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Ford Tractor Conversions
Ford Tractor Conversions
As early as 1903 published photographs appeared of a car providing a stationary source of power,
including Henry Ford sawing wood with A new Model A Ford in 1903.
The editor of Ford Time, wrote an article
for the magazine in 1909, in which he matched the Model Ts technical characteristics point for point
with those he thought farmers required, concluding that "with a little ingenuity the Model T
can be made to run the cream separator, saw the wood, or pull a trailer
loaded with farm produce or housing supplies." For much of the Tin Lizzy long life, Ford
magazines and sales bulletins published numerous stories of how farm men had harnessed the
motor to do their chores, including plowing, in support of the advertising slogan that
the Model T was the "universal car.
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During World War I a humorous postcard series,"Let Lizzie Do It,"
showed the Model T doing many farm chores, including running a washing machine
and plowing a field. One card depicts a woman using the car to launder
clothes, wash dishes, churn butter, and rock a baby cradle while the man urges her to hurry
up and finish so he can plow the fields. While the post cards were apparently produced
independent of the Ford Motor Company the company saw no reason to discourage the free
publicity..
Left "Let Lizzie Do It," postcard series.
with the tractor
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It's no surprise
dozens of companies including the Pullford Company, Staude's Mak-A-Tractor, KnickerBocker
Forma-Tractor released their Model T tractor conversion to market
before Henry Ford'
s own highly successful tractor, the Fordson. Therefore it appears that one of Henry
Ford'
s toughest competitors in the tractor market was his own popular Model T and Model A.
.
Over one hundred different manufactures made kits for converting a Ford car or using car components to create a tractor
using Ford car parts including Sears and Montgomery Ward.
Right Montgomery Ward Ford Tractor conversion.
click on image to enlarge
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Shaw Manufacturing Company of Galesburg, Kansas, which also made garden tractors.
Responded to the economic crisis of the Great Depression by targeting their ads toward
farm men who were prosperous enough to have an old car to convert permanently into a
tractor but not wealthy enough to buy a tractor.
Left "Make a Handy Tractor From An Old Auto," .
Shaw Manufacturing Company brochure.
To Download this complete Shaw Farm Tractor brochure and countless more rare brochures and
manuals visit our
Literature Page
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The Thieman Harvester Company
In 1936, the first Thieman
farming tractors
were sold with Model
A Ford engines at a cost of approximately $500. Sales were so brisk that in peak season the company employed
150 people working 3 shifts. Due to the shortage of steel during World War II, production of tractors suspended.
In 1945 the business was sold, and within a short time it was sold once again, finally going into bankruptcy.
Right Thieman Ford Tractor conversion.
click on image to enlarge
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The Thieman Harvester Company was incorporated in 1921. Their first invention was an ensilage harvester. Other farm items that Thieman built,
including livestock feeders and waterers, end gates, plow guides, saw frames, and power units.
Like other ford tractor conversions cultivator equipment could be adapted to the tractor. The idea that the
Thieman tractor along with many other conversion companies, was to salvage the engines from used or junked
automobiles and create inexpensive
farming tractors
from other wise scrap components. The idea had quite a bit of merit and success during the depression years, and thus Thieman and other
manufactures had a readily salable item right up until World War II steel shortages curtailed production
Left Thieman Ford Tractor conversion
with optional cultivator equipment .
click on image to enlarge
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The Pullford Company, of Quincy, Illinois, introduced a $135 tractor conversion kit in 1916 and continued in business as late as 1940.
It consisted of a set of lugged steel wheels, and a rear framework and gears which allowed the Model T rear axle to be geared down to tractor speed.
These changeover kits were marketed to farmers who were farming with horses as a low-priced option to a tractor. The conversions became
especially common in the 1920s and 1930s as the Great Depression set in. Cheap Model Ts were easy to come up with, therefore the
conversions became an easy and inexpensive way to mechanize the small farmer and begin weaning them away from horses.
Right Model T conversions kits were sold to transform Model Ts into sources of power to run machinery,
to turn them into trucks for hauling, or to transform them into tractors. One of the most successful of these
conversion kits was offered by the Pullford company click on image to enlarge
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FORD
Model T |
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Following the Model T'
s skyrocketing success came mail-order catalogs
and magazine advertisements filled with parts and kits to turn the humble
Fords into farm tractors, power units for belt driven farm equipment, and farm
trucks. Historians credit the Model T — which Ford first advertised as The
Universal Car — with launching today'
s multibillion-dollar automotive aftermarket industry.
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Top
Conversion kits like the Pullford bolted onto an existing Model T chassis while others used the
engine, transmission, radiator and and other parts and bolted then onto their tractor chassis.
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About 1922 the Raymond tractor appeared. It had a unique hitch design and was powered by a Ford Model T engine. The Raymond
used individual rear brakes and also featured a innovative mechanical lift system for the plow. A cultivator could be mounted
directly to the tractor frame. The Raymond tractor brochure proclaimed that after using the engine, transmission, radiator
and fuel tank for the tractor, the remaining parts could be used for making a four-wheel farm trailer.
Left
The innovative Raymond farming tractor
conversion tractor.
click on image to enlarge
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Sears Tractor |
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In 1938, Sears & Roebuck offered the Sears New Economy
farm tractor. Priced at $495, it was powered by a rebuilt Ford Model
A engine. This tractor came on steel wheels, with rubber tires being an extra-cost option. Sears offered assorted
cultivators and implements for use with this farm tractor.
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FORDSON |
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Fordson
Henry Ford made no public announcement before introducing this,
his first
Ford Tractor
. A group of promoters in Minneapolis hired a young man named Ford and brought out "The Ford Tractor"
ahead of Henry Ford, although it was not a success. This was why Ford named his tractor "Fordson." |
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FORD
Ferguson 9N |
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Ford Ferguson 9N
The first
Ford 9N was built in 1939. It used the company's own four-cylinder engine, which carried a 3-3/16 x 3-3/4-inch bore and stroke. The unique feature of the 9N tractor was the fact that it was equipped with a unique three-point-hitch system.
The Ferguson System consisted of a combined
linkage and hydraulic control, applicable to a wide variety of implements and was perfected in 1935 after 17 years of engineering development by Harry Ferguson. |
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FORD NAA |
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The 3PT War
a $9.25 million dollar settlement agreement against Ford. Ford agreed to discontinue production of the
hydraulic system using Ferguson's reservoir-side
hydraulic pump
by the end of the 1952 model year. 1953 saw the release of the Ford NAA Ferguson,
who had begun producing Ford 9N look-alikes that he marketed as Ferguson TE-20 and TO- 20 ,
suffered in the final settlement for his success. He had manufactured nearly 140,000 of the 9N clones without Ford's permissio
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International Harvester Farmall H |
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International Harvester
Farmall H was the redesigned sequel to the Farmall F-20. The Farmall H had a new engine
that used a water pump. The H was introduced the same year as the popular Farmall M and
since both models shared the same frame, mounted farm implements were interchangeable.
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