C 22 1/2. A tricycle front C might have a little more clearance under the rear axle.

Some comments in this thread may be helpful:
http://ytforums.ytmag.com/viewtopic.php?t=573029

Jim

We will be using the tractor for growing multiple types of vegetables. Including a lot of carrots and squash with some of the squash under plastic.

If the tractor does a good job keeping the weeds down we would use it on 4 plus acres this year and could expand up to 10 acres next year. It all depends on what this little tractor can do keeping the weeds down.

I have found a couple super A's in the area and a 140. It looks like I can pick up a tractor for between $1,500 and 2,000 but non of these tractors have cultivators. I'm pretty encouraged to see that I can pick up cultivators in other parts of the country.

The vegetable tool bar for carrots you mentioned would be very helpful. This is all new to me so any help with this setting up a machine will be deeply appreciated.

That helps pin things down a little more. My first comment you probably already know, but I'll mention it anyway for anyone else reading this. You can only cultivate at one time what you plant at one time. Close cultivation requires very close control of the row spacings. Otherwise you will cultivate one row while removing much of the adjacent row. I will guess that you plant really small plants (carrot is good example) with multiple rows in a bed and some greater separation between the beds. For the sake of argument, you may have 3 Cole planters ganged together to plant 3 rows with 12 inches between them. Then you leave 24 inches before the next set of three rows, giving room to walk/weed/harvest without walking or driving on the next row. (The 3, 12 and 24 are examples and may be any reasonable numbers.) You would want to set your tractor to track at 48 inches and set up a cultivator to do the bed of 3 rows at one time. For this type crop, a tool bar with the appropriate tools would be the easieest to set up. Then when you are ready to cultivate the squash/melon plants, I would expect them to be a single row that is at least 48 inches. So you widen the center row tools as needed and adjust the outer tools to clean the area where the 2 side rows were.

Back to the row crop type cultivation, if you are doing much corn, tomato, or potato; the row crop cultivators would be better for the higher crop clearance. The tool bar type will only give you about 12 inches of clearance. Fine for carrots, severe limitation for corn. You may have to ask yourself if being able to cultivate higher crops makes it worth while to have a second cultivator and do the changing out. If approached the right way, you can minimize the effort to make the change. If you also have to change wheel track, the changing becomes more work. (Then you start thinking about having 2 tractors with different wheel spacings.)

On the 1 vs. 2 row question (Super A vs. C), you need to consider how much doing 2 rows speeds up the cultivation as opposed to how much time it adds to doing set-up. Think of this: say you have an acre of sweet corn set on 36 inch rows. That is a total of 14,520 feet of corn row. A Super A doing first cultivation, crawling along at low idle in first gear, will go about 1 1/3 mph and cover the whole acre in just over 2 hours. A C covering 2 rows at the same speed and would save about an hour. It would require having twice the tooling and how much of that hour would be used on extra set-up time? The time saved would be even less in later passes when you can go faster.

For your operation, I'd stick with a single row tractor, either a Super A/100/130/140 or a Cub. The Super A/100/130/140 would be preferable for several reasons, more power, better hydraulics and more ground speeds. Finding a tool bar type vegetable cultivator will be difficult, for all practical purposes may be impossible. If you can't find one, you may be able to bolt together what you need starting with a row-crop unit. The most important consideration is the condition of the universal mounting frames. For close work, you want as little wear as possible in all the pivot points. Wear translates to tool movement, which you want to avoid. I have been told that Waterman's in Sabattus often has equipment for the small Farmalls. If you are anywhere near them, you might want to see what they have sitting in the back yard.

You will be happy with a SA/140. You can do multiple row cultivation with the standard cultivators, it just takes a little doing to get the spacing correct. I use a five foot center to center tire spacing, with either one, two or three rows depending on plant size, with 12 spacing between rows. For large plants like squash, just use the center row, for smaller plants, the outside two rows and for really small plants use all three.

I have an extra set of cultivator frames, so if you find a 140 without them, let me know. You would still need to get the actual cultivating tools, but since you are planning on using Bezzerides, you"ll need to do that anyway.