Looks like I'm getting a 3525!

[AchingBack]

Have you ever been bush hogging with an 8N (or any Ford N for that matter) and have the 'hog run up on a hump on a hillside, and just kill the tractor dead before you even have time to react? That's the makings of a really great day! You're stuck there until you can get a jack and either jack up a rear wheel or jack up the 'hog and let the pressure off the gears... or maybe you can get lucky and hammer it out of gear (I hope I don't break anything...) And, you can't slow down to try to see and avoid... every gear is too dang fast, and if you throttle back, then you don't have enough power to get through what you're cutting down. Well, there's no shortage of hillsides or humps here where I'm at...

You happy 8N owners will know what I'm talking about.

JoeInTX, you're right... you've brought me back to my senses.. I think I'll stick with my 8n.





NOT!

Are you sure you won't trade for a team of oxen? Very low hours!

 

[xlr82v2]

AchingBack,

Wow, now you're really getting me in the spirit...

Let's see... each ox should eat about 2 bales of alfalfa per day, 7 days a week... times 2 oxen... that's 28 bales of hay per week, multiplied by 52 weeks per year, let's see, that's 1456 bales of hay per year. At $3.50 per bale for alfalfa hay, that comes up to $5096.00 per year, plus vet bills on top of that. Let's figure probably close to $150 per visit, and hopefully we'll get off easy and only have to call the vet 2 times a year, for $300 total. That brings the oxen up to $5396.00 per year.

Now, for the Mahindra... Let's say I finance the entire tractor at $14500. According to the payment calculator on the Mahindra site, that comes up to $208.29 per month. Now, with my 8N, I usually put about 120 hours per year on it, so I'll use the same figure for feeding the 3525... 120/12= 10 hours/month*1.5 gallons per hour average fuel consumption= 15 gallons/month, @ 2.759 per gallon, = $41.39 per month to feed it. It will be under warranty for the first 3 years, so there really shouldn't be any expenses for "upkeep" other than oil changes, so let's figure about $30 per year in oil changes at my useage rate. So far, that's a total of $252.18 per month, or $3026.16 per year, to keep the Mahindra working.

AB, you might be on to something here!! Those oxen are starting to look pretty good! Knowing their capabilities, and also what they can't do, and comparing that to what the Mahindra can do, (or the 8N for that matter...) I might be better trying to go back about 120 years (heck, if we liked it 60 years ago, then we must have LOVED it 120 years ago, right??? ) My wagon is gonna have 8 HOOF power!!! I just realized something... when the oxen get tired, then I can take a break too!!






NOT!!!

ahhh, this is some good fun!

Brian

 

[JoeinTX]

"Have you ever been bush hogging with an 8N (or any Ford N for that matter) and have the 'hog run up on a hump on a hillside, and just kill the tractor dead before you even have time to react? That's the makings of a really great day! You're stuck there until you can get a jack and either jack up a rear wheel or jack up the 'hog and let the pressure off the gears... or maybe you can get lucky and hammer it out of gear (I hope I don't break anything...) And, you can't slow down to try to see and avoid... every gear is too dang fast, and if you throttle back, then you don't have enough power to get through what you're cutting down. Well, there's no shortage of hillsides or humps here where I'm at...

You happy 8N owners will know what I'm talking about.

JoeInTX, you're right... you've brought me back to my senses.. I think I'll stick with my 8n...."


Oh boy, I sure have and in fact it's happened to be a couple of times this week Now, I just disengage the pto shaft, engage pto, and raise it on up and regroup.

Gears are less than ideal too.........especially reverse, sheesh.

A new tractor would be nice and I sit and slobber over the shiny new brochures and tractor websites all the time but I just putter along with it and leave my money in my wallet instead.

But, good luck on the new one!

 

[xlr82v2]

If you got your PTO shaft off, you got lucky! Usually when you come to the screeching halt, everything is in a bind, and you can't do anything until you: A. Jack up a rear wheel to relieve the "bind". B. Jack up the 'hog to relieve the "bind". or C. Manage to knock the transmission out of gear and into neutral, thereby releasing the "bind", hoping that you don't bend or break the shift fork inside the transmission in the process.

And you ain't kidding about the gears on the 8N. EVERY gear is too dang fast at some point. And Reverse is just about useless, except for backing up. I know that sounds strange and silly, but believe me, if you have a Ford N tractor, you know EXACTLY what I'm talking about!!!

