REGINA – Trucks may be the one piece of farm equipment whose praises remain undersung.
Considering the responsibility these machines have in transporting the crop, often in the most extreme weather, their evolution hasn’t been as prominent as the tractor or combine.
Farm trucks were introduced around 1920 to replace horses. Fuel distribution was expanding and these metal beasts of burden could maintain speeds of up to 25 km-h without rest.
They carried little more and sometimes less than a good team, but their reliability more than made up for cost and soon they plied the dirt tracks crisscrossing Western Canada.
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By the end of the 1920s, a good truck had three forward gears, one reverse and as much as 27 gasoline fired horsepower, in a time when the term had meaning. A grain box in 1927 would hold 75 bushels of wheat.
Today’s tandem trucks start at 475 hp produced by diesel engines that are common to the largest field tractors.
Eighteen forward gears and two reverse mean a 1,400 bu. B-train load of grain can be carried from the field in harvest time. This amount is larger than the grain bins used for field or farm storage in the 1920s.
Leaf spring suspensions have been replaced with air bags. Wooden-floored grain boxes that used shovel-on, shovel-off technology and were covered by oilskin tarps secured by hemp ropes, have been swapped for hydraulic lifts, steel floors and powered end gates. Lightweight, self-securing poly tarps keep the cargoes in place.
In 1920, a new Traffic truck cost $1,195 or about 1,200 bu. of wheat. By 1927, a Chevrolet grain truck might cost as little as 625 bu., or about $750.
Today, a new, budget- conscious tandem could be traded for 14,650 bu. of premium wheat, not including shipping and elevation.
The majority of producers in a straw poll at the recent Western Canada Farm Progress Show in Regina said the greatest innovation to the grain truck was the two-speed rear axle that allowed loaded trucks of three tons or more to lift themselves out of a soft field and still travel at 80 km-h on the highway.
Cyril Griffith of Naicam, Sask., restores older trucks and spent his farming life hauling grain with them.
“Air conditioning. Cruise control. Boxes that clean themselves out. It’s a toss-up. But the two-speed axle was pretty good,” he said.
For the lighter trucks, Bill Wilson, a farmer and vehicle restorer from McCord, Sask., said the 1950s and 1960s innovation of four-wheel-drive changed the cattle producer’s ability to travel farther to look after cattle in the pasture in any weather.
What truck has played the biggest role on your farm and why?
Your replies to this question will form the basis of a feature in
The Western Producer’s 80th anniversary special edition in August. Send your replies to Building a Legacy, Western Producer newsroom, Box 2500, Saskatoon, Sask., S7K 2C4.
You can also reply on-line by going to www.producer.com and clicking on Building a Legacy.
