Memories of your first time... a pleasure reading thread

[groundcover]

My first time 'solo' was on a Farmall C. I must have been three or four and had been watching this tractor stuff pretty close. The tractor was parked next to a large veggie garden.While dad was tending to something in the garden I climbed up,pulled the ignition knob and gave the starter loop a pull. She started right up,only it was in gear and off we went! I thought I was doing a stroke of business till the old man (must have been all of 25) sprinted across the garden, climbed up and shut off the tractor. That was the end off my tractor driving for quite a while , I wasn't the only one to catch it that day, Mom tore him a new one for not watching me close enough!

[Barneyhunts]

On the first day I had my new BX2200 with ROP my FIL took it for a "spin" and almost tipped it over backwards when the ROP caught on a clothesline pole and he couldn't figure out why the front of the tractor was climbing into the air. We had a good laugh at his expense! It wasn't so funny about an hour later when I pulled down the clothesline with that same ROP.

[MossRoad]

Originally Posted by TomOfTarsus

Anybody else have any memories of their first time they'd like to share?

Yes. I used my bucket teeth to put an air hose pass through port in the side of my garage.

[davitk]

Originally Posted by groundcover

My first time 'solo' was on a Farmall C. I must have been three or four and had been watching this tractor stuff pretty close. The tractor was parked next to a large veggie garden.While dad was tending to something in the garden I climbed up,pulled the ignition knob and gave the starter loop a pull. She started right up,only it was in gear and off we went! I thought I was doing a stroke of business till the old man (must have been all of 25) sprinted across the garden, climbed up and shut off the tractor. That was the end off my tractor driving for quite a while , I wasn't the only one to catch it that day, Mom tore him a new one for not watching me close enough!

You got me beat; STEERING WHEEL time!! I was about the same age, playing on Grandpa's Farmall "H" pulling and pushings things I wasn't supposed to, when suddenly she roared to life (not in gear, whew!), I jumped off and ran and hid behind the hen house. Never did live that one down

[MarkV]

Good story Tom. Get an implement on the back for ballast or have the tires loaded and you will find those hills easier to work on.

MarkV

[Tractors4u]

I was 9 or 10. My dad had a trailer that e would put behind my grand dad's C Farmall to haul firewood out of the woods. He decided it was time to teach me to drive. Been an avid tractor driver since then.

[AndyMA]

Growig up on a nursery spent a fair amout of time around multiple types of power equipment. Started driving a Ford 8N sitting in my dad's lap when I was 6 or 7. By the time I was 10 or 11 I was york raking and plowing snow by myself. Since I'm 58 this year I guess that meams I've been on tractors for about 50 years. (I still feel young and the rush hasn't really gone). I just like bigger toys, there's nothig like ripping out a volkswagon sized boulder with my 44,000 excavator. I've owned tractors for about 2/3 of yhose 50 years. Still looking to get an 8N back. Preferably 1950, the yeear I was born.

Andy

[gemini5362]

Not my first time driving a tractor but my first time with a tractor that had an FEL on it. I was building a new garage ont my house. to get the floor level we had to build a wall and fill it with crusher dust. I hired some masons to lay the blocks and then I had trucks dump the crusher dust in the middle of the floor and i would spread it around with the tractor. I was almost completely finished and was working on the last little bit of the top layer and watching my box blade as I was leveling out the top I looked up and i had hit a corner of the blocks with my FEL. I moved the tractor back and I had knocked off about ten blocks from the top row. I got some cement and put the blocks back in place. After my garage was finished a friend of mine came over and was admiring it. He mentioned that the block work looked really good except for that one corner. He wondered if the block layers had come back from lunch drunk before they did that corner. There is a list of items that I have had to repair or replace while I was learning that the front end loader has a really long reach when you are going backwards and turn the tractor.

[TomOfTarsus]

Well, it's lunch time again and I wanted to thank all of you for the funny, poigniant, and in one case tragic, stories, and for the tips as well.

Everyone here wonders what I'm chuckling about! It's a tractor thing, they wouldn't understand. Let'em wonder!

And to my original post: It turns out that DDW* really DID think I had major trouble with the tractor when she got home and saw it with the hood up getting the battery charged. She still can't get over me buying it. But I can tell you I'd have been a good long while moving the wood from where I'd cut it to where I stack it. "Uphill" just doesn't make it fun for moving large quantities of wood in a wheelbarrow. I need my exercise but you have to draw the line somewhere!

I can't wait to get out there again. The thrill and the fear call me...

Thanks again, & keep'em coming!

(* DDW = Dear, Disgusted Wife, for those who don't want to go back to post #1 - see my sig.)

[jdpharmd]

1981 on a Oliver with narrow front end. Bailing hay in Maymont, PA when I could barely reach the clutch. We did not have a hay wagon so my older brothers and dad would load the pickup truck behind me while I baled away.

It only took me 27 years later to finally buy a tractor of my own. ....and yes...I can finally reach the clutch.

---jeff