A 850 you don't see very often

FLOLDFORD

Well-known Member
Location
Lakeland Florida
A friend of mine had his 850 kerosene tractor at the Florida Flywheelers show this week. I have never seen one in person. Took a few pics to share. It does have the correct tank and the 3 way valve. Serial number has a K at the end. He is still looking for the correct manifold as the original was broken and not repairable
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That tractor was built at the very end of X00 production. The highest serial number that I have heard of is 144875 which a member of this forum owns.
 
Thanks for sharing. I've never seen a kerosene tractor of any make or model around here.
I bet we all know what's on Sounder's wish list now! :)
 
I actually passed up a 641 AN that was for sale from? messicks maybee.. it was listed onthe other board a while back.

with parts tot he vaporizer carb NLA.. i wasn't sure about taking it on as a project, since I like all my machines to run.
 
John, as I recall, they start up on gas and once they're warmed up, they switch over to kerosene.

The special manifold for them had a built in heat sink to warm the kerosene and make it detonate easier. Dual fuel tractors were more common during the war when gas was rationed. Heating oil was a necessity and more readily available.

Obviously, power was a tad less when running on kerosene as it was somewhat less volatile.
 
Some of the old JD A's used a gasoline start with some type of distillate fuel after warm up. It was referred to locally as "power fuel". An older neighbor had a hand flywheel start A. Starting, as I recall, was to open compression release valve on each cylinder, start on gas, close valves, warm up engine, switch over to "power fuel". I do not know how it impacted power but I would think the compression ratio was low and each spark plug was required for firing when using the heavy fuel.
 
(quoted from post at 00:11:58 11/09/13) A friend of mine had his 850 kerosene tractor at the Florida Flywheelers show this week. I have never seen one in person. Took a few pics to share. It does have the correct tank and the 3 way valve. Serial number has a K at the end. He is still looking for the correct manifold as the original was broken and not repairable
a134835.jpg

a134836.jpg

a134837.jpg
 
(quoted from post at 16:11:58 11/08/13) A friend of mine had his 850 kerosene tractor at the Florida Flywheelers show this week. I have never seen one in person. Took a few pics to share. It does have the correct tank and the 3 way valve. Serial number has a K at the end. He is still looking for the correct manifold as the original was broken and not repairable
a134835.jpg

a134836.jpg

a134837.jpg


Does anyone happen to know the production numbers on these or what they could be valued at? I bought an old 850 out of a pasture over the weekend to part out, when I got it home, my dad and I were looking at it closer and realised it was a kerosene model. My father grew up on these tractors and has never seen a kerosene ford. I have been searching online for a few days, and this post is all I can find on this model. The sheet metal on mine is a little rough, but could be repaired with a lot of work. I am just trying to determine if this tractor is unique enough to put a few thousand dollars into to restore, or if I should just resell it as-is. Any info would be much appreciated.
 
"if this tractor is unique enough to put a few thousand dollars into to restore, or if I should just resell it as-is."

In my opinion, it would be a labor of love.
Worth every penny if it is exactly what you want to keep forever.

Other than to a "rare" tractor collector the value wouldn't be
all that high and for it to be worth big bucks to a collector it
would have to be restored perfectly, which, in turn, costs big
bucks. Most likely more than a few thousand dollars.

Welcome to the forum by the way. If you don't get many replies
try starting a new thread on the subject with pictures of your
tractor so others can give you a better estimate.
 

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