HD-31

There are a couple of FD30's around here.  I'm told they are basically HD 21C's with a Fiat V8 engine.  I've driven one of them on a ferry.

41 tractor came out first.. It had a 1710 Cummins V12 motor and full weight was about 80 tons.. 41 B was an upgrade mainly final drive work... Several years later FA wanted a "cheaper" big tractor to compete against others. Took the 41B and shortened it one track roller, same final drives, same transmission, used the 1050 Cummins straight six and called the tractor a 31... weight was in the 65 ton area.. Started calling them FD50 and FD40  sometime around 1980 -82.  Mid 1980s Fiat wanted to close the Springfield Illinois plant and move everything to Italy... Built a backlog of  FD40s and 50s and keep them in the plant to sell for 2 years..  All manufacturing tools were sold or boxed up and shipped to Italy... Not sure they ever go it going after that.. Sold the last of the FD50s about 1987..

There were a couple of fellows here locally that had FD30s and they were used primarily for ripping vineyard ground, if any of you have ever been around wine grapes and vineyards it is a constant one upmanship, a manhood wagging contest if you will. Should the local vineyard rip vine rows 18 inches deep with a 3T D7, then the neighbor would have to rip 24 inches deep and then cross rip and the next guy would rip 30 inches with a D8 and then 36 inches until somebody brought in 2 D9's to rip 6 feet and then 3 D9's and then a D10, it is just ludicrous, at any rate, they guys with the FD30's did very well with them, tough, dependable, seems like they proved to me what a great machine they really are. Nothing is harder on a tractor than ripping, up against the full potential of the machine 100% of the time and the FD's did every bit as well as the Cats and the Kumatsus if not better, one guy even had a TD25, which I always thought was a very good machine, very comparable to the FD30 in weight and ability but Lord help him if it breaks. I never could understand why the thought process was to bring bigger and bigger machines and run them solo when two smaller machines coupled would spread the load between the two and then have the ability to move them from place to place without special weight and width permits and finding a lowbed that will haul them and a crane is necessary to remove the blade and whatever other parts to make weight limits, a lot to deal with. Just thinking outloud

Come on Tad your side the river you got all that hard pan, after ripping all that rain just sinks on in.

I took a farm tour to California in the late 1990's, we went to a peach farm pretty much surrounded by vineyards.  The owner also grew grapes, someone asked him about the pile of vineyard material pushed up into piles a ways down the road.  There were a couple D9's sitting there.  He said the owners, a large wine company, don't remember the name, decided they had too much of one variety of grape and pushed it out to replant the newest and greatest new variety, even though the existing vineyard was only a few years old.  He told us he would watch what was being pushed out and plant that variety because in a few years, there wouldn't be enough of it anymore and people wanted that grape.