What's wrong with these tractors

[Cowabunga]

Have a friend with a Massey fergusson from era, that's giving him loads of trouble as well. It's in the garage for last month whilst they try and source parts. Says its last Massey he'll ever buy. Know of others with similiar stories.

They only make some parts in batches. Some no longer. Perkins and MF no longer supply critical parts for the a4 318 engine for instance. Things like screen washer bottles for the very common 390 tractors are no longer made by anyone. Or they weren’t a while back.
Popular tractor models that sold in their thousands of all brands are more likely to have more available parts than less popular models. That’s especially true for breakers/used/salvage parts, which will be the main source eventually for even popular models in their day.

In general it would be unusual not to be able to get reasonably priced parts for the big brands and big selling models. As stated, there are exceptions even within brands such as the 318 engine I mentioned, and presumably the earlier 300 engine found in combines also.

Tractor companies are not charities and if the demand is low for very old parts, at some point they will just cease to be made and any stock will run out.

Currently and hopefully only for the short term, there may be long delays for ‘available’ parts, due to the importation situation caused by you know what. Expect many spare parts prices, if not whole goods prices to a lesser extent, to rise sharply, and that isn’t taking into account the massive relative drop in the value of Sterling over recent times.