#1 year for tractor production

Prawn Farmer · Jan 22, 2014

In what year were the most tractors manufactured and how many were made, who was the #1 manufacturer and what was the #1 selling model?

rrlund · Jan 22, 2014

I had a chart showing a breakdown by year but I can't find it. Here's one by decade.

Smalltowner · Jan 22, 2014

I recall 1952 being a big tractor sale year down in the blackland prairie cotton country. There were 4 Farmall dealers within 15 miles of each other, with only one AC/Oliver, one JD, one MM, and 2 Ford dealers in the same area. You could get more tractor for the price with Farmall due to sales volume I suppose and it was well suited for rowcropping. Folks bought Fords for utility use, JD plows and grain drills, Oliver cotton strippers, and Gleaner combines. I do not recall a single farmer in those days who had all one color equipment. My dad always said you could tell a good cotton year by the number of new pickup trucks sold in the fall, and there were dozens of new Chevy's and Fords around here in 1952, along with a bunch of new Farmall model M's. The average farm was 300 acres or less, half sections.

rrlund · Jan 22, 2014

Ya,I think around 52-53 demand after the war finally caught up and they had to actually start "selling" again instead of rationing whatever they could get. Not to say that there was forced rationing,but demand was still outpacing production.

Prawn Farmer · Jan 22, 2014

From what I found so far maybe it was 564,000 units in 1951 and IH was #1. Haven't found out what was the hottest selling model then - maybe the H or M? Would also be interesting the #1 selling tractor model of all time - maybe Ford 9-2-8N series?

rockyridgefarm · Jan 22, 2014

I'm fairly certain the Farmall H had the #1 with over half a million units

Ultradog MN · Jan 22, 2014

If you include all the Ns it probably was the biggest seller.
Around 800K units produced.
Over 500K on just the 8Ns.

Ultradog MN · Jan 22, 2014

If you include the H and Super H it was about 320K units. A far cry from the 500K 8Ns they made. On the other hand, IH was producing the M,B,C and A at the same time so they did build a Lot more tractors.

Owen Aaland · Jan 22, 2014

Part of International Harvester's problems was that the Farmall plant could produce about 28,000 tractors per year. That was more than enough to provide the entire US tractor yearly sales in the early 80's. They needed to produce 100 per day to break even on production costs. The Solar division, Industrial division and the Ag division were all sold as part of the downsizing. The Motor truck division has survived without government aid.

GM had the same problem but they were not building everything in the same plant and had many more outside suppliers. With government help and shedding Saturn, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, and medium duty trucks, they have survived.

fixerupper · Jan 22, 2014

In mid to late 70's there were a ton of tractors sold as there was a six month waiting list for major name brands. I don't know what the numbers were. Jim

#1 year for tractor production

Prawn Farmer

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rrlund

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Smalltowner

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rrlund

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Ultradog MN

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