"History" lesson?

Grew up with Allis tractors, then Dad had a couple Fords. I have had a couple Agcos but have switched to Deere now. Agco,ruined it for me, poor mgmt.,poor dealer support.

In my county, 190s weren't the end, but definitely hurt AC bad. In the early '60s you could find a WD, 45, or D17 on nearly every farm, and some had all 3, AC was a very strong #2, right behind IH, by the mid '60s that was starting to change JD was coming on strong, and by the late '60s they had completely ran them over, and were gaining fast on IH, so I'd say yes 190s, and their reputation was a major factor.

Alberta Phil wrote: The 60 year old greens are all shined up and sittin' in shows or collector's buildings.

As a kid I heard the same thing about the 190 and the D19 having issues that set allis back. I know better now and wouldn't be afraid to own wither. I also remember having a discussion in one of my Ag classes about Deere's lawn and garden division being the key factor to their sustainability in the 80's and had been their most profitable arm for some time. Ford was slow to build a 100 horse tractor, stuck with the jerkomatic(selecto-speed) for too long, and didn't come out with a 2 speed partial power shift until 70 but there are a ton of hundred and 2-5000 tractors out there so it's easy to get the perception they only built small tractors.

No we will just all be putting the points back and taking out those electronic upgrade kits.... having been a controls engineer for years I can tell you that the talk about electronics and magnetic pulses is over rated poorly built circuit boards will overload everything else is just fine. I worked with lasers which had massive electromagnetic fields pulsing all The time and yes you could fry something like a digital meter inside the laser cabinet but the boards built for it where fine.

I don't believe the 190 or the XT hurt A-C all that much it all fell on management I mean poor management. A-C was spread way to thin with all their diversity.John Deere on the other hand only had tractors and farm equipment.I've talked to a lot of ex A-C employees they said if they would of took the pres. out back and educated him or worse they would still be building tractors.Allis had a bright future if they would of continued.

White was bought by agco in the 90s

WDman1951 wrote: Jd people will be jd people lol case sucks that must have been why they were able to aquire a huge tractor mogul like ih right and allis had the harvester market corned for almost the entire life of the all crop

Only reason they were able to acquire IH was the Tenneco money. Tenneco was very diversified buddy worked for a Tenneco subsidiary making cardboard boxes.

Back on to the 190 gas engines. The early gassers did have problems breaking the top of the pistons off. Later they changed the piston and the problem stopped. The XT diesels tore up rear ends because the rear end was first developed to run behind a straight 190 with 77 hp. Then the 190XT shows up and the early literature talks about pulling the same plow as the 190 but pulling it faster. Farmers were slow to learn high speed farming and instead put that power to the ground pulling a bigger plow then a straight 190 could pull. The farmers also discovered that a turbocharged engine could easily be turned up from 95 pto hp to 110 to 130 and even 150 hp. A 4020 had no turbo so couldn't be turned up like that. Lots or XTs came from the factory with 110 to 120 pto hp. 

Back in the late 80's I met a man at saw hammering school who had just bought a saw and cutter shop, after working for a number of years in tractor factories.  He was probably about 50 years old then, so I guess was building tractors in the 1960's and 70's.  International, and Case as I remember.

Having lived in Taiwan for a year and a half I will still pass on everything maid in china. They really don't care about quality. They might k ow how to do it right but they don't care to.

I did actually look at a Mahendra tractor.   It was pretty cheap money for the power. But what I realized was that everyone sitting on the dealer lot here had a 4 speed standard transmission with no power shift or no high low you could shift on the fly. The power shift or the high low combo on the D serries is a must have for both mowing and bailing if you ask me. So I didn't buy one.
As to the abuse versus use comment from the dealer I am pretty sure most small farmers will end up using a tractor to the point that the dealer would call it abuse. See my thread Allis to the rescue I am sure my hard use of my D17 would be called abuse by the mechanic you talked to. Yet she has pulled big bailer and a hay 20 foot hay wagon most of her life. That is how we hayed when I was a kid.

Now not checking or changing the fluids is neglect not abuse and in book worse. If you are going to beat on it you can at least try to take care of it. As to the loggers yes there are some here who try to go cheap or into tighter areas with small tractors and I agree that is abusive to the tractor there is a reason skidders are built big and heavy.   You see old ford 800s with the 4 wd kit here and a broken rear end because they used them with the winch setup. A 3 point hitch is not meant to be used like that. I don't even like a 3 point counter weight but at the moment I need to use one. Or my favorite is the 3 point backhoes.   How many of those break the rearend on a tractor and everyone just looks dumb going the rock didn't look that big or I have moved bigger rocks......

Edited by Dan73 - 03 Aug 2015 at 9:49am

Economics of scale, keeping shareholders happy and management making decisions that sometimes should have only been made in Vegas.

Manufacturers tried to offer something to everyone under their brand name back in the day and still do, from required small utility units to big HP out west.
In 1970, my father had a decision to make as he needed a tractor that could do everything, including being driven into the dairy barn with a 180 bushel spreader at night to prevent freezing in Upstate NY. The 10 Series JD and 06 IH had been around and folks with good money had either a 4020 or a 56/66 series IH being delivered. Dad's brother with the A-C dealership wanted to bring him a 190XT but it would not fit in the dairy barn. He later said he looked at the 180 but settled on a British Leland for the money aspect, although he never did get accustomed to straddling that transmission. Seems the 180 was also going to be a tight fit in the barn and he felt the tranny/rear diff. were not heavy enough for our hilly area.
The 4/65 Nuffield (a two year leftover unit) was picked up for 4800.00 and ran what became a 500 acre dairy when we rented the land next door. People used to joke about the old "nuttshaker" but she did everything and you could not swing a cat without hitting one in that area as they were inexpensive, snorty and heavy little stubby units that easily cranked 70-75 hp without a turbo; BMC diesel with Simms pumps.
If I recall, Mahindra was making the small IH utilities back in the 50's so that name has actually been around a long time and IH did pretty well with that little India import for decades.
I give my dad plenty of credit as at the end of the day he also raised eight kids on that dairy and believe me, he and my mother went without plenty. I realized how just easy his decision must have been back then as I have the original delivery invoice for my D19D SC that was purchased in 1964 by the neighbors that eventually bought our farm; 7,200.00.
Funny how different brands dominated specific areas but I think the American farmer has always been pretty astute, when it came down to spending money for the tractor he needed, and what he could actually afford.

Oh and all of Asia is one very high end luxury car swerving around an ox cart to get down the road faster. Well in taiwan they replaced the ox with scooters pulling the same cart. I think they ate the ox. The point being if you think there is an income gap in the us go to Asia they have a much bigger one.