I have an old 8N I use at the cabin and it would be acceptable for conventional till/broadcast and harrowing or using a conventional drill such as an old Van Brunt.
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I doubt that you would operate a ten foot wide Van Brunt drill in most lands. Maybe?? Maybe a cut-down model like a six footer would work. Dunno.
When I was a kid.....most of those little N fords were used to operate grain elevators, pull bale wagons, blade roads, push some snow, run a sickle mower, for cultivator work, hay balling, post hole diggers, a 3 point "pan", pulling a gas engine powered, pull type, combine, and many more light duty tasks.....tho make no mistake......they got allot of work done. You gotta understand folks did not have nearly the kinda land under "the plow" for row crops back then. Instead many were diversified farmers and had lots of hay ground, pastures, and such. times changes quickly in the 50's and pretty soon large tractors and high horsepower were in demand. The little fords were relegated to utility work....and the Case's, Farmall's, John Deere, International Harvester, Oliver's, Cockshutt, Minneapolis Moline, Co-Op, and such did the heavy lifting (plow work).
Ford was always two steps behind in the race for Horsepower.....tho their use for utility tractors was hard to beat. They largely were no longer relevant in the larger farm race for bigger tractors and stubbled their toes with a few models that were kinda "Edsel's" in the farmers minds.......like the Ford 6000.....which was debut'd with some major flaws.....and never overcame that reputation....depite making a pretty good product in following years. <----that model really sealed the fate of Ford in the tractor biz....tho they did offer some good products to follow...they lost the sale numbers to go forward (IMO). Too late to the party.....too much $ for what could be had elsewhere. (Tho....almost all brands said above have gone broke since those times.)
Enter the Japanese tractors....first was Yanmar.....followed by Kubota and now many other brands.....all originating out of Japan, Korea, India, or CHINA. The USA may have shown the Jap's and others how to build tractors.....but the Japanese came back in spades....as well as the other nations mentioned. Far better equipment at a lower price....especially in the utility market. John Deere made a deal with Yanmar.....and the others followed Yanmar to capture much of the USA market for small tractors......not to mention the whole WORLD.
IMO the USA did this same thing in so many areas. We develop the tech....then pass it on to other nations to reap our tech. Now.....gonna be hard to re-enter those markets.....just as it was for Ford. Too little too late. Sad.