One of the other posters summed up the Ford N series tractors perfectly: In it's day, the 8N was a GREAT tractor. Unfortunately, it's day was 60 years ago.

That statement says it all, perfectly.

I've been trying to get She Who Must Be Obeyed to let me get a new tractor for going on about 4 years now(we will have had the 8N for 9 years now I think in October)... and I think I'm finally starting to break through the concrete with her. Last week while we were mowing the grass, Ol' Henry decided he was going to raise the finish mower up to full height uncommanded while I was going from one section of the yard to the next and over-extend the PTO shaft while at rated speed (I've got a 6ft King Kutter RFM, which has the short PTO shaft), thereby letting each end sling around like a set of nun-chuks you've never seen before. After that, it took me nearly 2 hours of heating, bending and hammering to get the tractor end of the PTO shaft opened back up and in shape so that I could slide it over the other end of the shaft. After telling the wife what happened (she heard it happen, but didn't see it) and telling her how much it would cost to fix if I couldn't get this shaft back together, and her seeing how long it took to repair this mishap, now I think she's starting to see the light about why I complain about this old Ford tractor so much. Hopefully before the end of the year, there will be a new Mahindra sitting in the shed. I have to be honest, the 3525 isn't my first choice, but it will do everything I need to do, much, much, much better than the 8N, and it sure fits the budget the best as well, hands down.

But, until then, I'll have to see if I can tweak the adjustments on the lift for the old 8N, and I might possibly have to tear into it and see what's bent or worn out inside and fix that... (I"m just afraid that if I do fix it, it will be another 4 years before I can get a new tractor! So, as you can imagine, I'm not getting into any hurry about getting the lift fixed on the 8N!) Don't want to stand in the way of Progress, you know

 

[AchingBack]

If you got your PTO shaft off, you got lucky! Usually when you come to the screeching halt, everything is in a bind, and you can't do anything until you: A. Jack up a rear wheel to relieve the "bind". B. Jack up the 'hog to relieve the "bind". or C. Manage to knock the transmission out of gear and into neutral, thereby releasing the "bind", hoping that you don't bend or break the shift fork inside the transmission in the process.

And you ain't kidding about the gears on the 8N. EVERY gear is too dang fast at some point. And Reverse is just about useless, except for backing up. I know that sounds strange and silly, but believe me, if you have a Ford N tractor, you know EXACTLY what I'm talking about!!!

One of the other posters summed up the Ford N series tractors perfectly: In it's day, the 8N was a GREAT tractor. Unfortunately, it's day was 60 years ago.

That statement says it all, perfectly.

I've been trying to get She Who Must Be Obeyed to let me get a new tractor for going on about 4 years now(we will have had the 8N for 9 years now I think in October)... and I think I'm finally starting to break through the concrete with her. Last week while we were mowing the grass, Ol' Henry decided he was going to raise the finish mower up to full height uncommanded while I was going from one section of the yard to the next and over-extend the PTO shaft while at rated speed (I've got a 6ft King Kutter RFM, which has the short PTO shaft), thereby letting each end sling around like a set of nun-chuks you've never seen before. After that, it took me nearly 2 hours of heating, bending and hammering to get the tractor end of the PTO shaft opened back up and in shape so that I could slide it over the other end of the shaft. After telling the wife what happened (she heard it happen, but didn't see it) and telling her how much it would cost to fix if I couldn't get this shaft back together, and her seeing how long it took to repair this mishap, now I think she's starting to see the light about why I complain about this old Ford tractor so much. Hopefully before the end of the year, there will be a new Mahindra sitting in the shed. I have to be honest, the 3525 isn't my first choice, but it will do everything I need to do, much, much, much better than the 8N, and it sure fits the budget the best as well, hands down.

But, until then, I'll have to see if I can tweak the adjustments on the lift for the old 8N, and I might possibly have to tear into it and see what's bent or worn out inside and fix that... (I"m just afraid that if I do fix it, it will be another 4 years before I can get a new tractor! So, as you can imagine, I'm not getting into any hurry about getting the lift fixed on the 8N!) Don't want to stand in the way of Progress, you know

I'd get the wife a nice old working, wringer washing machine. She'll get the idea. Besides that, you'll get more done in less time, and be less tired for those amorous occasions. Lots of benefits to owning a sexy new tractor.