Trailer plough

Ley253

Member
Location
Bath
Just like to point out that Frdcps are not legal on trailer ploughs, not being made for the plough at time of manufacture.Mind you, that will probably get ignored in the same way YL 183 s are, same applies to them.
 

Boohoo

Member
Location
Newtownabbey
Is it time someone made out a clear set of rules that apply to every match whether it's a local match or the European match? There are people using frdcp and yl 183 in the trailer class at European level
 

Ley253

Member
Location
Bath
Indeed the rules should be sorted out, but when it was pointed out to one of the rule makers that his plough did not conform, he brushed aside the complaint ,saying that as he made the rules, it did! Things are getting worse, not better. Some matches in the South have introduced a match and modified class! What a can of worms that is,as I pointed out to a sec of one of these events, every plough on the field had been modified in some way, the ploughs are just too old not to have had a repair or two carried out, and people use what bits they can get to do that. For example, how many trailer ploughs out there are still held together by the original square headed bolts? Not many, but putting in a hex bolt is a modification, an extending axle, is a modification!
 

Howard150

Member
Location
Yorkshire
Whilst most trailer ploughmen in this part of the world by and large still cling to square nuts, very few of them actually plough with YL165's
Most would consider FRDCP's to be too big a departure from IRDCP. However most would also consider a YL183 to be a very small departure from a YL165. After all it is still a one piece board with very similar angles and length, possibly a little less twist, and to be honest it could be said that the 183's superseded 165's as they wore out in general use.
Can anyone clarify the date the last trailer ploughs were made. I think, but please correct me if I am wrong, trailer ploughs were still being made quite late on in Ransomes history, possibly till after YL183's were introduced. This would blow the argument out of the water. The devil is in the detail. Regardless of 165 or 183, they are both YL mouldboards, and in a similar vein so are RND's, be it 119 or 69.
Slightly different for IRDCP vs FRDCP

The devils advocate in me is unable to reconcile the fact that vintage ploughing is subject to depth constraints. As such then in the greater number of soils a YL165 is not up to the job and will not handle the greater depth. If depth were at the discretion of the ploughman then this would give some justification to having to use 165's. Comments please.
 
Last edited:
Whilst most trailer ploughmen in this part of the world by and large still cling to square nuts, very few of them actually plough with YL165's
Most would consider FRDCP's to be too big a departure from IRDCP. However most would also consider a YL183 to be a very small departure from a YL165. After all it is still a one piece board with very similar angles and length, possibly a little less twist, and to be honest it could be said that the 183's superseded 165's as they wore out in general use.
Can anyone clarify the date the last trailer ploughs were made. I think, but please correct me if I am wrong, trailer ploughs were still being made quite late on in Ransomes history, possibly till after YL183's were introduced. This would blow the argument out of the water. The devil is in the detail. Regardless of 165 or 183, they are both YL mouldboards, and in a similar vein so are RND's, be it 119 or 69.
Slightly different for IRDCP vs FRDCP

The devils advocate in me is unable to reconcile the fact that vintage ploughing is subject to depth constraints. As such then in the greater number of soils a YL165 is not up to the job and will not handle the greater depth. If depth were at the discretion of the ploughman then this would give some justification to having to use 165's. Comments please.
is the move into trailer class going to be permanant
 

Kenham

Member
Quite agree about the depth rule, I have ploughed for years with 165's and now with RND,s and really are trying to plough to deep for the boards in certain conditions. With our heavy clay there was no need to plough at 6 inches and with the very deep tramlines we have today there is no hope of trying to get in deeper. The only time we ploughed deep was for potato ground but would use a deep digger plough for that.
 

arcobob

Member
Location
Norfolk
If 183s are ilegal there is a hell of a lot of ploughmen going to have to change there bodies on trailer ploughs
YL183 were first manufactured in 1933, three years before the RSLD was introduced and thirteen years before the TS43 Motrac. As both these ploughs were offered with YL bodies of unspecified type it seems highly likely that 183s were available for both. If anybody has any documentary evidence to the contrary I suspect that the idea that RSLDs were not available with 183s is a myth that has grown up without foundation.
 

Ley253

Member
Location
Bath
YL183 were first manufactured in 1933, three years before the RSLD was introduced and thirteen years before the TS43 Motrac. As both these ploughs were offered with YL bodies of unspecified type it seems highly likely that 183s were available for both. If anybody has any documentary evidence to the contrary I suspect that the idea that RSLDs were not available with 183s is a myth that has grown up without foundation.
I think that you are wrong there Bob, David Bonning told me 183s were introduced on the mounted ploughs to cope with the wider(11) inch work.There was a YL 163, available in the late 1920s, a cast steel board, there is a Motrac no 3 near here with them.Anthony Clare ,I believe states similar to David in his book, and I believe mentions that they are of New Zealand heritage Another pointer is the fact that they dont fit trailer plough frogs, including the Motracs without the stays being modified. RSLM, and RSLD are similar ploughs, one being three furrow, the other two, the letters standing for Ransomes self lift multiple, and Ransomes self lift dual. They are in fact of Hornsby design. On very early ones, you will find a Hornsby plate, or the rivet holes for it, on the diagonal brace fitted across the frame
 

Kenham

Member
Reading Anthony Clares book it seems to say RSLD and RSLM were introduced in 1919, my no7 RSLD is maybe 1926-28 as far as we can tell.
 

