Hi, I have a 1940 farmall H with no hyd. While searching for a trailer plow for it I came across ajd44 and an IH 2 bottom plow with rubber tires all the way around and two piece points!. I can Buy the plow quit reasonable but was wondering about moldboards? Points? How can I tell if this is a little geuins? Which would you buy and plow with?

You would be fine with either plow. The JD will be worth more bc it is a JD. I hear they are very nice plows. Unless any of the parts are worn out now before you use the plow you will NEVER wear them out.

The IH plow sounds like it has Plow Chief bottoms. Some NOS parts are still around for these, but not all. If the ones on the plow you're looking at are decent, they will last a long long time if all you're doing is plowing a couple of acres a year in easy ground.

Plow days are often held in fields that have fairly easy plowing dirt. The ones I've been to, they don't plow very deep either. Wear parts last a long time on land like this.

How do you know what's wore out?

On moldboards, it's easy. If you can cut yourself on the outer edge, it's wore out. Moldboards will wear to a razor's edge on the outside. If there's any thickness there, it will last a long time.

Other parts will look stubby and rounded off. If the plow is up off the ground, look at how much material is left on the shares and whatnot before the plow's framework (frog) comes in contact with the ground. If the share and/or landside is even with the frog, someone ran the wear parts far too long.

I also compare what they look like to pictures of new parts, which you can dig up online.

I'm sure more expert people will be able to give you better ways to judge the condition of plow parts... I'm just a wannabe when it comes to knowing about plows compared to some of these guys, even though my collection has more plows than tractors!

Probably just an "old wife's tale", but back when I was a kid I can remember the old timers saying a JD plow pulled harder than most other brands. This would have been in the '50s, and may have changed over the years or may have been different in different soils.

IHfan,
Your story brings up the opposite of what I heard in the 1950s in Iowa. Farmers with Farmall tractors and IH plows often complained that JD tractors plowed at faster speeds because "those JD plows pulled easier". Ever since those days, I've always wondered, if JD plows pulled easier, why those Farmall owners didn't just buy a JD plow! (But that would have been sacriligious).
I now own a Little Genius and that is one of my proudest possessions.
LA in WI

I was in NE Iowa and that's what I heard there... guess it depended on who was complaining . Dad had a JD 3x14 plow and when I was a Sr. in HS, I bought an IH 3x14 plow. Both pulled with a JD 60, but dad had sold out and moved to a smaller farm in '56 and in '58 I talked him into renting more ground for me to farm. The owner of the farm we rented had a 3x14 Oliver that we used the first year, but I wanted a hydraulic lift and Dad said if I wanted one, I'd have to buy it. Since we didn't have them both at the same time, I have no direct comparison. In our ground the 60 would run away with a 3x14". We had a variety of black loam to sandy "timber soil".