Go Anywhere Loader Tractor

Go Anywhere Loader Tractor TRACTORS Loaders 16-1-6 "I was having trouble getting stuck while hauling round bales with my front-end loader. I had a couple of old trucks and an old combine and decided to make a loader tractor out of them," says Clint Watson, Scandia, Alberta, who built the tractor for less than $100. Watson took the cab off a 1960 Ford 1-ton pickup and box, removing the worn out engine and transmission, then fitted the stripped-down pickup frame with a Chrysler 6-cylinder gas engine taken from an old Minneapolis Moline 4290 combine. He mounted the combine's cab and body onto the pickup frame so that the truck faces backward. It's equipped with two 3-speed transmissions. The first trans-mission, removed from a 1952 Dodge 1/2-ton pickup, is bolted to the engine. The second one, removed from a Ford 1/2-ton pickup, is installed 4 in. ahead of the first transmission. The pickup's rear axle was worn out so he replaced it with the rear axle from a 1957 GMC 2-ton truck and fitted it with the combine's drive wheels. A set of 9.00 by 20 tires (removed from the 2-ton truck) mount on what was formerly the front end of the pickup. He used the arms from an E-Z-On 100 front-end loader and the grapple fork from a Farmhand loader and built his own bucket. "It has great traction. I use it to handle round bales and also to load chopped hay," says Watson. "All the weight is on the big combine drive tires. It goes anywhere and is so light it hardly leaves a track even in mud holes. I haven't got stuck with it yet. The 2-ton drive axle is built very strong and lets me easily pickup 1,600-lb. bales without straining. I added the second transmission to slow the tractor down for working in soft ground." Watson modified the Farmhand grapple fork to fit the arms of the E-Z-On loader, and he modified the loader arm mounting brackets to fit the tractor frame, then welded them on. He installed a hydraulic pump (driven by the engine crankshaft) and hydraulic valves to raise and lower the loader and to operate the grapple fork and bucket. He modified the wheel rims on the combine tires to fit the wheel rims on the 2-ton truck axle, then welded them together. He also modified the rims on the 2-ton truck wheels to fit the pickup axle. Watson uses a pickup to tow the tractor to hay fields, then drives home with the pickup and returns with his tractor and hay trailer. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Clint Watson, Box 85, Scandia, Alberta, Canada TOJ 2Z0 (ph 403 362-2249).

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