New Massey Convert?

I've been a red and grey Ford guy most of my life but acquired two 35s with Perkins deisel engines and used them to mow last year because of the cost of gasoline. I was impressed by the old 35 diesels, and, getting up there, wanted something with power steering. I sold both 35s earlier this year and all of my vintage Fords, though very good, are gassers.

I will use it with a 6' cutter for mowing this year at least and hopefully get another bigger tractor in a year or so. Then I will still use it to cut in my irregular, some places steep, and obstacle cluttered mowing jobs before switching off to aomething bigger with a bigger mower.

I think it is just the right tractor at the right price for my needs. Costs about the same as some good large lawn mowers.

Interestingly, Massey has finally stopped making the 533 and the ones out there are all that is left. Quite a run as this tractor is a direct decendent of the original Ford/Ferguson 9N that first hit the fields in 1939.

Now, the question is: When it is time to shop for a 60-65 HP tractor in a year or two will MF be on the list? I was planning on an orange one from Japan.

Dean

Donovan from Wisconsin

Didn't mean to imply that MF might be going away, only that I had planned on shopping only Kubota for my larger tractor in the future but may now include MF.

I was quite impressed with my two 45 year-old 35s vis a vis my stable of 45-50 year old Ford gassers.

I did learn that MF is discontinuing the 533, 543, and 563 with 3 cylinder Perkins engines and replacing them with new models made in Brasil (?) with "Sisu" three cylinder engines made in, of all places, Finland.

Sisu sounds Japanese but I'm not certain of the design origin. If Japanese, I'm confident it will be a good engine but would not want to buy one in the first year of introduction.

The point I was trying to make is that I may have become a MF convert after nearly 40 years of Ford patronage. I shopped CNH and, though they offered attractive models, they had nothing to compete with the inexpensive 533.

Dean

I ended up getting the 1855 fixed later on so we put it back to work instead of racking up hours on the rental tractor. Then they wanted to charge us a flat rate of 10 hours use, when we only put on 3!- the secretary stepped in for us and told him he never mentioned a minimum charge involved, so he backed off and we were only charged for what we used it.

Newest tractor on our farm is a 285 my dad bought as a demonstrator after he rented a different one to finish haying while the 1600 was tied up in the shop. Just had it overhauled this spring after putting 6200 hours on the first engine. Still has the original clutch. They inspected it from underneath and said it still had plenty of wear on it-hard to beleive but I guess when it goes I'll have to make a note of the hours....

Donovan from Wisconsin

By the way, word "sisu" means: to be tough, have guts, etc.

That is good information.

Being designed and manufactured in Finland, I expect that they worked out the cold starting issues long ago.

Dean