You "Road" Your Tractor?

[oosik]

When I had the Ford 1700 - once a year to my friends place. Clean up his feed pens and big 'ol barn. Not any more - the Kubota M6040 won't fit where the Ford use to. All of his tractors are just too big also.

It worked out well for both of us. His barn and feed lot got cleaned up - I filled my pickup and farm wagon with garden fertilizer. The wife always said - she got the crappy end of this deal. She drove the pickup and pulled the farm wagon - I drove the tractor.

This was an eight mile - round trip - to the neighbors place.

 

[LHF2019]

I've roaded over 2 hours back when I did custom work. Not a big deal. Bought a tractor at an auction that I drove 6 hours to get it home. What better way to make sure it was a good purchase. When I worked out west we roaded tractors and combines 8 hours or so. Sometimes it is just easier than making multiple trips and having to load/unload chain everything up

 

[rockinbbar]

When I take my tractors on the road, I don't want an "escort vehicle" per se.

Some guys I know have someone drive behind them with the emergency flashers on. In my opinion, if someone coming up behind you doesn't see a large tractor in front of them on the road, they probably won't see a regular vehicle with flashers on either...

I've added emergency lights to the back of both tractors, and turn them on when on the road.

They are pretty bright, and tend to catch someone's eye.

I actually have more trouble from the drivers who won't pass me. They just get behind you and stay there, bogging traffic. If they'd just go around, everything would run much smoother.

 

[Slowpoke Slim]

My tractor is tiny compared to some of your big Ag tractors, but I don't "road" it anywhere. Any of my off site jobs have been far enough away (anywhere from 10 to 50 miles) that even if I wanted to do so, at 15 mph top speed, I'd have wasted the day just getting there. So I chain it down and haul it, every time. Maybe once in a while a close neighbor needs a hand with something, but most any time I'm off my own place, it's trailered there and back again.

Would be burning way too much daylight to road it there.

 

[Jstpssng]

In my opinion, if someone coming up behind you doesn't see a large tractor in front of them on the road, they probably won't see a regular vehicle with flashers on either..

In my opinion it just creates two slow moving vehicles to try to get around rather than one.

 

[SmallChange]

In my opinion it just creates two slow moving vehicles to try to get around rather than one.

No personal experience with this, just wanted to say that I have seen exactly this opinion expressed here before. Seems to be the prevailing wisdom.

 

[EddieWalker]

About 15 years ago, when I was still flipping houses, I drove my open station backhoe to a house about 20 miles away. It was a nice day out. Not too hot, and I figured it would be an enjoyable drive. I didn't know about all the sand and dust that cars kick up as they drove by at much higher speeds!!!! That 20 miles turned into the most horrible, torture test beyond anything I could ever guess. It was non stop sand blasting on all my exposed skin, and face. Several times I thought about pulling over and calling somebody to tow it!!!!!

When I drove it back, I waited until Sunday morning when traffic was light, I wore long sleeves, gloves, goggles and a bandana. I felt like I had just robbed a bank, but it made a huge difference when the cars drove past me.

I've never done that again.

I have a cabbed tractor now, but I don't want to drive it on the roads. My neighbor drives his to the gas station when he needs to without any issues, but I'm just going to take my truck and fill up a five gallon can instead.

Eventually I have to buy a bigger truck and trailer to get to my other farm that's 62 miles away. I've towed a smaller tractor there and back with my F150 without incident, but I feel like I need more power and a better trailer to do this regularly. I avoided the Interstate and most of it was 45 mph to 65 mph. Until I buy those things, I'm considering hiring somebody to move my tractors there, but I'm hesitant to become dependent on paying somebody to do things for me.

 

[LouNY]

In my opinion it just creates two slow moving vehicles to try to get around rather than one.

No personal experience with this, just wanted to say that I have seen exactly this opinion expressed here before. Seems to be the prevailing wisdom.

I would agree with this in most cases. When we do feel it would be better to have an escort vehicle we leave a good gap to allow a vehicle to pass each of us separately. At times the trailing and or leading escort vehicle will also operate as traffic control preventing passing on hills and blind corners. If an implement is to wide to allow oncoming traffic to meet the lead vehicle will stop traffic at a spot were it is possible to meet and get by. In the same vein the trailing escort may drop way back when a corner or blind hill top restrict visibility of the slow moving vehicle to prevent vehicles from running up onto equipment to fast. To many people will drive way too fast on many of our back roads to accommodate slow vehicles or animals.

 

[azbinder]

In the late 70's, I was working on a farm in southwest Arizona. Owner came up to me one day and said let's go for a ride. Went to the IH dealer and looked at a used International 622 cotton picker. He bought it and guess what I did? Checked it over and then drove it home about 110 miles on Interstate 8. Did have leave it parked overnight about 3/4 the way home. We also would "road" our pickers about 20 miles to the owner's son's farm. We would do this 2 times during picking season. And NO cabs on them.

 

[hosspuller]

Trailer except when crossing the road to a neighbor's. Suburban traffic is dangerous with people that don't understand farm equipment and want to run 10 to 20 MPH over the posted limits. Wasn't always like this, but the city moved out to us.