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Well, ya know, us old goats think anything younger than us ain't really old.

How does that leveling system work? Is it automatic or operator controlled? Pretty amazing either way and probably adds quite a bit to the cost over a regular machine.

In a Gleaner, IH and later Deere they used a mercury leveling board. The board in the cab was hooked to the leveling valve and electricity flows through the mercury and activates the hydraulics when the mercury is not level.
You could also manually activate it, but the auto is in constant flux and you would tire very soon of manual operation with everything else you are trying to keep up with.

I should add, Gleaner, IH and Deere still have a hillside option.
The mercury board went away in production machines in the late 80's I believe.
These machines had up to 48% leveling capacity.

They have an electrical switch system now that activates the hydraulic pump.
27% leveling now.

Not all machines run in the hills now days are hillside.
They dual up the front and go without.

I have a CR9070 New Holland and the insides of the combine are self leveling to a certain point. Helps save the grain on side hills. ED K

Great pics and comments!

Wage, I take it you guys don't get many thunderstorms/downpours of rain?

You wouldn't be able to farm slopes like that around here with our soil/climate. The erosion would be terrible, we have certain fields where a guy needs to 'work the washes' out of the summerfallow every year.
Pull a toolbar over them and fill back in as best as possible. Better yet is leaving a grass waterway.

I've been summer fallowing the last couple days, hot and windy, perfect weather for killing weeds.

Problem is I was using a different tractor and it was running hot. Turn off the A/C and the engine will run about 5 degrees cooler so that's what I did.
It must have been +130F inside the cab(sauna), feels chilly when you step out into 95F fresh air!




They started on this mess last April/May. Really nice little project that goes 2 miles across this piece of land. I spent an hour yesterday picking rock by hand. Ground is beyond hard, toolbar won't even touch it, maybe it'll work up next Spring if we get some rain on it.

Yup, attended a few after concert "all Nighters" that left one's throat raw from song, and whiskey.

What a loss to the Canadian Folk Scene,......we built a Log Amphitheater / stage in his honor.

http://www.canmore.ca/Recreation-Parks-and-Facilities/Bookable-Parks/Stan-Rogers-Stage.html

Yeah, they use a leveling shoe in conjuction with 27% machine leveling on some models around here.
I guess leveling shoes are age old technology.
Some of the older boys here can probably confirm that on old pull machines.

It's just a pendulum hanging down hooked to the swiveling sections of the sieve.
Then they play some games with a wind fan blowing chaff uphill, across the shoe.

Liking the pics, Sam.
Beautiful country.

The Palouse varies in rainfall.
Say 16 to 24 inches a year in different spots.
Most of the higher rainfall areas are continuous crop.
By that, I mean, fall wheat, spring grain and/or a legume.
Some are three year rotation and some just two.

Of course the erosion helped form these hills in the great floods after the ice age.
Glaciers caused alot of soil movement too.
Anyway, this soil is heavy compared to Montana and alot of other places.
I've been in wet Montana soil gopher hunting and it is totally different than here.
That said, a thunderstorm or heavy rain will surely move dirt and ditch up the hillsides. Freeze and thaw with snowmelt also. Some no-till and that has helped.
In the old days, when there was ALOT of fallow in the rotation,
erosion was bad.
Lucky the good soil is deep here or there wouldn't be any left to farm.
I remember running the N7 for an afternoon,A/C out and climbing
out on the roof while unloading in the buggy and 95 degrees felt great, so I hear you there.

They tried dryland corn here for a bit about 13 years ago.
Not humid enough and gets cool to early at night to make it pay.

Some friends cutting barley and waiting on trucks.

Here's a couple pics of my great grandpa's and grandpa's 55's.







Nothing but good memories of Grandpa Chuck. Took me gopher hunting, minnow trapping, let me have a sip of Bailey's once in awhile. He is still blowing around out in those hills.

Nice looking memorial.

An old roundback with a Hercules engine.

Sam, more good pics. Those old JDs look pretty tired but I bet they did their share of work back in the day. There were none around with factory cabs when I was operating them. Once in a while you would see where some guy took a old pickup cab and tried make something out of it but I never saw one that looked "classy." And after some of them added a cab, they had no way of getting rid of the heat. Problems.

Machinery sure has come a long way.

There's an old threshing machine parked below my folk's place.

The 55's make that thing look fairly modern...grin



Griz, Grandpa Chuck is also swimming around Lake Pend Oreille.
My Grandma lives up there, it is their second favorite place. World away from eastern Montana, green year round.

I'm guessing those are real early factory cabs or Hiniker add-ons. I don't know what year JD started with their own cabs, but Hinikers were real popular around here. I believe my 95 is the last year they were made. It doesn't have a/c but it has a blower. I believe those blowers were as much to pressurize the interior of the cab and keep the dust from sifting in as they were for helping cool it. Mine's got the same engine as the big engine on the 55 but the fuel is turned up way more. It revvs pretty high and you have to watch it or you'll blow really light seeds out. I think my 1967 Gleaner E had a Hiniker Add On cab.

You see more threshin' machines around here now, for decoration, than you ever did when I was a kid. I'm guessing a lot more people bought those together and held them collectively, whereas most people back in the sixties and seventies had their own combines.

Sam, I was just a pup back in the threshing machine days but I did get in some "watchin" time. Yeah, things have changed.

Rode a '59 Model A Gleaner with a 12 1/2 ft head a lot of years as a kid, no cab! Man you haven't lived till you spend a few days cutting oats or milo in a closed in river bottom field with no cab! That reel just throws the the itchy stuff in your face and there's nothing you can do about it. Uncle had a 45 JD, he and Dad would have a competition to see who could put the cleanest grain in the truck with the least thrown over onto the ground. That old A never lost.
Dad finally traded it off on an "F" with a cab about the time I graduated high school. Wouldn't spring for the air conditioner though. Put a combine that is prone to overheating, (that 292 Chevy was underpowered), surround the driver with glass 270 degrees, summer time temps in the triple digits and I'll show you a driver that spends as much time out on the step platform as he can manage. Man that was rough!

My first combine was an ancient A with no cab. I bought it from my Dad's cousin who lived out by Enid and I went out there and picked it up with our '65 Ford two-ton. It was a long drive home.

SamO, ya come from a pretty swanky fam. First cabs I have ever saw on a 55, we had ta wait for a 95.

My dad died without ever having air conditioning in his house but always found something to do on his tractor on real hot days once it had an air conditioned cab. Good thing hot days are great for killin weeds. Sorry about your AC. Seems like a cab without AC is just so much the worse.

That can on the stack almost brought a tear to my eye. Reminded me of how my dad always asked when I got to the house if I remembered to put the can on the stack. Thanks.

One other thing, SamO, I recognize your Gpa's name. A lot of folks here might not be able to imagine that, but NE Mont is as geographically vast as it is socially small.


Again, thanks for the memories.