ploughmaster

It is indeed, excellent. It gets bigger every year. There are over 800 tractors on show this year, most of them under cover, with various displays of farming tools, model/toy layouts and a large numbers of trade stands. Very good day out. Here are one or two of the tractors:

NB. This is the catalogue of 2010 North American releases

It was made by Yaxon, usually found matched up to a 1/43 scale MF 1134:http://www.carmodel.it/zoomPage.php?MjI5NDc8Oj4wPDo+YWRkVG9DYXJ0KCdUVUZUVTBWWklFWkZVa2RWVTA5T1BEcytUVkpETFMxaGJHd3RNQzB6TUMweExRPT0nLCcnLCAnJywgJycsJycsICdhZGQtMS0yMjk0NycsICcwJyk= They also made an Acrobat Rake with red finger wheels which was very similar to the Britains one.

It amazes me how flagging up a couple of apparent errors on what is supposed to be a model (not a toy) can be regarded as nit picking, but when a certain other mainstream manufacturer (Britains) makes a similar error on a toy, we see a string of post moaning and whingeing about it. It seems it's OK to make unreasonable criticism of Britains, but "thou shalt not criticise the almighty Imber". Jeez, if this had been made by Britains, I know full well that certain people would have ripped it to shreds, regardless (and you would probably be one of them). If this is supposed to be a model rather than a toy (and even at £45, it would be expensive as purely a toy), I think it needs to be right. That is my opinion, and I have every right to express it, without being stoned to death or burnt at the stake for it. It has already been stated that the wheels are being looked at for the full production version, so that isn't a problem, is it? As I said in a previous post, it looks extremely good from the pictures, but, for me it isn't perfect. Now get off my back.

Not at all. This has been a major cause of complaint against other manufacturers by a significant number of people on this forum, even where the base model is correct for all the variations depicted. Or is this just another hypocritical case of one rule for them and another for these??? This is precisely my point. The majority of collectors are not rolling in money, and will quickly lose interest in a brand that overdoes it with one model - you only have to look at the regular criticism of the string of colour and decal changes on the likes of UH, Siku and Ertl/Britains.

You are quite right, the surrounds were indeed matt dark grey. However the ones on the model appear to be light grey, which is the wrong colour! I'm pleased to hear that, I thought it would be a preproduction thing

They certainly look good from the pictures, and very good for that price, although I don't see how they can be profitable at that (especially bearing in mind the limited runs), unless they are going to produce an endless number of variations, which I hope they are not intending doing. Constant redecals on the same model is one of the prominent and recurring whinges being constantly directed at Ertl/Britains, so we certainly don't want a repeat with these. The only two points that I pick out from the pictures (I haven't seen the real things), is the splayed front wheels on the 2 wheel drive version, and the headlight surrounds being the wrong colour (which I asked about in an earlier post). Hopefully they are just pre-production models and both faults will be rectified before release. If the production version is like that, then I consider it unacceptable on such a model.

They may not be what you want, but their volume of sales suggests that they are what a very large number of people do want. If you don't want them, don't buy them. Ertl won't go bust - they are the biggest player in the marketplace.

The new range of Case combines have different panelwork from the old AFX and so the new model is a new moulding to take account of this, as are the new balers. I think some folk have to wake up to the fact the 'Britains' does not exist any more. It is simply a brand name that Ertl use in Europe, so it should not be any surprise that we get the same items as ertl sell in the US. As for being 'older' Ertl, there is nothing in that list of that type. They are all either new mouldings (Case combine) or new decals(JD8R) to both sides of the Atlantic, or Europe releases of recent US introductions (such as the CVX). Neither the Toy Farmer Steiger, nor its equivalent the FW60 have yet been released in the US Ertl range, so we've had that one first. When you look back historically, Ertl have always been prolific issuers of redecalled toys (some of them being the wrong decal for the toy - the 16th scale MF3650 springs to mind - it was actually a 3070 with a 3650 decal ). They have now discontinued the use of the Britains name on US releases altogether, so who knows? This of course is exactly the case. The biggest market is North America, where 16th and 64th outnumber 32nd by a wide margin. Consequently, Ertl dominate the toy tractor market. Regarding implements, the simple truth is that they do not sell terribly well compared to tractors (I think the ratio is about 8:1). They are not financially attractive for Ertl to make (and in any case, Ertl never have been big on implements), so unless an OEM comes forward with a proposal (and probably the development cash), we probably won't get much.

