Worst IH tractor since 1960?

What do you think is the worst IH tractor built from about 1960 to the merger, and why? Or if you are in the camp that thinks IH never built a bad tractor, what was the "least good"?
I've been asking a lot of different brand guys and it usually boils down to two things; tractors that needed more time to get the kinks out(2+2?), and tractors that were given more horsepower without the necessary upgrades to the power train.(560?)
 

No personal experience with either, but the 1468 with the V8 was kind of a joke. Several recieved engine transplants that turned them into a 1466.
 
My grandfather purchased one of the very first 806 Farmalls when they debuted in the early 1960's. They never had really any problems with the tractor and drivetrain, but that gasoline burning engine needed a "zipper" on it. The first engine "grenaded" before there was an overhaul kit offered by IH. The engine lacked any type sleeve, so it needed to be bored out and fitted with oversize pistons. None were available at that time, so no boring of the block was done, and standard size pistons were installed. Afterwards, there were oversize piston available, and with each subsequent engine failure, it was bored out. I think it was the final time for a rebuild, the engine was taken to a specialty shop where it was also balanced and blueprinted. I do not know how many times the engine self destructed, but when it was traded off in 1976, the engine was bored to the limit. It was traded for the first diesel tractor on the farm then, which proved to be even more of a "lemon," but that is another story for another day.
 
I worked at the dealer so always told everyone that complained about particular models that because I was the guy who was supposed to repair them, I could tell them a whole lot more problem areas than they knew about. Same with case & John Deere when I worked on them.

IH rarely made a completely new model. They would use considerable components already in the system. The one exception is the 806 Diesel. It used a different engine, clutch, TA, transmission, and final drive and hydraulic system including hitch. It turned out to be one of the best accepted tractors to this day. Even the 50 series tractors used the same engines as previous models although most every thing else was different.


The one tractor I always said I wanted to buy and get even with it was a 460 Diesel. They gave me more grief in the shop than any other model from engine to final drive. Exceeded the 560 by far.
 
My vote goes to the 86 series with the shifter on the
wrong side that you had to climb over to get in.
Granted the cabs were an improvement over the
66s once you were in it but they were miserable
rough riding things. If only they had come with the
88s sooner.
 
My father-in-law bought a new 560 and said it was the worst tractor he'd ever owned. He traded it for a new 806 when they came out, and said the 806 was the best tractor he ever owned. He then traded the 806 for a new 1066. He got cancer and died before the 1066 had 500 hours on it, so we really couldn't tell about it, but I believe IH had problems with the wet sleeve engines in the 66 series.

When I owned an 856, people told me the 856 was the best tractor IH ever made, partly because of the dry sleeve engine. I owned it for 9 years, never needed to do more than routine maintenance, and sold it for about what I'd paid for it.
 

Covering from an ease of service and longer service life, I would take a wet-sleeved engine over a dry-sleeved engine 10 to 1.
 
I tend to agree. The 1468/1568 were not a very good tractors and hardly the powerhouse IH advertised it as. While the 460 and 560 had their issues you still see them in the fields on a regular basis. When was the last time you saw a 1468/1568 working ground - I would say its been since the mid 1980s since I've seen one in the field.
 
There is a 1568 near here that I see being used regularly. The guy winds it up and lets it roar, nothing else sounds quite like it.

The engines were D-550 diesels built from the 549 gas truck engine (rarely a good idea) and IH tried to innovate with things like a system that shut down 2 or 4 cylinders when not needed to conserve fuel. It was ahead of it's time and didn't work worth a crap. Today GM uses a computerized system on trucks to do the same thing that works fine, but it is computer controlled, a luxury IH didn't have in the mid-'70's.

The V8's had no lugging power like farmers were used to with inline 6 cylinders, they needed to be run at higher RPM's to get anything out of them.

IH used basically the same engine in trucks and buses and called it a 9 liter diesel with a lot of success. It just wasn't a very good farm tractor engine.
 
Not to mention the doors being hinged on the wrong side which forces you to shimmy up on narrow steps between the door and the dual . . .
 
I've had a 1086 for 38 years and 17,000 hours. I used to call it a 'bronco' till I put a loader on it. The loader weight holds the front end down enough to smooth it out. On occasion I have the loader off, that is when I am reminded how much the front end bobbles on the bumps. When I used it for heavy field work it did OK, but traction was a bit of a problem. Fuel economy in the field was OK. Shift levers? They are in the way for getting in and out for sure but for loader use it's kind of nice to be able to shift with the left hand while using the hydraulics with the right hand The corresponding forward-reverse gears are geared wrong for loader work though. Oh, I lengthened the hydraulic levers so I don't have to reach down for them anymore, Downfall is they are in the way for getting in and out the door. So no, it's not near perfect but it has served me well.
 
Well you can have your wet sleeve engines, and the electrolyisis that comes with it, i bought a new 806, new 9-11-67, my bother bought a one ninety Allis, because it was a 1,000 dollars cheaper, That 1,000 dollars end up costing him almost 15,000 Dollars in repairs and what not, and guess who's tractor always had to go down and do his work too, That things been long gone in the junk pile, and my 806 still looks and runs and looks like new, and never had the sleeves out of it,with a turbo on it putting out a 115 horse power!
 
