My New (Old) Tractor
My New (Old) Tractor
by rdpecken on Sep.01, 2016, under Ranch Maintenance
While visiting relatives in Arkansas this summer, My brother Roger offered a deal I couldn’t refuse on a 1973 Ford 2000 tractor. This is a small tractor useful for light grading, pulling, chopping weeds, etc. After returning to Arizona, I prepared my trailer for the long round trip to Arkansas and back, and set off to pick up my new prize.
The tractor is in reasonable shape. It has a few leaks, and a few cosmetic defects. It could use a new seat and steering wheel, and will eventually need a new clutch. While the clutch is a major job, the symptoms at this point are not too bad. It just has a lot of play in the action, and engages only about an inch from the top of the clutch release. I quickly learned to adapt to these conditions.
Here are some pictures from the walkaround that Roger and I did.
He also included a very old blade with a 3-point attachment for the back. While it could use a rebuild, it actually works very well for blading our drive in Arizona, and general scraping around the homestead to clear cactus and rocks from the area.
After arriving back in Arizona, I couldn’t wait to try it out on some real work. It had just rained that morning, so the ground was soft, but not muddy. Perfect for grading.
Our old two-track driveway had always been very bumpy, with lots of bumps and holes along its half-mile length. I decided to do a couple of passes, just light ones, to see if I could improve things any. Here are the before shots…
And here are the results of one pass down and one pass up. It went very easy, and I like the results. Someday, we will add rock tot he drive, but for now this is much better than it ever has been.
The next day, I needed to find a place to park the tractor, until I
could get a shed built to cover it. The spot I decided on was near the
spot that we store our leftover construction materials. The ground
has a lot of prickley pear cactus in the way, so I decided to scrape
them out of the way to provide a cleaner area for the tractor and
trailer.
Here are the before pictures…
And here is a 10 minute video of the tractor in use doing this work…
And finally, here are the results. Not bad for 15 minutes of work. That would have been a couple hours by hand.
I’m very pleased with my new acquisition.
October 28th, 2016 on 4:56 pm
Hi Randy!
Just wanted to say how much I appreciate your website! I check it out from time to time (since I bumped into it on Cluade’s forum about 2? years ago). Your tractor adventure put such a smile on my face, that I had to let you know. It looks like your brother’s tractor has a great new home – I’m sure you two will be very happy together! hahaha
Thank you so much for journaling your property adventures. Your information is priceless. We brought SVR 646 in June 2008. We have dreams of a house on it some day and would like to tackle much of it ourselves. Well, reading about all your hard work makes our dream seem a little more achievable
We live in Scottsdale and don’t get to our property often (a few times? a year?) and are still learning the lay of the land south of the 40, but we hope to bump into the “real deal” Peckenpaugh Pack some day!
Thanks for sharing all your hard work,
Lisa and Michael Parker
(Address removed for privacy purposes)
just south of Ridge Runner, on the newly named, “Edge Ridge Way”
(Phone removed for privacy purposes)
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