Why do we collect old iron? Your thoughts! Chuck

I like the simplicity of the old equipment. It is easy to work on and I have parts tractors for replacement parts. I grew up raising mostly tobacco and it just doesn't take newer stuff to raise it. I farmed and worked a full time job for a long time. Once I quit farming I started traveling. I like to find an odd or nice original piece of equipment in an area I want to see and go get it. That way when I go on vacation I have something to show for it.

Nick

like the older equipment, think it has great value per horse power, still can do a lot with the older girls. Lot easier to work on them and some models you can make the parts needed to get it up and running fast. Couldn't afford to pay what some do for the newest.

For me its a matter of survival, the economics of owning and making a living operating these vintage gems is relaxing and I'm proud of this old iron. Servicing these tractors 30-40 years ago I was envious of their owners. Now farming and still servicing these units, they have for the most part become affordable to many. I can't do anything about the cost of seed and fert, but I can hold my eguipment cost to almost nothing while still raising a crop equivalent to those driving the latest and greatest. To me it just makes cents, Rod.

when I read all the comments below I had to smile as everyone had a part in my "addiction" as I call it mine is like a fever that cannot be cooled even when this year I have made the decision to "cut" down on what I have I am still buying more items just trying to keep it to things I will use for the most part as for me I was lucky enough to grow up with our Case Dealership for me that was the "best times" I could have asked for I ran/demoed everything we had on our lot and got to talk "CASE" all the time and to be honest I cannot really describe how I felt kinda like Bro Loren said about chasing girls it still brings a smile to my face when I think back about sitting in and looking over and YES driving operating the "new" iron we had and got in, big memories for me are of those beautiful CASE combines we had oh YES I would dream about harvest time other early thoughts are of the row of "30" series my Dad and I lined up by the driveway coming up to our shop "just so" at the time I thought wow the 1030 with factory cab was the biggest thing there was (well not really we had a new 1200 as well) but then the "70" series came a few years later and WOW those were top selling top performing tractors, Demos was something I will never forget more than a few times we were asked to bring one of the new tractors/backhoes ect on the lot out to a potential customers to "compete" with another brand I do remember we missed a few sales but not many on the AG side but I do not remember any Construction ones we lost they may not have bought that day but I really never remember ever losing a sale to another brand back then those Case construction units we really that good, sorry got side tracked a bit, I also enjoy the fact that so many great people I have gotten to meet because of this site and I do want to say THANK YOU for that, this year like the last several has brought new people to my farm for me to meet and walk around and talk with I often think while we are doing the "tour" how these fine people can just walk by all these units and not climb up and sit in the seat for a bit, I could never do that when I was younger and even now if I go some where I have to really fight the urge (sometimes I can sometimes no LOL) to climb up into their equipment just to "get the feeling" again and think what it would feel like to be going down a field in it, right now my first thought is to delete this rant/memory/garbage I have typed as I am sure some out in YT land will skip reading it all and then think what does this all mean and why the heck did he write this!! LOL sorry my friends sometimes it just flows out, as I have told a few of my close friends I have always joked that I am J.I. Case reborn why else would I work so hard for that last 40 plus years to collect what I have no one in their right mind would gather as many as me if they are really right in their heads? just kidding I know I am a little "NUTTY" but so far it has worked for me and to answer the question of this post for me my wife has said it some what about me she knows I every time I buy some thing else it could be worse as I could be in town or at the bar "picking up" a woman LOL I say NO WAY nothing can be as true to me as my CASE's well except her!!

thanks for reading and for the post
cnt tom

Tom, thanks for sharing your past......really enjoyed it. Can't wait till you get the chance ta put on the "Case-o-Rama" hee hee. Don't you dare sell Dual-range 700 hee hee.

Tom,
I really enjoy your posts and pictures. You and many others make the Case forum one of the best out there.
Nick

I like your running on, that is why we like CASE. I drool every time I see Flamebreau Red, 30 series, and any CASE. My Uncle Charlie was the local CASE Dealer, and his sons" continued until the IH thingy. I am just getting started, and it hurts that at the present, I cannot save the ones I see. I have a MM BF, that I saved at scrap price. I hope to see your set up when you have the CASE Show of the Century at you place.

Heck Tom I enjoyed your carr-innn on. But I just can't do that. You see had I written that much I would have had to start typing yesterday! lol, Rod.

I farm with the old stuff because it's affordable and I don't need a computer to fix it. Mom calls me a hoarder because I pack tractors and implements in every nook and cranny I can find, but I get everything out about once every 5 years and use it! I spent 5 ours last night plowing with a 1950 VAC and Eagle Hitch disk plow, why, because I could!

