Open Station Tractors

Ole Ringneck · Jan 21, 2018

How many of you still use open station tractors to do winter work? I have manure to haul from a guys place that's seven mile down the road from me.I don' t have a heat houser or anything to help break the wind.I just can't take the cold any more.When I was young I could take anything. Think I will wait few good days.

K Effective · Jan 21, 2018

I do, but don't have nearly that much distance to cover. I pull a gravity box to the neighbor's other farm to get corn/beans from the bins and then to a scales, but use my pickup for that. Pulled 500 bales from the barn yesterday and took it to the horse farm across the road about a half mile down, not too cold.

Bruce from Can. · Jan 21, 2018

I will spread manure with a open tractor right up till Christmas most years, but snow in the fields becomes a problem , and everything stops. A trip 7 miles down the road here would just be crazy, as the roads are often wet with road salt, and you will get covered to.

tomstractorsandtoys · Jan 21, 2018

We feed trm with an open station tractor every day but do have a heat houser for winter. I use my 4230 cab tractor more for heat than AC. I do like the dust protection from the cab when round baling. Tom

mtf · Jan 21, 2018

Neither of my loader tractors have cabs. I unroll hay everyday. Takes between 30 minutes and an hour of tractor time each day. This winter has been colder than most. Here in KY we typically have sperts of cold temps.

I prefer the open stations because there are so many gates to open and close. Plus taking the net off the rolls. All that climbing in and out, the the Windows would never defog.

rrlund · Jan 21, 2018

I haul hay and manure with my 2-105 White with a cab,but I use an Oliver 77 on the feed cart every day,load silage with the 1365,feed round bales with the 1600 and grind feed with the 1850,all open station.

Kansas4010 · Jan 21, 2018

Yep, seems to be getting colder as I get older.

IndianaSteve · Jan 21, 2018

More than an hour out there is enough for me. If I am working cutting wood and stay warm that's fine but just riding the tractor? No way.

RedMF40 · Jan 21, 2018

What are you wearing? For long stretches outside when it's sub-freezing with wind just about every part of me is covered up. I recently even bought a small mask that covers nose and mouth. I put on layers and then put on Carhart or similar overalls. Good mittens are better than gloves. They also sell plug-in heated socks, never tried them but others tell me they work. If you use hand or toe-warmers, they work best when you get them started inside where it's warm. Produce much more heat that way. Yes, I use open-station tractor but mostly it's for other activities that I have to dress so warm.

David G · Jan 21, 2018

Get a heat houser.

Ken Macfarlane · Jan 21, 2018

All cab tractors here but used to have open. Used to wear my snowmobile suit and helmet for snowblowing.

ss55 · Jan 21, 2018

Ditto on recommending snowmobile clothes. If you don't have a good helmet, a ski mask and ski goggles help too.

flying belgian · Jan 21, 2018

Tie some cardboard on engine sides and wedge some between fenders and cowl. 7 miles is a long ways. Is that the only winter work you do with that tractor? If snow handling too I would seriously consider getting a cab tractor. I used to do it in the cold too but after working hard all my life I felt I deserve some comfort. I plow snow for 12 neighbors with front end loader on my Case with cab and heater. Really kind of enjoy it now sitting in there with sweatshirt, no gloves, radio tuned to favorite station and quiet cab.

Tony in SD · Jan 21, 2018

I have open station tractors but they only get used in nice weather. I spent too much time being cold on my dads tractors when I was a kid. So I told myself long ago that I would have heated cabs when I got older. To each their own but the gain is not worth the pain anymore to be that cold.

fixerupper · Jan 21, 2018

Cab tractors here. I don't have livestock anymore so the only tractors I need in the winter are snow movers and both of them have cabs. When I had livestock I sometimes used a cab tractor to haul manure if it was a distance but mostly I sat in the open.

Philip d · Jan 21, 2018

One of our loader tractors is open station only because our older barns aren't quite high enough to get in with a cab to clean out,we have a fwa cab loader besides because I don't like it either

Bob M · Jan 21, 2018

I fill in occasionally on a friend's municipal sidewalk snowplow crew. Plows are narrowed Farmall H's and M's fitted with heat housers.

Even with a snowmobile suit, Sorel boots and a ski helmet/goggles, plowing a 3 hour route can be a chilling experience - especially when it's windy!

howdy1960 · Jan 21, 2018

open station W/O heat houser for plowing driveways.
Takes from 1 1/2 - 2 1/2 hours depending on how good of job I do.

730virgil · Jan 21, 2018

i must be getting to be a wuss i can't hardly stand using skid loader to feed cows hay let alone jump on open station tractor and drive it down the road

SVcummins · Jan 21, 2018

Never really knew any better we had cab tractors before the 80s farm crash and we lost everything but the 4020 I have now and a 4320 with a cab I don?t mind not having a cab but someday I?d like to have a cab with heat and ac a good pair of boots a warm coat gloves and a scarf I can handle anything but heavy rain

Cory Schmidt · Jan 21, 2018

All we have are open tractors...with the exception of the 3588 we are bumming (if it was ours the cab would be gone or modified),but that's for field work when its not frozen.

Rodeo man · Jan 21, 2018

(quoted from post at 23:54:09 01/21/18) Neither of my loader tractors have cabs. I unroll hay everyday. Takes between 30 minutes and an hour of tractor time each day. This winter has been colder than most. Here in KY we typically have sperts of cold temps.

I prefer the open stations because there are so many gates to open and close. Plus taking the net off the rolls. All that climbing in and out, the the Windows would never defog.