Ley253

Member
Location
Bath
The very first "straight beam"(RSLD/M) ploughs had the lift operated from a lever attached to the "trip clutch", thats the spring loaded device on the furrow beam. There is a very early one in use in Somerset area, behind a Fordson "F".
 

arcobob

Member
Location
Norfolk
I think that you are wrong there Bob, David Bonning told me 183s were introduced on the mounted ploughs to cope with the wider(11) inch work.There was a YL 163, available in the late 1920s, a cast steel board, there is a Motrac no 3 near here with them.Anthony Clare ,I believe states similar to David in his book, and I believe mentions that they are of New Zealand heritage Another pointer is the fact that they dont fit trailer plough frogs, including the Motracs without the stays being modified. RSLM, and RSLD are similar ploughs, one being three furrow, the other two, the letters standing for Ransomes self lift multiple, and Ransomes self lift dual. They are in fact of Hornsby design. On very early ones, you will find a Hornsby plate, or the rivet holes for it, on the diagonal brace fitted across the frame
I would be the first to aknowledge the experience of the late David Bonning but in this case he is surely way wide of the mark. It is true that the 183 had its origins in New Zealand but I cannot believe that they were developed for mounted ploughs. With the exception of the Weetrac which had very limited production, the first Ransomes mounted plough was developed in 1946 and was referred to as a mounted Motrac. Are you suggesting that boards developed in 1933 were for mounted ploughs and therefore not fitted to any Ransomes or Ransomes/Hornsby plough until at least 1946? I find this very hard to believe.
 

arcobob

Member
Location
Norfolk
Whilst most trailer ploughmen in this part of the world by and large still cling to square nuts, very few of them actually plough with YL165's
Most would consider FRDCP's to be too big a departure from IRDCP. However most would also consider a YL183 to be a very small departure from a YL165. After all it is still a one piece board with very similar angles and length, possibly a little less twist, and to be honest it could be said that the 183's superseded 165's as they wore out in general use.
Can anyone clarify the date the last trailer ploughs were made. I think, but please correct me if I am wrong, trailer ploughs were still being made quite late on in Ransomes history, possibly till after YL183's were introduced. This would blow the argument out of the water. The devil is in the detail. Regardless of 165 or 183, they are both YL mouldboards, and in a similar vein so are RND's, be it 119 or 69.
Slightly different for IRDCP vs FRDCP

The devils advocate in me is unable to reconcile the fact that vintage ploughing is subject to depth constraints. As such then in the greater number of soils a YL165 is not up to the job and will not handle the greater depth. If depth were at the discretion of the ploughman then this would give some justification to having to use 165's. Comments please.
I remember my father buying a brand new Motrac in around 1952 exactly like the one pictured at the start of this thread though I cannot remember which bodies. I don`t think many were made after the mid fifties and though Ransomes continued with crawler ploughs for much longer I think this could be considered the end of the line for the smaller trailed ploughs.
 

Fowler VF

Member
Location
Herefordshire
I run several 6 furrow Hexatracs. These were definitely offered with a YL option, my early one (pre-war) is adjustable but appears to have always been set at 10" and is on 165's and one of the later ones is a TS59 with fixed frame at 12" and has 183's. I was always told that this later plough was one of a pair that were the last ones made by Ransomes in the late 60's to go behind a TD20 or similar. Obviously the boards could have been renewed during its lifetime, but I somehow doubt that a plough designed to be run at 12" wide would have been fitted with 165's. My other TS59 had deep digger boards, and I swapped the frogs to YL, just bolted straight on with no alterations. My point being, that trailer ploughs were still being made very late on and were being made to take 183's. Not sure about earlier, smaller ploughs, but logically, since Ransomes made such a wide variety of ploughs for different markets and customers, I think we can be pretty sure that there will have been customers specifying 183's on a wide range of ploughs as soon as they were available. Incidentally, if anyone wants them I have four brand new original 165 boards, surplus to requirements.
 

Ley253

Member
Location
Bath
I think we need to put the crawler ploughs aside.They are indeed a special case.years ago, we broke up several hexa and quintracks for the bodies, they were all fitted with 165 s, anything other was scrapped with the rest of the plough The fact remains though that 183s do not fit trailer plough frogs, and there are no Ransome made parts that I have found which will bolt straight on to solve this problem.
 

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