2009 - Volume #33, Issue #3, Page #22
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John Beer Tractor
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With help from his wife, Betty, Weiss made a 3 1/2-ft. wide by 5-ft. long tractor using aluminum cans held together with silicone caulking.
"It consists of 920 cans - mostly beer. I used 47 tubes of aluminum rain gutter caulking," Weiss says. "It took me about 2 months to make, using a whole lot of trial and error."
Making the wheels was a special challenge, according to Weiss.
"The secret was to find the right amount of cans to make the right sized diameter so it would be proportionate to the rest of the tractor body," he explains. "It was tricky because the length of the spokes had to fit an even number of cans."
As he was building it, Weiss painted the unit in sections, using Deere colors. He modified a steering wheel from a used toy tractor.
The couple found a doll just the right size to be their tractor driver, and had suitable farmer clothes sewn for it. The unit also has a cab and stacks for air intake and exhaust.
The mini tractor weighs about 80 lbs. Weiss is displaying it in his large storage shed, and is considering taking it to a farm show sometime. In the meantime, he plans to make a protective dust cover for it.
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Ed Weiss, Box 183, Mossbank, Sask., Canada S0H 3G0 (ph/fax 306 354-2546).
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