Pedal-Powered Farmall

Pedal-Powered Farmall FARM HOME recreation Dan Rubison Shelbina Missouri likes to get kids involved during the annual Northeast Missouri Old Threshers Show so he s always working on something that will appeal to them     Last year he stripped the engine out of a perfectly good C Farmall lengthened the frame a little and mounted two banks of four bicycles The result is a people-powered tractor with a working clutch and transmission      The tractor was donated for the project and was in beautiful shape he says Aside from removing the engine and adding about 4 ft to the frame he made very few changes to the tractor     Rubison decided to use girls style bike frames for the tractor He says finding eight decent single speed bikes was the hardest part of the whole project He put out the word that he needed bikes and a mountain of them appeared shortly most left at his shop after hours There must have been 100 or so and with all those I still had to go looking for more because there weren t enough alike that worked he says     He mounted the bicycles back to back so four riders face out on each side Seats pedals and sprockets for the single speed bike frames were left in place The front wheel has been removed Instead of a rear wheel the bike riders power a shaft that Rubison says connects to the clutch and transmission Regular bike chain transmits power from the bike cranks to a drive shaft     Each bank of bikes powers a separate shaft so there are two power inputs to the transmission and just how this works Rubison won t tell He also won t say whether he used the original clutch or whether he added weights or a flywheel to help maintain momentum      You ll just have to come look for yourself he says     All he ll confirm is that he left the coasters in place on the old bikes so if somebody stops pedaling his or her pedals don t continue to turn     He says just one person pedaling can move the tractor With eight football player sized pedalers the tractor pulled a sled about 100 ft          The project was completed in three weekends with two or three people working on it at an out-of-pocket cost of only about $350 The tractor and bikes were all donated I spent about $300 for steel and chain and another $50 for red paint he says     Rubison s pedal powered C will be at the steam show again this summer And he s still working on that pedal-powered dozer He s already got the Caterpillar tractor he ll use The Northeast Missouri Old Threshers Show held in Shelbina is always the first weekend after Labor Day     Contact: FARM SHOW Followup Dan Rubison Four R-D Repair 403 East Maple St Shelbina Mo 63468 ph 573 588-4444

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