Old Iron in Star Valley

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  • 1936 Farmall F30

    About a year and a half ago we picked up a non-running 1936 Farmall F-30 tractor from someone over in Eastern Idaho. The F-30 is the predecessor to the popular Model M tractor. Where I already have a Model M and the successor Super M, I thought the F-30 would be a good addition to the lineup.

    The F-30 is a hand-start only tractor with no battery or lights. It also originally shipped on all steel wheels, so the four speed transmission tops out at around 5 MPH. It’s not exactly the tractor to take if you want to get somewhere in a hurry… However, it was considered a big tractor for the time–almost too big, as the smaller Model F-20 was the top seller (by a long shot).

    The John Deere tractor that competed with the F-30 was the Model G. The earlier G did not sell as well either, where the smaller Model A has significantly higher sales. The John Deere A was even outsold by the even smaller Model B. I guess farms at the time just weren’t ready for the larger equipment yet.

    Anyway, I’ve been slowly working on the machine for the past year. I finally took the plunge and purchased new back tires, which was the last thing it really needed to be able to get it out and use it some. Where tires are so expensive I was procrastinating the purchase for a while.

    I hope you can enjoy this old piece of history.

  • McCormick-Deering Number 5 Side Delivery Rake

    A neighbor was selling an IH (McCormick-Deering branded) Number 5 side delivery rake. I don’t really need the rake, but part of restoring old tractors is having matching implements and equipment.

    I have a good amount of John Deere implements, but I don’t have a lot from IH and some of the other brands I have. So, I thought it’d be fun to pick it up and match it up. I also thought it’d be fun to use a Farmall (IH, or International Harvester) tractor to pick it up and bring it home. As I mentioned earlier I don’t really have a ‘need’ for it–but hopefully I’ll be able to find some excuses to use it this summer and make a few videos while in the process. 🙂

  • John Deere 420U vs 430U

    In this post I compare some of the differences between the John Deere 420 Utility and the John Deere 430 Utility.

    The 430 has an Oliver loader, but I tried to focus on the mechanical differences between the machines. The 420 and 430 were John Deere two-cylinder tractors, manufactured in Debuque, Iowa. What makes them unique over the Moline tractors is the vertical two-cylinder engine and foot clutch. The Moline tractors had a horizontal two-cylinder engine with a hand clutch (among other factory-specific differences).

  • Spring Disking with the 5020

    In this video we are disking with the John Deere 5020. The tractor has been gone all winter to a shop, so it was nice to have it back & be able to do some work with it. In this video we’re pulling a John Deere BW disk. The field was plowed in the fall, so in the spring we disk it to break down the soil further (remove the slumps from plowing) to help prepare a better seedbed for planting (seed drilling).

    After we disk it, we’re going to plant new alfalfa on the East half and a three-way grain hay on the West side.

    Yes, I know the disk is too small for this tractor–but it’s all I have. 🙂

    The tractor is a 1966 John Deere 5020 with a John Deere BW disk.

  • John Deere 430 Utility with Loader Restoration and First Drive

    Over the winter I picked up a 1960 John Deere 430 with an attached loader (with bucket), box scraper, and tire chains. However, the exhaust manifold had a crack in it, and as such water was able to get into it and rand down the cylinders into the block. The cylinders were seized, and the oil pan was full of ice.

    Getting the tractor out and home was also quite the ordeal. The transmission was full of water and was locked up. We had to melt that out to get the axles to turn. The tires were also frozen down to the ground, as was the heater. The bucket was frozen with the tip into the ground, which had sunken in about three inches and was quite frozen. To get it out we had to put the space heater onto it for a few hours, which allowed it to heat up enough to melt out the ice. Overall, it’s been a fun little project & I can’t wait to use it some this summer!

  • Feeding Beef Cattle with the John Deere Model A (December 2020)

    In this video I use the 1951 John Deere model A to feed cattle. I feed with a custom built feeder (it was once a home-made round bale plastic bagger). As much as I hate talking on video, I tried to explain some of what was going on and a bit of the hardware.

