Home Forums Miscellaneous Topics Rural Living Open Tractors?

Cold days, and the best was the Heat Housers. I think I'm still cold.

I have froze my azz off on open station tractors. I never had a heater house on any of mine.

Nothing had a cab in the old days.


You could reverse the fans on the old Cat equipment, but then you would get pelted with snow and dirt all day.


Canvass tarps and cardboard over the engine sides. Try and run as much cardboard back around the operator.


The old Terex scraper was not so bad. It was hot all the time.


The coldest outfit is the 950 cat loader.



Regular tractor work was not too bad.....all you were doing was feeding the cows.



All day moving snow.....that was cold.

Small hometown didn't have any real snow removal equipment other than a grader. To get the snow off of the four blocks of Main Street, the town would pay farmers to come to town with tractors and loaders to clear it. It was always fun to watch them at work - all with heathousers. It made them some cash, and most of them were coming to town anyway to clear driveways for relatives and friends.

Imagine that. Hire some dumb farmer to clear a bit of snow when needed.......not bury the county in debt by keeping extra people hired all year long, borrowing money to purchase and maintain snow removal equipment.


Sheesh!

We don't get a lot of snow here, maybe a really big one every 5 years or so. We had a whopper of one though back in the late 70's, a real genuine blizzard that shut everything down for days because of the drifts over the roads.......6 to 10 feet in some places. The county and state had to hire some local farmers and contractors with loaders, and in a few instances, they made a bigger mess than good. One man had gotten his new car stuck in a drift, left it, and by morning, it was completely covered. Guy clearing the road with a dozer didn't see it in time, and mangled the snot out of it.

You have to learn real fast how to dress for the cold when all you have is an open tractor. Even if all you're doing is feeding cows. They didn't have the thermal under layers that they have today back when I was tooling around on a tractor. Insulated coveralls, wool gloves, and pac boots were a necessity.

All of our tractors in my lifetime have had cabs except one. GrandDads old 8N Ford that I learned to drive on.

Got my education on an open station of course.

That's why my tractors have a cab now...

You don't know how much you miss the a/c until one stops working either.

Even in winter time here, I run the a/c.

Still have some on the farm.

I still use an old Oliver 550 gas for pulling my spray unit around and until I bought a skid steer with a heater a few years ago it was my snow clearing tractor. I didn't mind it when it was cold until got into my 70's.

I have one, a NH TC45A, that I actually prefer for many jobs over a cab tractor. It's low to the ground, so I can step on and off easily, and you can see what you're doing a lot better. I don't use it much in cold weather, but if I have to, it's no big deal. Open station tractors will always have a place on most farms.

The open tractors beat walking behind a horse all hollow.

Especially in a parade.

Lots and lots of open station tractors here.
Many small farms have nothing else, a lot from the
50's or 60'.

As our dairy farms shut down, tractor size increases and
more are closed.

30 years ago, nobody crop farmed. It was all feed for their livestock.
Now, so many cows have left, the farmer either crop farms, or leases to
a crop farmer.

Or, the rich fuggin Import that bought a farm, pastures horses, or leases
it.

Thinking of this made me slip a Christmas spirit cog.

Merry Christmas to you real farmers.

Imports, go home!

We have a lot of imports here........Amish and Mennonites from Pennsylvania. Please come get them...lol

Merry Christmas to all.

suck....

I fed cows one day, I had a white spot the size of a quarter on my cheek. .

Windshields and snow dont mix.



Your face will toughen up eventually.

Fiddlesticks