Why is 8N Reverse so darned high?

tom888fish · Feb 9, 2015

I'm sure this has been answered before, and its really just for my own edification, since I'm sure there's no easy way to change it, but what were they thinking? Trying to back up up-hill can be a real nuisance, and in general I rarely want to back up as fast as the tractor wants to, e.g. backing up to hitch up a trailer.

JMOR · Feb 9, 2015

Cheap reverse. Just had to add coupling & shares drive & 2nd that are already there. To fix it on NAA, had to add a counter shaft gear.

Ultradog MN · Feb 9, 2015

I started out with a 2N and the reverse worked just fine.
But I wanted the advantages of an 8N - position control, a better drawbar, better brake pedals, etc.
So I bought an 8N that smoked a lot and swapped engines, tires and fenders and sold off the now smokey 2N.
When I finally got around to using the 8N I was terribly disapointed in the ridiculously fast reverse. So much so that I started looking for a different tractor.
I really wonder what Ford was thinking when they made that reverse.
For what it's worth, one option is to find a Sherman Combo. Reverse/low works good for stuff like backing trailers.

gwstang · Feb 9, 2015

I have a '52 8N and let me tell you that if you have a box blade on the back and start backing up at about half throttle without looking back and "accidentally" run into a short stump that you would swear was not there a minute ago, it will hurt like double HH Hell!!!! yeow!

Just about throw you off. :shock:

tom888fish · Feb 10, 2015

Is that true that it shares 2nd gear? The manual shows its not exactly the same gear reduction; just slightly higher than 2nd.

JMOR · Feb 10, 2015

(quoted from post at 06:20:34 02/10/15) Is that true that it shares 2nd gear? The manual shows its not exactly the same gear reduction; just slightly higher than 2nd.

y son, if it were not true, I would not have told you so! Just because it shares one of the two gears making up second gear does not mean that 2nd & reverse are the same ratios. Such sharing did mean that reverse options were no longer a wide open clean sheet of paper type decision. Second still shared in NAA, which has lower rev ratio, but another gear was added to countershaft, in the rev path, in order to achieve that.

tom888fish · Feb 10, 2015

OK, then why not share 1st, or would that not physically been possible with the given layout? Speaking for how I use the tractor, I'd take a gearing closer to 1st than 2nd if I had a choice.

JMOR · Feb 10, 2015

(quoted from post at 15:40:31 02/10/15) OK, then why not share 1st, or would that not physically been possible with the given layout? Speaking for how I use the tractor, I'd take a gearing closer to 1st than 2nd if I had a choice.

...or would that not physically been possible with the given layout?" Basically, true. You just have to study the layout of main & counter shaft gears to get an idea. Looks like maybe 4th would have been a possibility, but was not used for obvious reasons.

Why is 8N Reverse so darned high?

tom888fish

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JMOR

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Ultradog MN

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gwstang

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tom888fish

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JMOR

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tom888fish

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JMOR

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