[bojanb]

People just love them for haying, auger tractors, loader tractors, just a perfect size with both pto's and short frame. The 4650 is a great tractor its just that for here it ends up being too small to farm with and too big for haying and augers and such. The 44 is a little more manuverable. Just depends on what you are doing and I guess if you could use the higher HP you may want to consider a 4850 as they are usually similar in price.


Good tractors

All of the above, 4450-/4455, 4650 and 4850 are hard to come by around here ( EU ). If any good, they are ungodly expensive, or if affordable, those have a lot of hours and in a pretty bad shape. Honestly, I could use both 4455 and 4650 but seams to me that 4650 is the smartest choice, as I would need something with more horsepower. Maneuverability is not that important for this tractor as I do have ones that do the job where that is required.
This tractor is for ploughing, pulling heavy discs or heavy tillage......thats about it.

 

[bojanb]

I myself am looking at the 4650 as we speak. It has 9000 hrs and supposedly transmission problem ( which to my understanding is common for all big 50, 55 and 60 series once they get over 8000hrs).
I do have a few 50 series John Deeres and they are bulletproof. I know that 55 series is good too and wish that 4650 had ELC like those ones. Not sure what exactly is different 4650=4755=4760 but ELC is one thing that 55 and 60 series has and 60 series has the side exhaust ( they do catch fire, supposedly ).
Anyhow, I think I shall scoop this one up. Keep you posted.

Ok, did get it, bought it in Sweeden
In a very good shape, everything but the transmission is outstanding. Transmission will need some work. Gonna play with that when it arrives home
Here is a picture of it

 

[albertabuck]

Ok, did get it, bought it in Sweeden
In a very good shape, everything but the transmission is outstanding. Transmission will need some work. Gonna play with that when it arrives home
Here is a picture of it

Whats wrong with the tranny? I just noticed in a previous post you said something about the 15 speed having problems being common? Not IMO, I have one myself with over 12000 hours on which the tranny has never been touched. Not saying there isn't a few that go bad, but overall they hold up well as long as proper oil is used and they aren't run short on pressure.

On another note, noticed in your pictures the tube that covers the front driveshaft is missing. That's a sure way to end up with stuff wrapping on it and taking out the seals at the tranny and front diff input yokes. I've seen guys make replacements out of plastic sewer pipe and they seem to work just as good as the originals
__________________

 

[SWFarmService]

Looks good! Probably one of the most iron clad machines out there

 

[bojanb]

Whats wrong with the tranny? I just noticed in a previous post you said something about the 15 speed having problems being common? Not IMO, I have one myself with over 12000 hours on which the tranny has never been touched. Not saying there isn't a few that go bad, but overall they hold up well as long as proper oil is used and they aren't run short on pressure.

On another note, noticed in your pictures the tube that covers the front driveshaft is missing. That's a sure way to end up with stuff wrapping on it and taking out the seals at the tranny and front diff input yokes. I've seen guys make replacements out of plastic sewer pipe and they seem to work just as good as the originals
__________________

Thanks for the info you've shared. I am not sure what is wrong with the transmission, haven't driven it yet. Was told by the owner that it acts up sometimes in some gears. and most of the time is just fine!?.....
Bought it as is, so what you se is what I'm getting. I did notice that its missing that cover, tail lamp broken, side grill on left side is damaged,.....thats about it.
Bought it for a song, as a project tractor ....and hoping that will be able to fix it up well and even put it to work

 

[bojanb]

Looks good! Probably one of the most iron clad machines out there

Thanks, can't wait to start with fixing it up

 

[stevie]

Early 50's didn't have a shield.

 

[Willy Nilly]

All of the above, 4450-/4455, 4650 and 4850 are hard to come by around here ( EU ).

They were all mostly worn out 15 years ago.

In a very good shape, everything but the transmission is outstanding. Transmission will need some work.

I have worked on a few places before I came here and have encountered a few of this series of tractor as either hire tractors or contractors tractors and a couple a few mates have driven and everyone of them has has £££££££££££ spent on the transmissions.

 

[bojanb]

They were all mostly worn out 15 years ago.



I have worked on a few places before I came here and have encountered a few of this series of tractor as either hire tractors or contractors tractors and a couple a few mates have driven and everyone of them has has £££££££££££ spent on the transmissions.

