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Get off my LAWN! "Grumpy Old Farts"
- Thread starter B-string
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What's a "corner pad"???
I don't think we had those. I guess they figured the fastest way to learn how to keep from knocking your head into the table was to knock your head into the table, but what do I know? My Dad had me driving tractors at the age of 6 so we could get the hay baled before it rained. He tied me to into the seat with our jump rope so I couldn't fall off into the baler.
Probably go to jail for doing that these days.
He's the greatest man I've ever met.
I don't think we had those. I guess they figured the fastest way to learn how to keep from knocking your head into the table was to knock your head into the table, but what do I know? My Dad had me driving tractors at the age of 6 so we could get the hay baled before it rained. He tied me to into the seat with our jump rope so I couldn't fall off into the baler.
Probably go to jail for doing that these days.
He's the greatest man I've ever met.
Oh yeah, and seat belts were unheard of. We used to lay on the deck below the back window of the car.
Kids are too fragile today. Many wouldn't survive natural selection like we did.
This would be the tractor in question...
2-cylinder John Deere 520. Hand lever clutch. Easy to operate. Lots of cool spinning flywheels and brake drums and stuff....right out in the open.
2-cylinder John Deere 520. Hand lever clutch. Easy to operate. Lots of cool spinning flywheels and brake drums and stuff....right out in the open.
- Feb 12, 2006
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- Disclosures
- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
I started driving a tractor bailing about 11 or 12 years old. Massey Ferguson diesel. Taught me to pay attention and get the job done!
I drove them a lot more around age 8 or 9 or so. That particular crop had a very narrow weather window to work with.
Dad's instructions were to "let him tell Mom about it before I did".
I also remember driving a grain truck to town around age 12 or so. Pulled I can't remember how many (a lot) wagons full of grain to town long before I could legally drive. Cops or Sherriffs didn't care, they were all farm kids too. We never really saw them. Maybe drove down our road once a year...no reason to.Most of my jobs growing up ('70's/'80's) were taking care of neighbors farms so they could get away for a few days, and playing gigs with Mom and Dad, our family band. When my little brother got old enough to learn to play (4 years my junior), he was in the band too.
We never had a lot of money but we were rich as kings in many ways.
True that...I'm the second oldest of nine kids. I wasn't on a farm, but I was always shoveling snow, mowing lawns, delivering papers, whatever I could do to make some money until I was able to get a real job, washing dishes. But, we learned what family was about and had moral values and respect for others.
Couple of the neighbors I worked for had Massey-Ferguson, and an old Massey-Harris.
Our other tractor was another 2-cylinder John Deere but a model 70 diesel. Similair layout but a bigger, stronger tractor. I really liked to drive that one. It was bigger, more muscle, but I also loved the way it smelled. Sweet, sweet, red diesel smoke. Way better than that low sulfer green diesel they use nowdays.
That one you used the battery to start a little gas engine, like a motorcycle type engine or something. Got that running, revved it up and used it to crank the diesel main engine. You'd pull back on the compression lever and it'd start cranking the big engine and heating up the cylinders (no glowplugs, just spin it and make compression/heat), then after a few cranks of that, you'd let the compression lever halfway in and it'd start putting diesel in the (now warmed up) cylinders and it'd start smoking and popping, then it'd take off on its own and you'd push the compression lever back to its "off" position and the big diesel engine would be running.
Then you left it run all day, or as long as you were going to use it for, then park it and shut it off until the next day.
Getting that thing running in a Minnesota winter was an achievement. Once it was running it didn't want to quit....even ended up running backwards a couple times.
I still remeber heating my hands up in -30F weather over these tractors exhaust until they started to sting again. That let you know they weren't numb/frozen anymore and you'd have all your digits ready for work tomorrow.
Our other tractor was another 2-cylinder John Deere but a model 70 diesel. Similair layout but a bigger, stronger tractor. I really liked to drive that one. It was bigger, more muscle, but I also loved the way it smelled. Sweet, sweet, red diesel smoke. Way better than that low sulfer green diesel they use nowdays.
That one you used the battery to start a little gas engine, like a motorcycle type engine or something. Got that running, revved it up and used it to crank the diesel main engine. You'd pull back on the compression lever and it'd start cranking the big engine and heating up the cylinders (no glowplugs, just spin it and make compression/heat), then after a few cranks of that, you'd let the compression lever halfway in and it'd start putting diesel in the (now warmed up) cylinders and it'd start smoking and popping, then it'd take off on its own and you'd push the compression lever back to its "off" position and the big diesel engine would be running.
Then you left it run all day, or as long as you were going to use it for, then park it and shut it off until the next day.
Getting that thing running in a Minnesota winter was an achievement.
Once it was running it didn't want to quit....even ended up running backwards a couple times. I still remeber heating my hands up in -30F weather over these tractors exhaust until they started to sting again. That let you know they weren't numb/frozen anymore and you'd have all your digits ready for work tomorrow.
All my friends that lived in town had the same ethic. One of them's Dad ran a grocery store. Couple others Dads were insurance guys and one a doctor. One worked at the 3M plant, another a machinist or welder. NONE of them were "spoiled". We all knew all about work and respect.
The common thread was Dads and Moms who gave a damn.
This is where old tractors and old hippies go where I live in Iowa.
if I'm the product of natural selection, then I must have been born on opposites day...
Great idea. The earlier you start learning, the more experience operating the machine, the better.
We started on a '70 IH pickup truck with a gear shift knob bigger than your hand following the cornrows down the field.
That let you operate the thing slowly out where you couldn't hurt anything, not even yourself.
The feeling of that, then running down a road at speed was quite different, but you had a grasp on how to operate the machine first.
Of course, that was before hydraulic clutch cylinders, power steering, etc.
My first, really MY, vehicle was a '56 GMC truck bought at a yard sale in the early '80's for $400 with my own money. My parents still have it (it's my Moms' baby), and it looks and drives better than it ever did.
Ajapses
Gold Supporting Member
Ah...the Leave It To Beaver years. Spent a lot of time on a JD 720, but they made me wait until I was 8. Had a lot of 'quality' fun time on a Ford red belly up until then.This would be the tractor in question...
2-cylinder John Deere 520. Hand lever clutch. Easy to operate. Lots of cool spinning flywheels and brake drums and stuff....right out in the open.
So Is the fact that they're 5000 miles away from whoever they're killing, it "seems like just another video game to them", and they do not have they the same weight on their conscience as an old-school bomber crew.
This is not a coincidence.
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