Case IH has good reason to celebrate this year with it being the 100-year anniversary of the Farmall, a model first introduced in 1923 as an all-purpose tractor designed to appeal to a wider customer base.
Although the Farmall badge is now proudly being used to signify a range of smaller general purpose machines, it has not been in continuous use – International Harvester dropped the name for 30 years between 1974 and 2004.
A lightweight at last
Despite this gap, there is much to celebrate, for when it first arrived on the scene it represented a significant change in direction for tractor design, which, heretofore in the US, had been focused on heavier machines such as the International Harvester Titan and Mogul.
At the time, Case also produced a brace of unit frame machines which shared many of their features with the Fordson, yet the company felt that the next step should be a lighter and cheaper tractor that would be more acceptable to mid-western farmers.
At the time, it was working on a three-wheeled cultivator that had the engine mounted high over the rear wheel.
This, unsurprisingly, led to stability problems, requiring ballast to be added to the front wheels which increased the overall weight and cost.
The engineers decided to rearrange the machine, placing the engine longitudinally in the frame and giving it a rear axle, and so the Farmall was born.
The Farmall legacy
The concept was an instant success and by 1947 the millionth Farmall had been produced, a figure which reached five million in 1974, although the machines, if not the concept, were very much evolved.
Today, there are more than 30 models to choose from, and this iconic tractor series is set to continue to evolve alongside farmers and farming.
The Farmall range now extends from 34hp up to 140hp, an increase in output that has kept pace with the demands from farming. Yet they still remain compact, lightweight and agile, keeping true to the original design parameters.