I've bought it knowing it has a transmission problem, but the price was so good that could not say no to it. I have some spare parts already, so there is a good chance that could fix it and not have to spend 5-6K Euros on repairs, like most people do when repairing those transmissions.

 

[cptusa]

Don't let willy bother you, he doesn't own a thing, just a hired hand that thinks he knows how financials of a farm look.

Should be a good machine for you. A little care and she will go a long way.

 

[Willy Nilly]

Don't let willy bother you, he doesn't own a thing, just a hired hand that thinks he knows how financials of a farm look.

Should be a good machine for you. A little care and she will go a long way.

I've not seen a 50 series Waterloo tractor in the wild for 15 years or more. The last one I know of was pushed into a container and shipped off to work on a sugarcane plantation with a knackered engine and transmission. The 10 series Mannheim and Waterloo tractors are looking pretty tired now too now.

You say I don't know about the financials. I know enough that we can't afford to run old tractors anymore. Most farms here are clearing out anything that can't earn its keep and replacing multiple units with one big machine. That one machine has to run, so is often leased and rolled over every 3 years or so. The labour costs are too high here to make major surgery on machines worth while, so generally they will get shipped out from paces like this Cheffins - Farm Machinery & Plant Auctions for export to countries where labour is cheap and it is more economical to make big repairs.

 

[bojanb]

I've not seen a 50 series Waterloo tractor in the wild for 15 years or more. The last one I know of was pushed into a container and shipped off to work on a sugarcane plantation with a knackered engine and transmission. The 10 series Mannheim and Waterloo tractors are looking pretty tired now too now.

You say I don't know about the financials. I know enough that we can't afford to run old tractors anymore. Most farms here are clearing out anything that can't earn its keep and replacing multiple units with one big machine. That one machine has to run, so is often leased and rolled over every 3 years or so. The labour costs are too high here to make major surgery on machines worth while, so generally they will get shipped out from paces like this Cheffins - Farm Machinery & Plant Auctions for export to countries where labour is cheap and it is more economical to make big repairs.

Cheffins had a really nice 4955 I was eyeballing
In EU people are selling used machines and getting new ones as most countries now qualify for EU founds up to 70% or even 90% subventions. So, to buy a new for a price of the used one is a smart move. Also, places that you've mentioned buy a new machine, run it without any service, maintenance for a year or so and sell it before repairs are needed. There is a lot of machines a year or so old with couple of thousand hours that have been ran 24-7. Those guys got their money worth out of them.
But for someone who has just over couple of hundreds of acres, to buy a 200K machine is a bankruptcy "ante portas". And thats how much i know about finances

 

[SWFarmService]

Have you lost you're mind Willy Nilly? I have an example. I run three 1480 International Harvester combines, (yeah made before CaseIH) I have less than 40,000 invested in all three plus headers ok, so if one new machine could out do these three and I say "if" one could. What I have invested would no even cover the interest of that new machine, in fact it wouldn't even be a payment on the combine aside from the headers. Also go ahead and' call my machines unreliable and take this into consideration if one of my machines goes down I still have 2 machines running with 30 ft heads, one break down on the new one would shut my harvest down. Believe it or not I am generally burning less fuel than a new one and when I want spare parts I can buy a whole combine for the price of scrap and better yet Case built combines on this platform for years so parts availability is almost unmatched. No one has the correct parts on hand for a new model. Can you do the math here? Money ahead anyday with older equipment

 

[lynas]

Have you lost you're mind Willy Nilly? I have an example. I run three 1480 International Harvester combines, (yeah made before CaseIH) I have less than 40,000 invested in all three plus headers ok, so if one new machine could out do these three and I say "if" one could. What I have invested would no even cover the interest of that new machine, in fact it wouldn't even be a payment on the combine aside from the headers. Also go ahead and' call my machines unreliable and take this into consideration if one of my machines goes down I still have 2 machines running with 30 ft heads, one break down on the new one would shut my harvest down. Believe it or not I am generally burning less fuel than a new one and when I want spare parts I can buy a whole combine for the price of scrap and better yet Case built combines on this platform for years so parts availability is almost unmatched. No one has the correct parts on hand for a new model. Can you do the math here? Money ahead anyday with older equipment

I have to agree with you there, SW! If Willys figures stacked up, we`d all be driving around in brand new tractors regardless of situation.
Maybe owning a property with mortgage repayments to keep up, would help sway his opinion otherwise. As you say, the interest repayments alone on a new machine would cover the repair costs on an old tractor for many years. Then there is the high rate of depreciation to consider. IMO the less money you have tied up in a depreciating asset, the better.

