Coasting in neutral doesn't save gas

[dpb]

...

...

OK, so there was at least one other w/ the aberration...

Did you ever find an actual productive use for the feature?

Or do you recall if Ford had some sales pitch?

--

[clare]

The freewheel was not a "feature" it was an "artifact".

[dpb]

That was my earlier conclusion based on the M-F design.

I found a Ford sales brochure which doesn't even mention the overrunning clutch in its extolling of Selct-O-Shift...

I was simply trying to find out if somebody really did have a reason that could be advanced that I couldn't/can't see...

--

[mm]

I don't think her mother would have liked that.

Wait a second. I'd still have to go home eventually. I had things to do there.

Maybe.

[HeyBub]

At your age then, and flush with the vigor of youth, perhaps you could have provided mom with sufficient incentive...

[Dean Hoffman]

No. It was something to avoid going downhill without an implement in the ground.

No, I don't. My dad bought it used. It did make a good cultivating tractor. There's just a little here at a site called Yesterday's Tractors. >

[Tony]

OK a different question. If stopped at a red light, does it save fuel to take the vehicle out of gear? Taking it out of gear raises the RPM's, in gear it has a load on it.

Personally, at a light I will take it out of gear if the A/C in running.

[dpb]

OK, thanks; was curious if somebody who had one did find a reason to have it other than it simplified design and thereby kept cost/complexity down.

Overall, I think I'd take the A-C power-shift or the JD synchro-mesh w/ the four ranges each w/ hi/lo/rev that was shifted sans clutch inside each range (but required clutching between ranges).

Indeed! :) As noted earlier it wouldn't be an issue out here but I can imagine it could be a lot of "fun" where we were in VA and E TN...

If you didn't see it, earlier posted a link to a sales brochure that extolled Ford's new SOS but never mentioned the overrunning clutch.

What kind of cultivating out of curiousity? Corn and/or beans I suppose...we're dryland wheat and row crops are milo (grain sorghum) and various feeds for silage, etc. Only rarely a little dryland corn and the occasional sunflower but beans won't make it dryland.

--

[Dean Hoffman]

Mainly corn back then. Dad did raise some soybeans but he was one of the few. No Roundup back then so weeds were a problem in the beans. He had a couple not very eager "volunteers" for rogueing. One thing has really changed. There used to be whole families of Latinos who would travel around to do the rogueing. Grandma age down to toddler. That would be a rare sight now. Beans are pretty common now. Roundup is one reason. Another is the seed corn companies. Guys are alternating seed corn and beans. Pioneer has a big plant nearby as do Mycogen and now Monsanto. I don't remember a time when there wasn't irrigation in my area. It's as much a part of farm life as planting and harvesting. Farmers have gotten by this year without much irrigation so far. Most of the irrigation is done by pivots anymore. Farmers just cut the plant population when they get to the corners. So I do see a lot of dryland, I guess. It's hard to tell the difference some years. One of our farmer customers commented that the crops are much better at handling dry weather than in the past. Some relatives do farm dryland because of some oddity in the water table. Milo and wheat mainly. One relative will harvest his wheat then put in some short season beans. I'm in south east/central Nebraska by the way.

[dpb]

There's always been irrigation here as well but water rights are closed so expansion is only by acquiring existing water rights from somewhere else. We're in one of those areas that has "some oddity" in the water table; namely there's a salt water layer not terribly far below the fresh water that if pump too much will intrude.

This is far SW KS where annual precip is roughly a third to perhaps two-thirds of what you would expect depending how far east ya' are there. Irrigation is, of course, center-pivot w/ some intrusion of drip systems on trial/experimental basis. So far they're installation cost and maintenance has kept it from taking over but it does reduce water loss so expect it gradually will increase. Given how dry dry is out here, many of the corners are in continuous CRP, particularly if the ground is a little harder. The one quarter of dryland corn neighbor put out this year look really good until mid-June when it turned hot and dry and now it's almost completely burned up after the last two weeks of

100+F and nothing but one 3/4" rain 3 weeks ago now. I haven't walked into it to see if it managed to make anything at all or not...

--