Comment about Oliver

Oliver, later White made good combines. Especially the White 9700, 9720, and 9320 Rotary Harvest Boss combines. These combines were way ahead of their time in features,simplicity, and especially in capacity. The "little" White 9320 beats Current Case IH's and Deere's largest rotaty combine in capacity and in moving parts. The 9720 still has no real competiton except for Cat. The 9720 has the Cat beat by leaps and bounds in simplicity.

My question is, Why didn't White sell many of these great combines compaired to Deere and IH? Massey already builds the small White rotary why don't they start building the big White rotary combine?
White didn't call these combines HARVEST BOSS for nothing.

I didn't realize my remark below would cause so much interest in this. Of course my vote would be for the re-introduction of the 55 series as a starting point. Quite a few people have always said that JD should start making 4020's again. In my opinion the 55 series were already well ahead of the new generation JD's. I think many would like to own a simple yet efficient tractor that was easy to work on but was so reliable that it seldom needed to be. Studies, however, show that this line of thinking may not be entirely accurate. The JD Advantage series is supposed to be a bare bones simplified tractor but the sales figures are not all that great. There needs to be more to it than just a re-introduction for a nostalgic sake. Excellent parts availability, fair pricing and fast courteous service are key components for success. I am still amazed at how available Oliver parts are for my 1955 Super 77. There are other tractors that are newer by 10-15 years that parts are NLA (no longer available) for. Any chance that some of these molds for castings are still around or was everything destroyed after White took over and the Charles city plant was torn down ?

Sure would do my heart good to see a fine company like Oliver play the role of the Phoenix and rise from the ashes to compete with the others and give them a run for their money on practicality, durability and advances that are ahead of their time !

How much do you think the first shares are going to be sold for :-)

Von WC Ohio

I didn't think that I would stir up that much interest on the Subject of New White Tractors being built Overseas and the little comment about if Agco could build a tractor worthy of the Oliver name, at the begining of the week. Deere missed the point on the Advantage Series. (1) They don't offer a cab. (2) They didn't price them low enough, a 105 hp 7405 is roughly around $50,000, for a open station (no cab) 7410 is only about $5000-9000 more and it has all the toys. When a person spends this kind of money they are not afraid to spend a little more for the better tractor. Find the dealers that need a tractor line and dealers that dropped the White line. Offer good incentives to the new dealers. Ex: Free or 1/2 price on a demostrator tractor, free Adveristing.
Got to have a good parts,service,warrenty, and sales program for dealers. Weak dealer network leads to a weak company.

It's hard to tell what Allied Products did with this stuff especially when they moved the White tractors to Coldwater Ohio. If it was in the Charles City Plant up to 1993 it was probilly scrapped. I heard once when they were cleaning out the factoy before tearing it down they were pitching EVERYTHING, files of blueprints, paint codes, tractor build and shipping dates,production logs, pictures,tractor testing logs etc. Luckily it was OK for people fish out what they wanted out of the dumpsters. I also heard, back in the early to mid 70's White also threw away alot of Oliver blue prints on future projects and concepts that were drawn up back in the 1950's and were filed away for future reference because the ideas and designs were 20-40 years ahead of it's time. I guess some of these drawings kind of looked like the Case IH Magnums.

Here is my question. Was it Allied Products decision to knock down the Charles City Plant? Wouldn't surprise me any. Look at what they did to Kewanee farm equipment. They completly scrapped it. Or was it Agco that tore the plant down? I'm only 21 years old. My memory is kind of limited on this.

Need to get more people notified on the new Oliver Corperation. The more people we get shares out to. The more money we would get to start out with, and maybe the shares will get cheaper.

Any Comments?

Good questions. I guess we need some market analysts (probably from Deere because they sure know how to sell anything) to tell us what to build. Personally, I would give the American series another try. But this time, add a 100 and 120 to the line-up with 6 cylinder Cummins engines. Keep all the same options such as cab, ROPS, FWA, etc., and put syncronizers in the transmission. Despite my genuine desire to bring back the Oliver engines, jointly manufactured in Waukesha, WI, I think this would be difficult since the molds for the blocks and other castings no longer exist. I would love to bring back those Oliver engines (the 310, in a new improved version of course with all necessary improvements, the 283, what a beautiful diesel engine, and some gas versions too, the 265). As for big tractors, I would begin with the first Workhorse tractors. They were rugged, simple, yet had some of the modern electronics that most farmers would not be willing to sacrifice in a simpler tractor. Cummins engines throughout the line-up, with, again, syncronized transmissions coupled with the Over/Under. As far as I'm concerned, everything else was fine. Only add a new Workhorse 225 model with 225 pto hp. I'd love to see the 1800 or the 1655 make a reappearance, this time with CCLS hydraulics, a flat platform, and an undermount axle. Now for the combines. The White 9700/9720/9320, I agree, were simply the best combines ever made. They still are under the MF nameplate. But to have such a machine in the late 1970s, only to have to try to sell them in the 80s during the recession is a tragedy. Anyone who claims any other company built a better combine has obviously never seen these machines in action. I would have to agree that we would also have to buy back the rights to the White rotary combines and resurrect them. Tragically, they were simply too much combine for most farmers, I think. And in the 80s, if farmers could afford a new combine, too many bought the worst on the market, the Deere conventionals. Boy, were they wrong. All for now before I start going off the handle again at those OTHER green tractors. Good comments.

A 44/440? Yes, maybe, but a Diesel version would have to be designed, and from the ground up, probably pushing it out of the 'inexpensive' range.

I liked the idea down the board of the new model designations just starting back in where they left off--as 60 series--that would really be something to see!

I would work, fingers to the bone hard, for free, to see such happen, as long as I got my one real wish, and was allowed a Cockshutt variant to sell here in Canada again....gleaming Sumac Red, and soothing Clover White....ohhh....be still, my heart...

Alrighty then--who's got about 25 million bucks so we can git started?