 

[Willy Nilly]

Have you lost you're mind Willy Nilly? I have an example. I run three 1480 International Harvester combines, (yeah made before CaseIH) I have less than 40,000 invested in all three plus headers ok, so if one new machine could out do these three and I say "if" one could. What I have invested would no even cover the interest of that new machine, in fact it wouldn't even be a payment on the combine aside from the headers. Also go ahead and' call my machines unreliable and take this into consideration if one of my machines goes down I still have 2 machines running with 30 ft heads, one break down on the new one would shut my harvest down. Believe it or not I am generally burning less fuel than a new one and when I want spare parts I can buy a whole combine for the price of scrap and better yet Case built combines on this platform for years so parts availability is almost unmatched. No one has the correct parts on hand for a new model. Can you do the math here? Money ahead anyday with older equipment

What are you paying per hour for the labour?

Most farms here run a skeleton staff level. The high cost of labour is driving farming businesses to use bigger machines. To keep 3 combine drivers employed 52 week of the year is going to be expensive, when you could run (lease probably), for example 1 Claas 780 and make 2 redundancies. The redundancies would probably make the payments on the combine

I spoke to The Management several times about our combine and running it longer (it's traded at 5 years old). There are some accounting issues that will be specific to the tax system here, but he said that the milling premium is worth X tens of thousands of £ per year and the risk of loosing that makes keeping a young/modern combine look cheap. I'm not saying new machine don't go wrong, we seem to get a few issues in the first year, then after that they just seem to work without issue, but no machine I have ever used has become more reliable with age.

 

[Willy Nilly]

As you say, the interest repayments alone on a new machine would cover the repair costs on an old tractor for many years. Then there is the high rate of depreciation to consider. IMO the less money you have tied up in a depreciating asset, the better.

Money is dirt cheap at the moment, so it make sense to use this cheap money to invest to keep plant and machinery up to date. Here businesses can offset depreciation against tax, which was why "we" traded a tractor (mine) and the combine early than planned.

Again, the cost of the repairs are only part of the story. We cannot expect 100% reliability, but what cost are you allocating for when your machine is broken at a critical time of the year? I'm not saying keep every machine on the farm bang up to date, but there are key machines you cannot afford to have stood idle unless you have huge amounts of spare capacity.

 

[Willy Nilly]

Cheffins had a really nice 4955 I was eyeballing

If you go there with you eyes open expecting it to be knackered and pay an amount for it that allows you to spend on the inevitable repairs you won't be disappointed, but by virtue of it being at Cheffins says it needs big money spending on it.

 

[aussie farmer]

old machines have one major upside and that's the lack of electronics. One little mouse can cost you thousands and unless your bill gates, the average farmer, driver cant locate or fix a bung sensor.
I love the older machines but when buying make sure they were the top of the line in their day and that all or most parts are available .
High hours I don't like, but if the right person owned it and has a proper overhaul history and its cheap enough to allow a third of its value in repairs incase of a major booboo well buy it.
Its better to buy what you can afford , but if you have enough work to wear out a new one, buy a new one I say.

 

[bojanb]

If you go there with you eyes open expecting it to be knackered and pay an amount for it that allows you to spend on the inevitable repairs you won't be disappointed, but by virtue of it being at Cheffins says it needs big money spending on it.

This was a really nice one. It was a part of some bank scam, so it had 1500hrs, and was immaculate. The tractor was sitting for a long time as the courts were being held over it....

 

[bojanb]

old machines have one major upside and that's the lack of electronics. One little mouse can cost you thousands and unless your bill gates, the average farmer, driver cant locate or fix a bung sensor.
I love the older machines but when buying make sure they were the top of the line in their day and that all or most parts are available .
High hours I don't like, but if the right person owned it and has a proper overhaul history and its cheap enough to allow a third of its value in repairs incase of a major booboo well buy it.
Its better to buy what you can afford , but if you have enough work to wear out a new one, buy a new one I say.

Well said