7 Welcome
As tractor prices soar, we consider the enduring values of the vintage tractor movement.
8 Records smashed at Cheffins sale
With a Marshall MP6 bringing £66,000, two Overtimes £83,500 between them and even a 1961 Fordson Super Major going for £12,650, it was another record- breaking Saturday in Cambridgeshire on 26 April.
12 John Deere 5020 – giant of the field
The John Deere 5020 was once the most powerful two-wheel-drive tractor in the world. Peter Love comes across a newly-refurbished example that’s worked in the UK all its life.
18 Ploughing centenary in North Wales
The Flintshire Farmers’ Ploughing Society celebrated 100 years of competition ploughing at Afonwen, near Mold, on 5 April, and our photographer Noel Bridgeman was there.
20 News
30 V8 for victory!
Peter Henshaw comes across an impressive V8-engined 145hp Oliver 2255 in Wales.
36 MFs on parade
Cumbrian correspondent David Bowers travels just across the border to view Stuart Barbour’s extensive Ferguson and Massey-Ferguson collection, one of the best in Scotland.
40 Marshall MP6s in South Africa
Despite the odds, the first of two rare six-cylinder Marshalls, rebuilt from battered remains, is finished in time for the big show, and the other returns for completion.
46 First into the ‘streamline’ age
Although it would be ludicrous to suggest that ‘streamlining’ could make any tractor go faster, in style- driven 1930s America it certainly made them easier to sell, and Oliver was the first to enter this brave new world, writes Mike Teanby.
50 Like father, like son…
Jo Roberts meets a father and son who drive their tractors to ploughing matches – even if they’re 170 miles away – and will represent Wales in Denmark later this year.
54 Prototype Nuffield conversion saved
Teamwork was the key when a superb restoration was carried out on a prototype 1949 Nuffield M4 fitted with a Perkins L4 engine, writes Peter Lewis.
60 History and brand new paint
Jerry Thurston gets a first look at Mike Kendall’s fabulous 1916 International Mogul 8-16, fresh from its impressive restoration by David White, and considers the magic of these tractors from a different age.
64 Alec’s cuttings
In his fourth article based on the scrapbooks of Alec Worbey, Donald Bowler finds some highly unusual wide and long implements from the post- WWII years.
66 Farming in the 50s
Looking back on a golden age, former dairy farmer John Blake recalls the tractors and implements of more than 50 years ago, along with corn stacking and early combining.
70 Pork scratchings!
Having set up a ‘pigotel’ to allow the required 21-day standstills for rare breed pigs enroute from Islay to their new homes, Polly Pullar warms to the animals’ intelligence and ebullient nature.
74 Letters
76 If at first you don’t succeed…
As Harry Dodd continues with the Fordson N rebuild, an unexpected cylinder block leak forces a hasty re-evaluation of the whole project and the original frost-damaged engine comes in from the cold.
81 Sort this lot out!
It’s the ‘X’ tractor as Ben Phillips finds himself restoring a Massey-Ferguson 35X that’s certainly seen better days.
84 News extra
86 Model World
92 It was going until it stopped!
When Plumpton College’s Machinery Department went looking for a smaller, older combine than their big New Holland for demonstrating the basic principles, they ended up pulling a Massey-Ferguson 187 from the undergrowth, writes Dave Harris.
96 Diary dates
102 Subscribe to Tractor
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104 Troubled times for a BTD6
Graham Hampstead gets to the roots of not just one, but several problems when an International BTD6 crawler refuses to run properly.
108 Kruse gross the most in Nebraska
Tractor magazine reports from the world’s biggest veteran, vintage and classic tractor sale of 2008 – the controversial Kruse-conducted event at the Garry Phillips estate in Nebraska, USA.
112 Sales & Marketplace News
120 Tractor Price Index
127 Tractor Marketplace
The place to buy tractors and everything associated with them.
138 Rare Breeds Factfile
This month Marianne Thomas tells the story of Dexter cattle.
