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Simplicity-Ford-Jacobson connection?


Les

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The tiller on this Ford garden tractor is obviously made by Simplicity. What do you think? Is it a soverign type tiller or a broadmoor type tiller? The drive is PTO via some kind of bevel gear setup. very interesting. Did Simplicity sell attachments to Jacobson? Or could this possibly be a one of a kind retrofit? If I were a little crazier I might buy this outfit.

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jacobson made tractors for mm and ford forsure and i believe oliver at one time or the other.I could be wrong on that but i believe that is the story.need to see a close up view of the pulley setup to tell my oppion. agco918 chad e shafer
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Hi, I have worked on a couple of the Fords with tillers. The Ford tillers I have seen are driven from a PTO that runs off the front clutch and runs back on the left side of the frame to the rear. The tillers don't look anything like this. It looks to me like a home project someone did to adapt a Simplicity tiller to the Ford PTO. My 2 cents worth and it is free, value accordingly. Al Eden
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Yes of course Jacobsen made garden tractors for MM, Ford, and for a very breif time, Oliver. If you know where there is one of these green guys for sale, let me know.

What is little known is that these tractors were also made in cockshutt red!

The Oliver and Cockshutt versions were only made in 1973 and 1974 and were apparantly a little pricy for what you got, so they didnt sell well. White motor also sold the Jacobsen built "Town and Country" models which were light blue and white in color. It seems strange to me that White would go with blue/white when they were messing around with Oliver green, MM yellow, MM red, MM brown, and cockshutt red and cockshutt yellow, then White charcoal gray. Duane Starr of Nebraska states that the blue/white models were produced prior to and after the green oliver models. Does anyone know when White changed garden tractors to MTD built charcoal gray?
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I seen a black tiller that looked alot like that one at a used dealer near me. It has a ford ID plate and that same 90 degree gearbox on the side. I would guess that's a factory Ford setup.
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Thanks for the info guys, I was just informed that Gilson also made blue Ford garden tractors, at least during the 1980's. Could this be a Gilson setup? Since Gilson and Simplicity plants are, or were, located very close to each other in Wisconsin, is it likely that Simpicity sold attachments to Gilson?
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Al, I think these are a factory setup. I have seen a couple of setups just like this on 76'/77' Jacobsens. The tiller is obviously the same manufacture as Simplicity but the drive system is a Homelite / Jacobsen piece of engineering. Les, your tie that binds Jac to Simplicity/AC is none other than Homelite. When Homelite dropped Simplicity as the maker of their Lawn & Garden Line they turned to Jacobsen. The thing I dont know is if Jacobsen bought Homelite or Homelite bought Jacobsen. One way or the other the two companies were married together. The speculation is how did Homelite /Jac end up using Simplicity Tillers? Was it because they had leftovers to work with from Homelites T series line up or was it a contract carry over or other??? Did/does Simplicity make their own attachments or does a third party manufacturer make them for them under contract?
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It looks like that 90 degree gearbox is the same as on a 4040-9020 powermax snowblower. I cant tell for sure from that angle, but it looks close. Neal
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Textron, an early conglomerate(the name refers to the textile business, not Texas), bought Homelite in 1954. The Homelite division of Textron was sold to John Deere in 1994, word is that John Deere now wants to dump it bad. Near as I can tell, Jacobsen was bought by Textron in 1978(according to a Racine Wisconsin newspaper articale). They just closed the Racine plant in 2001. We know that Homelite started buying tractors from AC when?? 1968?? Previous info was that Homelite stopped buying Simplicities in 1975, but could it have been 1978? Jacobsen quit making garden tractors when?? I dont know. It seems logical that a large company like Textron would not want to mess around with a lot of low volume, time intensive attachments like tillers, snowblowers, etc. Look at Deere, Haban not only makes Deeres' snowblowers but a lot of their mower decks(ironically in Racine Wisconsin). So it seems very logical that since Jacobsen was toning down their garden tractor business that they would farm out a lot of the low volume work like tillers. Now Homelites all had Briggs engines, didnt they? Since you can date a Briggs by the serial number, we should be able to tell if there are any 1977 or 1978 Simplicity/Homelites out there... because if Jacobsen's made in 1976-77 had Simplicity tillers then the 1978 purchase of Jacobsen does not sound right, 1975 would be the more logical date. Confirming that date would probably confirm the ending date of Simplicity/Homelite tractor production.
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Had em at local auct here,,couldnt get a BID!!I got a NICE SHUTTLE Sim. here for sale,,I am impressed though Les,, you do come up with good stuff all the time.What will BOSS[wifey] say,,hmm??,,
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I've had a few Simplicity Homlelites through here and they all had 1975 dated engines. The one Homelite Jacobsen I saw with the tiller on it I swore was a 1976. Deere has already dumped Homelite. I have a relative that works at Deere here in Moline, and earlier this summer they were in the process of trucking in Brand new Homelite equipment & parts from warehouses around the country and as soon as it came in to the company yard it was all offloaded from the trucks , destroyed and thrown in dumpsters.
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She's an ol ja-kobe-sen,GT ser.I think the darn oilpan is welded in frame,,had a few of em glad to get rid of them,, Amen to above post!lol,,got you an awful nice shuttle here,how do you post pics on here?
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There is a display of old farm tractors every year at our county fair,and there was an Oliver garden tractor displayed this year.I don't think it could be bought.Looked like a nice setup.
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