    The model A is one if my favorite of the two-cylinder machines, as it is a great machine that feels “two-cylinder” as it gets. Okay, personal opinion there, but it’s mine to give. 🙂

  • 2020 Year In Review

    First off, sorry for not posting in such a long time. I guess time just slips by quickly…

    I’d like to state a few highlights from 2020 as well. As is the case for pretty much every person on the planet–2020 was definitely a year one will never forget. For myself, this was no exception. Some of the bigger items of 2020 are as follows:

    Covid 2019. This is probably the thing that rocked most peoples world the most. Where I work for a K-12 school district, COVID-19 altered things in a way that will change education forever. It forced people to use technology and practices that they wouldn’t normally do (such as videoconferencing). It shown the world that it is possible to work from home & lower the Co2 footprint. It gave schools new funds for replacing technology–even if the technology didn’t necessarily need to be replaced… I have to say though, I loved being able to work from home and would definitely do that full time if I was able to do so…

    Grandma. Another big change that affected me personally was the loss of my grandmother, Doreen. She was very beloved lady that affected the lives of so many around her. Her loss is felt every day, and she will forever be missed. Please see this post here.

    Tip. It’s hard to express the loss of a creature that is nearly with you 24/7. As a farm boy, one can best describe the relationship between a man and his dog as a form of symbiotic relationship. His loss was especially hard for me, and something I have yet to recover from…

    Tristan. Tristan is the new puppy we picked up. Although he will never replace Tip, I have enjoyed having another puppy around. He is also a full-blooded German Shepherd with a lot of personality. He’s still in his puppy stages, so he is definitely a handful… But we do love him. 🙂

    Tractors. I told myself I wasn’t going to get any more tractors this year. Of course that didn’t end up being the case… I ended up getting three. The year still has one more week to go too… We ended up picking up a John Deere 5020 in the spring (pretty cool machine and one I’ve always wanted, so it was hard to pass up), as well as a more recently a John Deere 430 with a loader, tire chains, box scraper, and loader–what can I say, the price was right). We also picked up a little Farmall model B. The B was also at the right price, and will make a fun little tractor to the slowly growing Farmall collection…

    Night on the mountain. I went on a nice bike ride with two of my cousins and a friend of one of my cousins. It was a good ride up Bald Mountain–one I hadn’t been on before. It was a fun ride, but we ended up running into troubles and had to spend the night on the mountain. That was definitely a learning experience for sure… Staying on a mountain when you aren’t prepared for it isn’t exactly something I’d recommend. Spending the night outdoors when it gets down below 40 degrees with nothing but a t-shirt and riding jersey on isn’t exactly something I’d recommend. Fortunately everything turned out okay though in the end.

    Coming out. This is a hard one to write, as it’s not exactly something I like to advertise. However, since no one really reads my blog, I don’t think hardly anyone will see it anyway. That being said, 2020 is the year that I came out to much of the family and our closest friends. It’s not something I would have ever chosen for myself, nor something that has been an easy thing to go through–but it is who I am, so it deserves a spot on the list. I have been with my partner for over ten years now, and most of my accomplishments that you see here on this website were the combined effort of the two of us; something I wouldn’t have been able to have accomplished without him.

    So there you have it. That’s 2020 in a nutshell. Here’s to the unknowns of 2021…

  • Hauling Hay over the Past Decade

    This video is a compilation of videos taken over the past decade of us hauling hay in Star Valley, Wyoming. “Haying season” has typically been a very integral part of life in Star Valley–especially during its agricultural past. It’s interesting looking back seeing how things have changed, both in the equipment used, types of bales, and quality of recorded video.

    The equipment shown is as fallows: 1972 John Deere 4020 PowerShift
    1964 John Deere 3020 PowerShift
    John Deere 4020 PowerShift Front-Wheel Assist (FWA)
    John Deere 4230
    1960 John Deere 730 Diesel
    1959 John Deere 630
    1949 John Deere BW All-Fuel (AF)
    1997 Ford F-250 7.3 L Power Stroke
    2001 Ford F-350 7.3 L Power Stroke

    We currently use 4x4x8 large square-bales. Previously, we used 3x3x8 large square bales. The 4×4 bales are much nicer to haul and work with… Previous to the 3×3 bales, we used little square bales. Sadly I don’t have anything in terms of video footage. During that time we used a farm-hand 8 pack accumulator with 8-pack grapples on the 3020 and 4020 FWA. The ’72 4020 was purchased after that era.

  • Planting Grain Hay Spring 2019

    I’m a little late with this one, but here’s some video footage of when we planted grain hay this spring. We planted using a John Deere 4640 and John Deere LL-A grain drill. The crop is a three-way grain hay crop (used for cattle feed) that we cut and baled.

  • Feeding with the 630, December 15 2019

    It’s winter time again. And with that, feeding the beef cattle. In this video I am feeding the cattle with a John Deere 630. Dad loaded the bale on the 3020 Diesel PowerShift, as well as brought a little more hay out (alfalfa) to supplement the bale where the weather was so cold (it was below zero f while feeding).

    The hay is a three-way mixture of barley, oats, and peas, which the cattle quite enjoy.