(quoted from post at 20:20:32 07/21/17) Well you can have your wet sleeve engines, and the electrolyisis that comes with it, i bought a new 806, new 9-11-67, my bother bought a one ninety Allis, because it was a 1,000 dollars cheaper, That 1,000 dollars end up costing him almost 15,000 Dollars in repairs and what not, and guess who's tractor always had to go down and do his work too, That things been long gone in the junk pile, and my 806 still looks and runs and looks like new, and never had the sleeves out of it,with a turbo on it putting out a 115 horse power!

Electrolysis isn't exclusive to wet sleeve engines, but at least when it happens to them you can pull the bad part out and replace it. If the parent bore of a dry sleeve engine gets a hole in it, your'e left getting a new block or hoping that it doesn't leak when you put a new sleeve in it.

I look at if from the side of field serviceability. I can tear down a wet sleeve engine in the field and rebuild it in no time. Where as some dry sleeves such as that in the 806 (to be done correctly) are going to need to have the sleeves pressed in with almost exact pressure and have to have perfect sleeve protrusion or it's going to have to come back down and be rebuilt again when the sleeve cracks or head gasket leaks. There are more shops out there that can't build these right, than can.
 
460 gas - biggest gas drinking, gutless, cold blooded dog ever built, the cab on the 86 series wasn't anything to be proud of either
 
Brutus49DC,i never owned one, but had some neighbors who would help each other put up their corn silage,so the one neighbor had just bought a new 460 gas, so they decided to put that on the chopper, since it was new and had live PTO. Ah big mistake, it never did 3 rounds on the chopper, They put the old M back on it,and got the job done, while the 460 was back in town,more than it was on the farm.
 
I don't like the 460 either because IH made it look much bigger and more powerful than an M. It was a 350 on too many steroids. But if doing 350 level work it would serve (and drink fuel). Jim
 
I had a F 460 ONCE , Got mad at my 450 D one night at a tractor pull when i ended up i second place in the 10500 Lb class and got beat by a 1206 by three inches when the T/A lever did not latch back correctly and it slipped and went into high and killed herself . and i made the comment as i was driving off the track i ot to sell this thing and some guy from Pa said how much and i blearted a price off the top of my head and said 2850 and he whipped out five hundred and he would bring the rest in the morning . So i went and bought a rag 460 and started fixing it up and when done she sure looked pretty and the first time i hooked to the I H 540 4x14 semi mounts i found out what a DOG i had and i went to work in it as i just knew i could make it better and i worked on it and worked on it and ya know what it was still a DOG , it was a nice little BIG tractor even setting now at 62 Hp it was a DOG . This tractor fell under the same heading as owning a boat or snow mobile . there are two days you happy , the day ya bought it and the day ya SOLD IT . I owned F 460 S/N 571 It sure was NOT a good replacement for F 450 D s/N 25806 Oh yea and F460 S/N 571 would show ya just how fast a tank of gas would turn into Noise and NOT MUCH WORK and always ran out at the far side of the farm from the fuel tank.
 
DV550, and 9L, and the horsepower series (180.190,and 210 if I remember correctly) were all noisy, smokey, head gasket blowing disasters. Not a great truck engine either.
 
(quoted from post at 20:20:32 07/21/17) Well you can have your wet sleeve engines, and the electrolyisis that comes with it, i bought a new 806, new 9-11-67, my bother bought a one ninety Allis, because it was a 1,000 dollars cheaper, That 1,000 dollars end up costing him almost 15,000 Dollars in repairs and what not, and guess who's tractor always had to go down and do his work too, That things been long gone in the junk pile, and my 806 still looks and runs and looks like new, and never had the sleeves out of it,with a turbo on it putting out a 115 horse power!

I`ve heard it from more than a few people that the D-361 in the 806 is the best diesel engine IH ever made.
 
(quoted from post at 19:54:49 07/21/17) My vote goes to the 86 series with the shifter on the
wrong side that you had to climb over to get in.
Granted the cabs were an improvement over the
66s once you were in it but they were miserable
rough riding things. If only they had come with the
88s sooner.
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I vote with you on the 86 series. The 1086 is the only tractor I ever owned that got traded off within 6 months of purchase. It went down the road in 1978 and I was glad to see it go. The cab was terrible with the left side shifter to trip you every time you got in the cab. The awkward shaped throttle and T/A lever along with the short hydraulic remote levers all made it undesirable. And the doors were hung from the front instead of the back which they should have been. That made it tough to slide in between the tire and the door. It is my view that the people who sanctioned that cab design should have been fired.

The only good thing about it was the strengthened final drives over what was in the 1066.
 
I'll agree. My favorite tractor out of all here is an 886. I cuss the doors and shifters, but those left shifters are great for a loader tractor. Right
now I have the loader off to make hay and it is one heck of a tractor. I even like it more than my 4440 that has only needed tires in 9600 hours.

When I was younger we traded our 856 on a 1086. I thought I was in heaven. I guess I've always seen them as work first and comfort second
so I overlook those doors and levers. That radio and ice cold air is a step up from the crockpot cab on the 856 with that old green tint on the top
half of the windows. I don't think I would know what to do if I ever got a loader tractor that wasn't a good old fashioned gear machine!
 

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