colters

My question is;what are colters for,I see some plows with,some without.I am restoring a ford-dearborn 14"2 btm plow,it has no colters,are they necessary?the tractor that will be pulling it is a '52 8n.Thanks for the help,cw

Coulters cut the sod and do most of the left side cutting that the plow would otherwise have to tear.

Makes a plow easier to pull and the landside neater.

Gerald J.

Main thing is to cut weeds.

The share at the bottom of the moldboard is there to make the horizontal cut at the bottom of the furrow and maybe a few inches up. The coulter runs ahead of the tip of the share to slice the soil vertically. That gives the moldboard, which doesn't have a cutting edge of its own, a chunk of soil that it can then turn over. If you tried to pull a plow that was designed with coulters without them, it would be a lot harder to steer, pull a lot harder than it should, and you'd have a ragged edge from the moldboard having to beat it's way through instead of just doing its job, which is simply to turn the nicely cut soil over.

Plows without coulters have what are called shins, which are basically shares on the leading edge of the moldboard instead of on the bottom edge like regular shares. On those the shin does the same cutting that a coulter would, so that by the time the moldboard gets to the cut, it only has to turn it over.

So clean your plow up good to see what you have. If you have only a share bolted to the bottom of the moldboard and no provision to bolt a shin onto the leading edge, then you are missing your coulters. If, in addition to the share on the bottom, you have another piece bolted to the leading edge of the moldboard, that would be the shin and you should be good to go.

Gist of the whole thing is that shares, shins and coulters are made to cut, and moldboards are for turning. Ideally, you can break or wear out the cutting edges without having to replace the moldboard.

Rolling coulters cut surface trash to reduce plugging the moldboard.
They also make a cleaner looking furrow.
As for HP? Believe it or not, the plough pulls a wee bit easier without them.