My brother works for Eagle Tractor Parts and a few weeks ago a guy walks into the shop and asks if they want his tractors. They told him to go see the boss up front to find out if he wanted to buy them and how much. He said, "No, do you want me GIVE them to you?" So they took him to the boss. They went out to the truck/trailer and he had a ~10 year old payloader in good shape on the front with 4 brand new tires (one flat) and an older slightly ragged 120 horse plus Massey on the back. He said they were traded in under that clean air program and that they could have them for free if they wanted them, BUT they had to drill a hole through the engine block so they couldn't be placed back in service. The boss said, "SURE" since he can probably sell several thousand bucks apiece in parts off them so the guy unchained and cranked the Massey up and drove it off the trailer. It ran pretty good and just a little smoke from the stack, which is common with older high horsepower tractors. Then he drove the payloader off and it ran like a new one. The boys drilled a 1/2 inch hole in the water jacket and he took pictures/video for proof for the gov't boys in Austin and then they drilled the engine on the payloader, and he also wanted the payloader frame cut at the articulation joint, which they did with the torch right quick. He told them that they wouldn't believe who the tractor belonged to, and after a few guesses he told them 'Nolan Ryan'. He had the boss sign some papers and he took off. The boys were laughing back in the shop and said, "now go get a 1/2 inch pipe thread tap and a pipe plug" joking but the Mexican guys were kinda upset because a big high horsepower Massey like that would bring about $10,000 to $15,000 in Mexico and the Payloader would be more like $20,000. One of the guys joked about going to get the local welder to burn some rods on the articulation joints back together. They moved them out back and a couple days later my brother noticed a sticker on the door of the payloader cab advertising the program. He figured the guy came back by to put the stickers on and see that they were in line to be parted out.
Now what strikes me as stupid about this is, I know of a guy running a junkyard nearby that is running an ANCIENT payloader cobbled together out of parts and kept running with spit and baling wire and running on an old 4-71 Detroit that pukes, drips, and burns about as much oil as it keeps in the crankcase, and smokes like a freight train and slobbers enough diesel down the side of the block from the manifolds to run a pickup on. Seems to me it's a HUGE waste to cut up a ten or fifteen year old machine like that when what the gov't should be doing is taking the halfway decent trades they get and then retrading them for the REAL old ragged dogs out there that should be heading for the salvage yard. Plus, parting them out for parts means that that payloader and tractor will provide parts that will probably keep at least a dozen other compatible units in service.
Oh well, it's the government... go figure... OL JR
