# Massey Harris Pacer.



## alleyyooper (Sep 12, 2015)

I was told I should write about my old Massey Harris snow plow tractor. My Massey collection started way before the 1954 Pacer that is really my wife’s tractor.
It started in 1989 when I decided I wanted an antique pulling tractor. Finding that one was easy a 1951 44 with a single front wheel for weight reduction. 



http://smg.photobucket.com/user/oldgrumpy/media/my tractors/44singlefrontwheel-1.jpg.html



It needed some very hard to get parts so I went on a search for tractors setting in fence rows and behind out buildings that may have parts I could use. It became a day off from work day thing Kare and I did, drive country roads with the binoculars and spotting scope to get a closer look.
This (the top one) came up for sale at a tractor dealers auction to get rid of some old equipment. I bought it for the parts I needed figuring I was finished in my search. My dad said it was to nice to part out even though the diesel engine was seized. It is a 1952 44 special diesel.



So back to searching then one day Kare said we should start collecting these old Masseys, you like them and it is about all your dad talks about.
Got tractor number 5 this 1951 Model 30 and it became my snow plow tractor with a Afro engineered 3 point hitch and back blade.



So one morning I come home from work and see a red circled add on the kitchen counter for a 1954 Massey Harris Pacer snow plow/dozer blade 2 section spring tooth drag and one row plow for sale and a note from Kare telling me she had called and we were going to look at it Saturday morning.
Kare fell in love with it and it became number 21 in our combined collection of 22 Massey Harris tractors 







. I also have a 1961 Allis Chalmers gas and a 1965 Ford 5000 gas tractor in the collection. There Farm all H parked out back that a friend left here 17 years ago when he was going thru a divorce and has never attempted to come get.



 Al


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## detdrbuzzard (Jan 20, 2012)

oooh a tricycle


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## 1894 (Dec 16, 2014)

Very cool !! Want a road grader to tow behind it ?


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## bwdbrn1 (Nov 24, 2010)

Really nice tractors in your collection there alleyooper. Besides the tractors, you guys whose wives who get into collecting them is something super special too.

IH tractors are pretty special too. The Farmall assembly line used to be just about 3 miles from where I lived in Rock Island, IL It was a sad day when they closed the doors. Not much left of the original buildings now. Mostly an empty lot. Where the IH harvester works were just a couple of cities over is nothing but an empty 30 acre lot waiting for someone to come along and develop it into condos, or something, overlooking the Mississippi.


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## alleyyooper (Sep 12, 2015)

We went to Ohio and bought a 1946 Massey Harris 101 Jr which had the 162 Con. engine. Since my dad took over pulling the 44 single wheel and was having so much fun I wanted one too. 



That was the Saturday before mothers day. On the way home I asked Kare what she wanted the kids to get her. she replied a tractor. This 1946 model 20 with a wide front was second choice so before going home we went and bought it. I was still a bit on the dumb side thinking the 140cid was correct for it as a distillate engine making it really really rare. It turned out to be a swapped in gas engine.



The bottom one is a 1951 model 22 standard we bought in Forest ONT. Guy threw in a sickled bar mower for a Pony or Pacer when I went to pick it up.

Kare's birthday 1991 was coming up and she wanted her first choice tractor a 1941 model 81. top picture.



And Kare's last tractor # 4 is a 1953 44 Butane. Yes that is what Massey called their Propane tractors back then butane.
Bottom picture.



The top tractor is my 1938 101 with a 6cylinder Chrysler indrustal engine. It is my favorite that engine is so smooth and quite at idle you have to be standing right next to it to hear it run.


 Al


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## bwdbrn1 (Nov 24, 2010)

Is everyone in your family still active in antique tractor pulls? 

Being from the Illinois Quad Cities area, which includes Moline and Rock Island, John Deere and IH are the two brands I'm most familiar with. Can't say that I ever knew a farmer where I grew up that had anything else except the occasional Allis Chalmers or Case. My dad had a mix of JDs and Allis Chalmers. I remember running an old WD45, which was replaced with a D17 and his last was a 180.


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## bad69cat (Nov 30, 2015)

I just have way to many projects going on - one day I would like to grab one of the old tractors and go through it. I pass up on them all the time.....


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## alleyyooper (Sep 12, 2015)

There was a rule that really kept all the old tractors stock or close where we pulled some thing like 10 horse power per thousand pounds of tractor. So a 5000 tractor could have 50 HP.

The John deer guys hated the rule as the old b's could not pull with any other tractors stock so they started running a different modified engine (power Block) and that put them way over the horse power range for their weight class, so they would add weight and pull in a higher weight class and not do well there either.

finally they rounded up enough support to change the rule that the tractor had to appear stock. Now they only have bought 4 guys who pull and the sled was sold and now belongs to a pulling assoaction that goes from small town to small town all summer and even that is starting to die out.

My nephew did pull his 101 JR last summer just to see what it would do. At one time that tractor could have been in the top 4 but last summer it was 9th out of 10 in the class.

We used to go to different old tractor shows with ours, like Buckley, Hastings Oakley some of the bigger ones but I started getting tired of loading and unloading them by my self after my dad passed away so we have slowed to a couple shows a year none of the big ones.

 Al


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## bwdbrn1 (Nov 24, 2010)

Ever thought of garden tractor pulling? There's a club up here, I think they're based in Rock if I remember right. I went to an event they did in Gladstone last year. They'll let people bring their lawn and garden tractors to hook up just for grins. I'm tempted to load up the old Suburban SS/16 and see what the old gal can do which probably wouldn't be much with the turf tires on it.


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## alleyyooper (Sep 12, 2015)

Garden tractor pulls don't do much for me. I have seen them. 
Escanaba has a decent steam engine show Labor day week end.

 Al


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## bwdbrn1 (Nov 24, 2010)

Those absolutely crazy contraptions with motorcycle engines are fun to watch.

The pioneer village on the U.P. State fair grounds is really something to visit. It was fascinating to watch the saw mill being operated.


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## oldtractorman (Feb 16, 2017)

*Pacer plow hook-up*

Hi, Do you have any info/pictures of the plow hook-up for the Massey Harris pacer? Thanks


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