TRACTOR TRIVIA and other interesting stuff 5/20/2024

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Today’s letter is “R”    realizing rapid revisions result in rewards Rock Island responded

 

Rock Island Tractor

 

During the final quarter of the eighteenth-century millions of acres of land was put into production so demand for plows was tremendous. Plow companies by the dozens popped up looking for a piece of the action. For quality manufacturers like Rock Island plow prosperity was assured.

Rock Island saw a need to diversify and broaden its product lines due to market saturation in plow manufacturing. The 1900-1912 period saw a wide expansion of the Rock Island product lines. In addition to the usual tillage implements, they added such diverse items as manure spreaders, litter carriers, and other machines. Existing lines were broadly expanded; the 1912 implement repair catalog was a big book of over 400 pages.

Rock Island began looking for a tractor to add to the line in 1913 and began selling a few Heider tractors that year. The following year Rock Island entered a contract with Heider to sell their Model B tractor. In January 1916 Rock Island bought out the tractor department of Heider Manufacturing Company and moved production to Rock Island, and retained Henry Heider as a consultant to their tractor division.

Earlier models had friction drives allowing seven different speeds. Moving the engine drum forward and the tractor went forward – the further ahead, the faster it went. Slide the drum backward, and the tractor moved backward. Neutral was in the middle. It could pull a 3-bottom plow and 10-foot tandem disk and has a 4-cylinder Waukesha  323 CID engine.

Henry Heider resigned his position with Rock Island in 1922, but the tractor line carried the Heider name until 1927 when Rock Island introduced its 18-35 gear-drive tractor.

 Rock Island’s 18-35 appeared in 1927. Its robust unit-frame design carried a Buda four-cylinder engine. Two years later the G-2 tractor was introduced. In this series the 15-25 was a kerosene-powered model, and the 18-30 used gasoline fuel. Except for this difference, the two G-2 models were the same.

In 1937 J.I. Case Company purchased Rock Island Plow Company. This gave Case additional manufacturing capacity and additional implement lines.