Oliver Super 55 Diesel

[Bob_Skurka]

My wife says 4 tractors are too many so I am selling my restored Oliver Super 55. It is listed on Ebay if anyone wants to take a look.

Ebay Listing for 1965 Oliver Super 55

 

[5030]

Bob:

That's a nice old tractor. Remids me of the Oliver that my buddy has in his barn. I don't know what model it is, but the engine is enclosed with sheet mtal. It's completely restored and waxed regularly.

Your Oliver looks like a Ford Golden Jubilee.

Old tractors are like old women, nice to have around, but a pain in the ......!!

 

[Bob_Skurka]

The olivers that had sheet metal enclosing the engine were the row crop series and I think the fleetline series. My Super 55 was designed to out utility the Ford 8n utility tractors. It really is hard to part with, but I can't keep it in the garage anymore. It is fun and dependable and comfortable, but that could just as easily describe an old shoe. My little New Holland TC 24D is alsmost as powerful but is 5 times as practical. The new tractors weigh so much less than the old farm tractors that driving them is a differernt animal . . . you can't get any momentum with the light Japanese tractors when you engage the ground! It is hard to beat the weight of the old iron for plowing or blade work.

 

[5030]

Bob:

I have to tip my hat to you. You have Orange and Blue and White and Yellow too.

I think you and Henro should compare notes.

Why do you have a Kubota and a New Holland? I'm reasonably sure you mow the lawn with the Cub, lie I mow the lawn with my MTD (Huskee).

 

[Bob_Skurka]

The Cub and the NH mow the lawn. The NH does light landscape duties like work in ditches with a blade. The Kubota is 1/2 owned by me and my neighbor, it is the workhorse with the FEL and Backhoe and I have more seat time in the Kubota than the NH but the Kubota is rigged for landscape construction and I do less of that now than I did over the past few years. The NH is used for 3pt work while the Kubota is not (because the backhoe is on it).

As for WHY I have NH and Kubota. That is a dealer / pricing issue. 3 years ago Kubota was a bargain and a good tractor. The Kubota dealer & I have a 9+ year relationship and we know each other on a first name basis. He is also the Cub dealer. But when I went to inquire about a new and smaller Kubota I got one of his sales people because he was out of the office. I told the guy what I wanted and that I was looking at NH as well. The guy didn't call back. After a couple days, I did. Got a bad answer. In the mean time I talked to the NH guy, he was on top of everything got back to me several times, and generally out sold the Kubota guy by a factor of 10. So then I get a call from the Kubota dealer's owner and I tell him my problems. And I mention the price his sales guy finally gave me is almost $1200 higher than the comparable NH. And that is not to say the NH guy spit out the low price right off the bat, he did not and took some beating with a stick to get me a good price, but he did.

And while some on this forum would disagree, I find the NH to be the better designed tractor, and the better value, and am glad things turned out the way they did. I have been back to the Kubota dealer several times and played with the Kubotas since I got the NH and I know for fact that Blue beats Orange (at least in the compact class of tractors).

By the way, I also own a John Deere push mower and a John Deere weed wacker . . . does that count for anything in my multi-color collection?

 

[Bob_Skurka]

WOW, I can't believe it, I got $3550.00 for the Oliver by selling it on Ebay. I had it listed for 2 months on several sites, got 1 inquiry that was serious. 2 dealers offered me $1000 and $1500. A bidding war started and 3 people really wanted the tractor. Similar Ford 8Ns that were for sale at the same time sat with no bids or had low prices, none of them hit $2000 except for one that had a loader, and that went for just over $2000. Another that had a brand new 60" finish mower went for $2200.

 

[cowboydoc]

Have you gotten paid yet Bob? I've had some friends go that route and they got a really good price. Then the people backed out on them.

 

[Bob_Skurka]

The ebay auction ended on Friday, he was in my driveway with cash on Saturday morning. So all is well that ends well.

He was from near Louisville, I am near Chicago, so he got up real early to arrive at my house at 11am.

And in all fairness the tractor he bought was very sound mechanically and is very nice looking cosmetically so he paid top dollar but got a very nice condition tractor that should give him no problems and should do what he wants.

I did wonder if I would be paid, and if Ebay was the right way to go. I have seen Ford 8n's on Ebay sit without bids, in my area they sell for about $2000 in decent condition. I expected to get about $3000 to $3200 for my Oliver if I could find the right buyers. What was the biggest surprise is that there were 4 buyers who bid on it AFTER it was already at $3200. So maybe I undervalued (in my mind) what a restored Oliver is worth? I think the guy got a FAIR deal, given the condition of what I sold, but he certainly didn't get a bargain.

That said, I guess I would do it again, but I also think that selling a Ford 8n would probably be better done locally than on Ebay, an unusual tractor that is strong mechanically, and has collector value, is probably the best type of tractor to sell on Ebay.

 

[cowboydoc]

Yea I can't believe what those little tractors sell for sometimes. Esp. if they have a loader on one. A couple weeks ago a friend had an older one. I can't even remember what it was now. It had a loader on it and he set that thing out in front of his farm by the highway and was asking $4500. I thought man he'll never sell that thing for that money. That night I saw him out there with a guy. I asked him the next day how it went. He said the guy paid him 45 $100 bills and loaded it up and took it home. /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

 

[Macroman]

I sold a gas one a few years back. I had used it around the farm and considered restoring it but it was in rough shape. It sold for $800. The oliver had the Perkins gas and Diesel engines definately superior to the Ford or MF of the same era.

 

[CJDave]

You know the axiom, Bob; /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif "Buy the best tractor that you can afford." In other words, it's cheaper to pay a little more up front than have to bush the bearing bore in the main transmission, overhaul the engine, and search the U.S. for a front end casting that isn't washed out. /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gifWe paid top dollar for our John Deere "A", and I've not been sorry a moment since. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[Von]

Bob, I sold the Oliver 550 that I had with a FEL for $4500 about 7 years ago. I paid $2600 for it at auction and used it for 5 years with no problems. Gave it a paint job and new decals and the first guy who looked at it paid what I wanted! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[MikePA]

<font color="blue"> the first guy who looked at it paid what I wanted! </font>
When this happens, I wonder if I was asking too little! /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

 

[CJDave]

When I was a high skool kid one of our neighbors had a Super 55. I occasionally used it to pull my Model 55W baler and found it was A LOT more tractor in just about every way than the four-speed Fords like another neighbor had that I ALSO used to pull my baler occasionally. I loved that dual-H pattern transmission!!! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif So many folks just seem to want a Ford, but their only real asset is the thre-point hitch.....that and their resale value. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

 

[Bob_Skurka]

I owned that Oliver for years and it never let me down. There are several farms near me that still use Olivers in the field on a daily basis, granted they are using larger Olivers than the Super 55 now a days, but they are still out there. I paid $2450 for mine. I put some new sheet metal on it, painted it pretty and gave it decals. But mechanically that tractor was untouched while I owned it. It just worked, and it worked every day I had to fire it up.

The Ford 8n set the design pattern for utility tractors, but they were far less capable with less torque and fewer gears and I think that the prices people pay for Olivers today prove that they still are better tractors even after 50 years in the field. From what I can tell around my area, and from what I saw on Ebay, Ford values are based very largely on the IMPLEMENTS that go along with the sale. If you put a newer finish mower on a painted up Ford you can get $2200 to $2500 for it, but 1/2 of the value is in the mower deck!!! The Ford, left to sell alone, will sell for $1200 to maybe $2000. Other parts of the country might be different?