Its ploughing match time again, the old Fordson struck up fourth pull of the starting handle after standing almost six months at the back of the shed.
Its now looking a bit dusty and in need of a good cleanup, the paint work needs touching up particularly around the engine where heat and oil and the dribble of fuel when the carburetor is drained of TVO (tractor vaporising oil) to allow the petrol in for cold starting.
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| Ploughing at home when I hosted a ploughing match on our Maize stubbles, on this occasion it has its spade lug steel wheels fitted, it also has a set of steel flat bands that go over the spade lug to enable you to drive down the road |
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| Almost seventy years difference in age and technology met at a ploughing match a few years ago, both in their own right were top of the range when brought out for the first time.The Fordson had new hydraulic three point linkage and new implements designed to go with it, in this case I have the mounted plough of the same year 1946. The engine thermostat you may notice is the radiator bling which is half down, adjusted according to how hard the engine is worked. |
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| A view over the rear wheel of the opening split just about to close it back in. Other tractors at the far end of the field and to the right doing the same thing |
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| Transport for all the tractors taking part in the home ploughing match with seven of the ninety or more plots in the picture getting close to the finish |
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| Traveling at speed on a country road at 14 miles per hour |
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| No luxury of a starter motor, its a crank handle |
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| Stable mates together, The International B250 I drove that from new in 1956 that is diesel with a starter motor and has hydraulics and differential lock, a great step forward in the design particularly the diff lock |
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| This is how it arrived at my farm almost ten years ago, it had been the power unit to a rear mounted turf cutter, not had a great deal of work but left out in the fields year in year out. All the tin work wheel fenders had to be replaced, and the tyres, the engine was in good order with very little signs of ware. It had an extra high/low gear box fitted making it four inches longer to give creep gears for the turf cutting also a depth control fitted to enable the turf cutter to be carried at a fixed height |
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| Stripped down for cleaning and re-painting, the hydraulic unit has been lifted off the rear axle housing it fixes on with six stud bolts, fuel tank and the cast iron radiator also removed |
So now is a good time to re-fresh the old Fordson E27N and get it back to its gleaming self as of 1948 and 2006.
My father had one to replace the Standard Fordson that he had worked all through the war years, I would be just ten years old when the E27N came and learned to drive it, although we had been steering the Standard Fordson when cutting the wheat and oats with the binder.
It was nice to have that experience back again after all those years and appreciate how we worked out in all weathers on an machine that by today's standards is very crude and basic.
A day's work is a day's work, neither more nor less, and the man who does it needs a day's sustenance, a nights repose and due leasure, whether he be painter or a ploughman.
George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)
