Weekend Special: Tractor

Full sun all day through. The temperature peaked at 59F. Narrowly dodged an early frost last night.

Forget everything else that happened today. CSA and tomatoes, blah, blah, blah. After I had everything packed up and cleaned in the early afternoon, the boss taught me how to drive the tractor. We climbed into the cab and he showed me what is what. This will be a geek post, you've been warned.

Fortunately for me, I know how to drive standard transmission cars-- I guess that's becoming a rarity these days. The tractor has four pedals: clutch on the left, on the right are 2 brakes (left wheels/right wheels, it helps when turning in thick mud), on the far right is a long bar which is the accelerator (it has a tendency to stick). On the left of the wheel is the first set of gears: forward, neutral and reverse. There are 2 additional gear sticks: drive modes (A, B, C & N) and the standard (1,2,3,4 & N). A is a very low gear good for running machinery, i.e. harrowing, tilling, seeding, spraying, fertilizing, etc. B is a medium gear, faster speed but stable, good for the dirt/stone/gravel tractor roads. C is the highest speed, but only good for pavement driving. Shifting is a bit different from a car/truck. So there are 12 forward gears and 12 reverse gears. First off, the tractor needs to be stopped to change between forward and reverse (obvious), but you also need to stop when changing between A, B or C-- no smooth build ups. Fortunately the 1, 2, 3 and 4s are all the same as always.

The dashboard has all the standards: fuel & temperature. There is no real speedometer, rather only an RPM gauge (although a small digital display off to the side shows traveling miles-per-hour. On the right of the wheel is the general throttle lever-- it controls the general RPM output of the diesel engine. Behind the gear sticks alongside the seat are the hydraulic controls-- one series of levers adjusts the height of the 3 joint attachments-- like the rotor mower we had attached today. Two more levers control the hydraulic outputs to attachments-- the harrow can be raised or lowered with these levers in order to travel to the fields.

In front of the gear sticks on the right is a joystick that controls the front loader-- left and right movements curl/uncurl the bucket, forward and backward raise and lower the entire bucket. There are other movements I know nothing about. Levers on the left side of the seat allow the tractor to switch between 2 wheel and 4 wheel drive--we always keep it in 4 wheel, but the boss says this wears the tires down faster/uses more fuel.


With all this in mind the boss sat in the cab door as I drove around the barn a few times. Then he had me drive back and forth along dead-ends to test my reverse skills. Easy as pie. He hoped down and sat with Lucy (the dog), keeping an eye on me. Soon he left to go about his business.

I got a bit adventurous. I took the tractor out onto the paved road and drove out to the forest fields. I drove up and down the field's travel roads, before taking a trial run to the compost heap (gotta show a little initiative from time to time) and dumped off a bucket's worth of molded squash/water.

I could have driven around all day-- I wish I had (it would have been smart to try the road up to the hilltop when I had a chance). But I didn't want to eat up all the boss's fuel-- a couple dozen joy rides were enough for one day. Despite all the pain he was in, the boss was very satisfied with me. He told me how horrified the foreman was when he first learned to drive the tractor. I was giddy as a schoolboy-- but the more I think about it, I might need to reign in my excitement a bit. All the boys work real close with this big unwieldy powerhouse of a machine-- its better to be terrified and careful than excited and reckless, especially when someone else can be hurt/maimed/killed. So I am excited and paranoid at the same time. But the boss was impressed and I am happy. He said he would start me off the same way he did the foreman-- harrowing down the spent Fall fields. It is relatively easy and there is a wider margin allowing for mistakes.

Before leaving I sorted out pints of cherry tomatoes, chatting with the boss. He is glad to have another tractor driver around-- to cover weekends/days off/unexpected changes. For years now only the boss and the foreman have been the only ones driving-- now there's me.

What a day, what a day.


Feels good. Tomorrow I have off.
Take it easy.