Re: ot/ please help

Posted by ScottyHOMEy on November 01, 2007 at 15:36:59 from (71.241.212.142):

In Reply to: ot/ please help posted by D17 man on November 01, 2007 at 14:26:12:

My belief is that the tractor manufacturers spent the middle part of the last century competing with each other, and at any given time they all had a range of tractors that competed pretty well with the others. The current wars between the pickup truck manufacturers is a lot the same, especially in the diesel engines. Cummins dials up the hp and torque for Dodge, Ford comes up with a new and improved Powerstroke to give better numbers than the Cummins to take the lead for a while . . .

I said that to make the point that a lot of what makes a better tractor has to do with where you were, as in proximity to the dealer for a certain make, and the reputation of the tractors they sold, the reputation of the dealer for sales and, especially, service.

I grew up around Farmalls, but early in my experience we had an Oliver on the place. THe Ih dealer was nine miles one way, over in Lancaster. The Oliver dealer was four miles the other way, in Lithopolis. Those two, and A/Cs were common in our neighborhood. Not sure where the A/C dealer was, but I can say that Deere didn't have any real presence in our area. At least I didn't have the sense that there were many of them around.

If you have a library that can get hold of a book by Ken Updike, "International Harvester Tractors 1955-1985" and read up a little, you'll get a sense of what IH did over the years to compete with Deere and others. You'll get a sense of how a lot of the time, especially in the ten years after WWII, the others were chasing IH, but then IH got away with murder stealing the idea for the narrow torque tube on the A and B from A/C and calling it Cultivision as if they'd thought it up for themselves. Ken's book is fair, too, in pointing out the disaster of the 460 and 560, and the boardroom decision to not license out the Fast-Hitch system, both of which were significant factors in the demise of IH.

Maybe some others can chime in for books about Deere (I simply don't know about them) that would be similar, and I'd encourage you to read them, too.

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