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Bill(Wis)
11-16-2004 16:42:30
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Re: Evolution of Farm Equipment in reply to Jake In Colorado, 11-16-2004 08:23:54
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I don't know how you got yourself in a situation like that but here is 25 cents. John Deere started with plows. Really good plows. Other bits and pieces followed but they could see a big hole in their product line. No tractor. They assigned the project of building a tractor to a fellow named Dain. He designed and built a really good tractor. Four cyl engine, all wheel drive, etc. Trouble was, it would cost a lot. Like $3,000. Too much. Waterloo Boy was already in business, right there in town, turning out 2 cyl tractors for about half that, so, along came John Deere with some money and suddenly the Waterloo Boy tractors were green and yellow. That was 1918. It took JD 5 more years to come out with a tractor that was truly their own. The world famous Model D. 30 years later they were still making it. Along the way , alongside the D, came the General Purpose, & the A B, H, G, etc. JD stayed with 2 cyl engines until 1960 when the new generation of tractors came out. I would include the major advancements to tractor design such as rubber tires, mechanical lifts giving way to hydraulics, crude PTOs becoming more user friendly, ROPS (that was a JD first and they gave the technology to any and all). That made the cab a natural follow on. AC, heat and stereo to boot. Now Greenstar. There's plenty to talk about. Young people would probably be more interested in tractors or combines than milking machines, just a guess. Barnes and Noble probably have books about this. This website. Nebraska Test labs, etc.
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