Tractor heritage, news and features

Put your house on it

In 1975 Massey Ferguson manufactured 51,000 tractors at 70 assembly plants in 26 countries and were represented in 190 countries around the world. Makes for pretty impressive reading doesn’t it. Of the 51,000 tractors built, 11,000 were from what was known as the 10 series. A magnificent example of which is shown in the accompanying photographs.

The 1080 was available in one of four designations, either two or four-wheel drive (built in their French Beauvais plant for the European market) and from the Hesston plant in Kansas and specifically for the American market, what they termed their Western and Row crop variations.

A significant competitor

No matter what variant you chose the fact remained that the MF 1080 was a significant competitor in the important just sub-100 horsepower market. Built between 1969 and 1972 the 1080 would have cost the owner around £3800, the American price being $9500 and there being around 2.5 dollars to the pound at the time. As a matter of interest the average house price for the same time (1972) was £7300. Today the average house price is around £150K putting the tractor at a frightening £70,000 or so. One can’t make this comparison though as the reality is that a similar tractor in 2009 will have a list price of c£35,000.

The question must be. If you laid out nearly half the cost of an average house in 1972, what did you get for your money?

Most obvious has to be the four-wheel-drive system; although nothing new by the late 60s most tractors in this league were purchased most often as standard two-wheel-drive models. Four-wheel drive increased cost and complication but offered significant advantages if you had the sort of land that warranted it.

Massey Ferguson (or Massey Harris as they were at the time) were among the first to offer 4WD with their general purpose tractor of 1930 but once production of this machine had ceased did little with the concept. Later they approved conversions by Selene of Italy and the Four Wheel Traction Ltd of the UK (another Selene product made under licence); there was also a conversion offered by Manuel/Eden of UK but this could probably be classed as the same company as Four Wheel Traction Ltd as they worked from the same address.

Massey’s own 4WD

Here was a tractor with Massey’s own design of four-wheel drive which featured a hugely beefy front axle, a one-piece casting with big longitudinal strengthening ribs and enormous C-shaped ends, again with strengthening ribs to contain the joints at the ends of the half shafts allowing the front wheels to turn. Keeping the joints out of the muck is a pair of bolted-on pressed covers one pivoting within the other. The front hubs contain reduction gears to allow the shafts to turn at greater speed, which has the effect of making them act as if they were stronger because all the torque multiplication is done at the wheel end.

You’ll notice from the pictures that the 1080 has heavy cast iron wheel centres both front and rear, offering excellent extra ballasting for extra traction, the front and rear width is adjustable by means of Massey’s clever Z-shaped tracks which are welded to the wheel rims and slide-in clamps attached to the wheel centre altering where the wheel rims sit depending upon how far it is rotated relative to the middle.

Persuading the front wheels to turn, especially when working hard, would have been almost impossible without some sort of power steering, to this end the 1080 is fitted with Massey Ferguson’s hydrostatic steering mechanism, resulting in ‘finger light’ steering wheel effort. Further refinement comes in the shape of a steering column that can be pivoted up and down to suit the driver’s needs. A spring seat provided at least some driver comfort although its lack of damping did give a somewhat bouncy ride.

The instrumentation was comprehensive; in the plain steel dash panel there was an ammeter, water temperature gauge, oil pressure gauge and a fuel gauge. Plus the wonderfully named Tractormeter which recorded hours worked and allowed the driver to calculate speed in any gear when compared to engine revs. Standard equipment included the front weight frame, a set of tools and of all things a cigarette lighter, things were different 35 years ago!

Extra grip

The Perkins A4.818 (four cylinders, 318 cubic inches or 5.2 litres) engine produces its 88 horsepower without the aid of a turbocharger relying on its 17.5-to-one compression ratio and direct injection diesel system to produce the power.

What is more impressive is the torque produced a healthy 262ft-lb at just 1250 revs per minute, necessary to pull the sort of implement that could be handled because of the extra grip afforded by the 4WD.

The transmission is via a single plate dry clutch and features Massey’s Multipower system. This is essentially a step-up gear selected via a lever, which causes a separate hydraulic clutch to lock up and send the drive directly through the train. In low the drive goes via a pair of step down gears and through a free-wheel type device (described by one source as a ratchet type mechanism) before the transmission. An intriguing ‘feature’ is the availability of engine braking while in High Multipower but not while in Low, this is because of the ‘ratchet’ which allows free-wheeling on the overrun while in Low. While the Multipower is often described as a step up system, I argue that it is really a step down as the extra gears are used when the clutch is out rather than in. I’ll leave that for you to debate further. Anyway, the result of all the complication is an increase from the standard six forward and two reverse gears found on the American models to a far more useful 12 forward gears and four reverse speeds.

One of the stranger things that the catalogue makes a fuss of is the admission of a 150mm spacer in between the gearbox and rear axle housing, no reason is given for this rather than a rather cryptic note of ‘allows bigger fuel tanks’. Certainly the 210 litres (47 gallons) contained in the tank allowed many of hours use between fills even at full power. I’m assuming that the spacer also contained the Multipower clutches and gears, especially as its placing is in the right part of the transmission area, that is after the gearbox and before the final drive.

Commanding presence

One of the less tangible features that the new owner got was the styling, from any angle it is a good looking tractor, the looks aided by those big front wheels giving it a commanding presence especially when seen in the classic ploughing pose, nose up-tail down and pulling for all it is worth.

If you want one today most of our wallets are going to be considerably lightened as the chances of grabbing a bargain priced 1080 in the UK are all but nil. The Massey Ferguson 10 series, especially the 4WD types like this one having long been appreciated by the cognoscenti. Mind you if you fancy a hop over the Channel there are probably a few ex-farm machines on the continent; the expensive Euro is going to make these slightly more costly than a couple of years ago. But you can console yourself that even the very best example available isn’t going to set you back the equivalent of half a house.