I only ask this, because I noticed you mention, that you are from Ky. I'm in the western part of the state. I have never unrolled hay, I've always used rings. I assumed that our ground conditions were to bad in winter to be successful unrolling hay. Obviously, you see unrolling as superior. What is your method, when the bottom falls out of the ground, like it has the last few days?

PJH · Jan 21, 2018

About 30 years ago I had a beat up, worn out heat houser. I never was comfortable with that thing - always thought everything was gonna go up in flames. Some of the parts were missing, mainly the rods that kept the canvas away from the manifold. I made some rods, guessing at how they should be shaped. Finally quit using it. The remnants are hanging in the top of the machine shed. If I ever feel ambitious enough to climb up there, I'm gonna burn what's left of it. I have 20 head of cattle, so I'm out in the cold an hour or so every two or three days. When it gets to where I ain't tough enough to stand that, I'm gonna quit. I have two sons who are a phone call away. They're always offering to help, and I tell them, "One of these days. . ."

carvel minne farmer · Jan 21, 2018

I used to plow snow with my case 310b that I built an 8 ft. blade with hydraulic control, I had 4 ft. wide canvass cat tarps from the front to back of the fenders and across the back. thick sorel boots, heavy skidoo suit, balaclava, thick mitts. I plowed our acerage and 6 others in the area, up to 6 hours out there. what used to shut me down was my back got cold, in 2008 I bought a case 1845c skidsteer, built a front door with wiper, plexiglassed the sides and back window, installed 2 big heaters one up behind me on the engine housing and one on the floor by my feet, picked up an hla 6 way 8 ft. blade for it and can cruise along in my shirt and jeans in -30 or -40 with a wind blowing no problem. my 310b and my 2 m5's are open station and will stay that way as I like the visability, being able to see what ever I'm pulling and hear if anything starts banging or breaking. I find with most cabs on equipment wether it's tractors or dozers or what have you your always craning your neck or swiveling your head around to get eyes on what you need to see. usually through a window panel that's to small and in the wrong place! BUT having said that, I would much rather be peeking out a window of a cab with a heater than on an open station tractor in the winter.

Dick L · Jan 22, 2018

That is all I have! Those high wind below zero mornings does give me thoughts of a tractor cab. Then again I don't remember how cold I got last year so next year I will most likely not remember how cold it was this year in the same conditions.

^D

3020G · Jan 22, 2018

My FIL lives about an hour north of the twin cities in Minnesota and all he ever farmed with his entire life has been open station. Dairy farm at that. So grinding feed and hauling manure are daily chores. Now I am by no means as able to stand it as he is, but I get along fine not having a cab on anything. I have drove a tractor about 7 or 8 miles in the wind and snow and by the time I got where I was going I was an unhappy camper but I lived.

I would say it really comes down to what you can afford. If you can afford a nice cab to stay warm and your not happy on open station go buy one. I know plenty of people that survived without a cab for years. I personally don't really know any better I guess. Always eventually warmed up from working. I know people in MN who dairy and purposely bought an open station tractor to mix TMR with (everyday job on a dairy) and they get a long fine.

Bret4207 · Jan 22, 2018

I don't own a tractor with a cab or even a canopy. Stinks!

DR. EVIL · Jan 22, 2018

Dad's heat houser was a wreck back around 1960, I remember seeing pictures of it on the M moving snow with the Caswell loader. About 1967 Dad and the neighbor both got Koehn Tractor cabs. Ours went on 450 Farmall, neighbors on D-17 or D-19, forget which he had then. I remember disking corn stalks early one spring and was able to stay warm easily. Later when we had it on 4010 we had to tow the neighbors car a mile home thru foot or more deep snow one Sunday morning. Dad and I both fit in the cab, protected us from cold winds and blowing snow. If my Super H would fit under my shop door with one I'd find or make one in a heart beat!

Leroy · Jan 22, 2018

You still need that canvas cover.

Leroy · Jan 22, 2018

Have had cabs since 1944 when Dad built the first one for the 44 2N Ford tractor, home built on the B later A John Deere, and on the 4100 Ford, Canvase covers on others. Only factory cab was added on to the 5100 Ford bought used with no doors or windows we made them plus mounting brackets. Of 4 different JD combines 3 bought without cabs with junk yard cabs added, one had cab when bought. The cab for the 2N and JD were taken off in spring and put back on in fall. No heat in any of them but way better than out in the wind.

rusty6 · Jan 22, 2018

I have 3 open tractors that I use for feeding cattle and moving snow. But if I am going as far as 7 miles down the road in winter it will not be on an open tractor. Way too cold for that. I'll plug in the 2090's heater for a few hours and then ride in comfort.
Snow Pushing at Night

Destroked 450 · Jan 22, 2018

We have one cab tractor but I hardly ever use it during the winter months. I will chain it up for clearing roads if we get a heavy snow, but for the normal 2-5" snows we get I hardly mess with road clearing, county plows and salts the blacktop up the hill and just past my house, everything else is chip & seal or gravel and doesn't get plowed.

We have around 30 cows plus calves on each of the two farms 6 miles apart, here I'll put out round bales with the 4000 or 5000, at the other place I use the 5600, all open station, I can get done quicker and have less trouble using a lighter open station tractor.
Only have to travel 1/4 mile or less setting out hay so only takes about 30 minutes at each place. Quit using hay rings several years ago, more trouble than their worth to me, don't have a 4x4 loader tractor and was always getting stuck, went back to non loader tractors with rear spear, rather make a few more trips than get stuck in the mud when the ground thaws out.

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