Great post. There is a strong connection between us and the tractors of our youth. I'm 36 so you know where I'm at. We had a 1070 and my grandpa bought this 1570, I sure thought it was something.

Who's collecting it? I farm with it! I farm with it because I can't even begin to think of affording anything even 20 years old and because I can fix the old stuff myself because I can't hire it done.

They dont make them like the use to.. old iron has personality. That somehow we become attached .

They dont make them like the use to.. old iron has personality. That somehow we become attached .

Welll I read all the posts and can relate to most of them. Most of us are from "back-n-day" as I have sat in the seat with air,wipers,heat,radio and floation seat. I thought wow it can't get anymore "high-tech" then that. Well it has......tractors that can drive themselves and could go on with the "late's-n-great's stuff the new tractors have. But as I have said before, give me ah 700 and 4/14's and ah fall nite the sound the smell and peace mind. Great remarks by all of yeah thank-you all for sharing

I have an old John Deere model A that my grandfather bought used in 1950...since then, I have watched every member of my family from my great grandfather on down to my daughters run this tractor... it has actually been sold 3 times by family members and always seems to find its way home again. I was the last one to buy it back after my father sold it years ago. I have watched the twinkle in the eye of my daughter as she sat in the seat and I let her drive it all by herself for the first time.... and God willing... my grandchildren and even their grandchildren will drive it. Someday I will maybe even restore it... but it's too busy still working yet. That's why I collect.

I think it"s because it allows us to hold onto a piece of our youth. Our parents are gone, the neighbors are gone, but the machines we grew up with are still here. They are a bridge to the past, and that is getting harder and harder to find these days.

I miss those days when we had Case and the next door neighbor had Fords, and the neighbors across the back forty all had Allis, and the old bachelor up the road had the only Minneapolis Moline I had ever seen. Everybody said he drove Studebakers and that old Minny Mo just to be contrary.

As long as I am able there will be CASE tractors on this farm. Don

Don, I think you may have described every farm community in America of the past. I remember every farmer had their own preference when it came to equipment. We ran mostly Case, other neighbors had JD's, AC's, Fords, IH's for the most part.
I will definately have a Case tractor around myself also.
FE

For me it was like the day I spent today. Was at the Local airport today for their annual airport day. One of their members asked me and a couple others to bring a few tractors out. So today we had small passenger planes from new to back in the 30"s, a crop duster, a WWII air ship, an S2 used on aircraft carriers as sub hunters, 3 planes from the 40"s doing acrobatics, the new air evac chopper. With our tractors to go in with this and my boss"s Model T, you could look up and down the tarmac and see history in front of your eyes. But the best part for me was letting some of the little ones on our tractors and pedal tractors and they had this big smile on their faces as their parents took pictures. That is why I collect old iron

Brings memories back of being a little kid riding along side my father while he did field work etc. when he worked at a dairy farm.He is gone now but the old iron keeps plugging away.Hopefully my two sons will have the same good memories.

Vito

For me it's the hope that I will some day be able to farm a small farm with my collection of old stuff just like it was done back when it was made. Also the challenge of making it work when someone else thinks it's junk.

For me, it all has to do with the Industrial Revolution. From horses to steam to internal combustion engines. The precision of the work with the technology of the day still amazes me, each time I must tear into one. In many ways they are simple,but still complex. I enjoy learning just how everthing works in concert. Nothing more rewarding to get and keep one working and conversly nothing more frustrating. Just my random thoughts. gobble

I love getting the old tractors and implements that no one else wants anymore running and using in the field and working with it. A Case was a Case, a IH was an IH, a JD was a JD, ect. It also takes me back to a special time in my life that I can never get back working with my father and my uncle farming. No one can take that from me. Today's farming is not like it was back then to me, just saying.
FE

Because old iron reminds us of the days when we were in hot persute of our now wifeys, We were full of P and vinager, the world was beckoning us to explore it, and we were more than willing to do so.
Todays world is so complicated, with world problems on our porch step, etc. A simple ride on an older tractor which sometimes only takes a few words, to keep it running, and seat time where the only person you have to argue with is "Nellybell" and yourself, makes collecting old iron rewarding. Old iron is like your old dog. There for you when you need a break.
Loren

when the doctor tells me i am short on iron , i just go and buy another tractor.lol.

I have a magnetic personality. Then for some reason it follows me home. I havent figured out why yet. Maybe after a few more tractors?