Is a 1939 Farmall B worth more than electric start B

A widow lady wanted me to give her an idea what her 1939 B Hand Crank is worth as she wants to sell it. I think they went to electric starter in 1940 am I right? Mainly is it worth more or less that a electric start both being in the same condition. She said it was straight and runs but tires are bad. I will go down and try to help her. Any help you guys can give me would be appreciated. Thanks

The only reason it would be worth more is because its a '39(1st year production)If you look close,I think you wil find provision to in stall a starter.

Our '39 B had no provision for starter or electrics of any kind.

Early A's & B's could have been bought with or without provisions for a starter. I've seen them have the starter hole in the torque tube with a plate over the mounting hole, and I've seen them with a torque tube that had no provisions to install a starter at all.

I don't think the year is the determining factor for electric start, it is how it was ordered from the factory. At some point (and I'm not sure when, but probably in '39 or '40), if you ordered one without a starter, you got the torque tube that had the hole, but with the plate over it because IH stopped making the plain torque tube.

Gene Bender or Jim Becker can probably tell you when that change was made.

Did 39 little tractors have any 39 only items like the Ms and Hs?

First starter on the A was March 25 1940. Yes there were several things on the A at first later models didnt have seat ,steering wheel,serial plate location, overflow tube on the radiator,kill sw,opening in the head for the sparkplugs, fasteners for the sheet metal

Yes later on they had a field converson kit as the early ones didnt even have the grouve for a ring gear on the flywheel then they made changes making it easier to install the starter. I have never seen a block that didnt have the bosses for a generator i guess it was because of the Bosch system that didnt require a battery so you could have lites and early ones didnt even have the pulley on the fan for a gen belt.

There were a lot of running changes over the duration of A/B production. I don't know if any were actually synchronized to the year change from '39 to '40. For that matter, I'm not sure any changes were on the H and M either.

The bell housing was changed on all production in '41, although the starter was evidently available somewhat before that. Electric lights were available from day one. All the castings were set up for battery, light and generator brackets. However field installation required changing the fan hub to accomodate the generator belt. Backfitting a starter onto the early tractors required a bell housing and flywheel.

(quoted from post at 13:03:34 07/28/12) Did 39 little tractors have any 39 only items like the Ms and Hs?

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Like Gene said, the kill switch was the mechanical type, bolted to side of magneto and the cable running up to steering wheel post was like a choke cable swith an "S" stamped on the metal kill button. My `39 A (serial # 1474) has a 2 spoke steering wheel- only one I`ve seen like it. I have sales literature showing them, but never saw another in person. The drawbars -swinging and hoop are different also. The plate on the hoop drawbar where it bolts to the drop axle is rectangular, where as on later version it is tapered and longer on the back side as it goes down to the hoop drawbar, making it a little stronger. The swinging drawbar is backwards from later version- the crossbar has an extra channel iron welded in middle for the swinging drawbar to slide into. The front of the swinging drawbar only has the single bar that slides into the slot in the crossbar. My swinging drawbar is NOS . I got it at the local IH dealer with part # tag still hanging on it. Serial # plate location is on shield on foot platform between clutch and left brake petal. My A has a torque tube with a starter hole , but it`s from a newer tractor as the part # ends in DB ans is supposed to be DA.

Neat tractor Mark. Does your dealer happen to have a bunch of NLA WD-9 parts? :lol:

Sorry to say they are out of business and somebody went in and offered a one price takes all for their old parts, so there`s nothing left. :-(