I think you have to undertand that without a high level of sales in the US, they are not viable on European sales alone.

Why is the headlight surround incorrectly painted silver??

Those are very nice indeed. Certainly very rare, and as you say Andy, they were promotional models available only from New Holland dealers. If I remember correctly, I think they were made by Bourbon? The combine is based on the Clayson 1550 from the mid 1970's. The 1550 and 1540 were the only two combines in the range that had that shape of grain tank/engine bay side panels. The 1520, 1530 and 1545 had flat side panels. I have a vague memory that there was another version of the combine with a 'Clayson' decal on the tank sides instead of 'New Holland', but I may be wrong? Maybe someone else could confirm? I have only ever seen one - it was for sale on G&M's table at Spalding in 1989 for £125 unboxed.

I don't think it is a case of being sidelined. If there was a demand for them they will sell. As they keep hanging aound for some time (several years in the case of the STX), and then have to be cleared out cheap, I tend to feel that the demand for them may not be that great. I recall at the time, Ertl basically dumped a lot of the first JD 8400 on Europe because they didn't sell as well as expected in the US.

That tends to be my feeling also. Of the seven 32nd precisions that Ertl have produced, at least five of them were remaindered and sold off at a greatly reduced price (I think the two versions of the JD 8400 were remaindered as well as the ones you mention), which suggests to me that perhaps they are not actually that popular in 32nd.

It is certainly correct to say that the manufacturers have designed their nozzles to work at at a given height and pressure, but the reason they are designed like that is because that is the optimum height and pressure for effective application without exposing the operation to significant drift. There is only a certain amount of scope for altering pressures and nozzle height without compromising performance of the active ingredient. This is one reason that it is increasingly common to change to different types of nozzle for different pesticides - the old days of spraying everything with one nozzle type and all at the same volume have long gone. The reason the change from the old 80 degree fan nozzles to 110 degrees was made primarily to allow the reduction in optimum boom height to around 50cm, precisely because many of the modern pesticides require application as a medium or fine quality spray, and the smaller droplet sizes are more vulnerable to drift. Research (by Syngenta in particular) has shown that drift starts to increase dramatically when the nozzle height increases to more than 70cm above the crop, regardless of droplet size/pressure/nozzle type. This is the reason for the 50cm optimum designed into most nozzles. This is where, in my opinion, very wide booms become impractical, as it is difficult if not impossible to maintain a low enough boom height to avoid significant drift - particularly on undulating ground (and most farms prepare such rough seedbeds nowadays which makes it even worse). Modern automatic boom height controllers help, but due to damping of boom movement, struggle to react anywhere near quickly enough to cope (particularly at the high speeds that many sprayers are expected to travel at now - 18km/h is fast becoming the norm). The problem isn't helped by the fact that most farms are grossly under capacity when it comes to sprayers. Most have used bigger sprayers, wider booms and faster spraying speeds to reduce staff, rather than to allow them to keep more on top of the job and avoid having to spray in doubtful conditions. Indeed, I frequently see sprayers working in wholly unacceptable wind conditions, and unless the industry wakes up and mends its ways, we will end up with huge buffer zones and strict weather restrictions being imposed upon us. For wheat growers, as a rule of thumb (from Syngenta research), you should be able to cover your wheat area in 3 to 4 days at most to get both optimum timing and avoid unsuitable weather conditions. I would hazard a guess that not many large arable farms are actually well enough equipped or well enough organised to achieve anywhere near that!

That is an extremely nice set, and in a box that I doubt can be bettered. And the rarer spud lug variation of the 'Power Major' version too - something I have only seen mint boxed once in 20 years (and unfortunately couldn't afford it at the time).

I bet you did, especially at that price! I didn't even see it. I do sometimes wonder if eBay search restricts who can see what - I do a search every day for both newly listed and ending soonest, and that one definately didn't show up in either I've noticed it happen before on a number of occassions.

The 980, having been deleted last year, is probably about sold out, and the US dealer edition CR9080 which came out last autumn would have been a short production run so may have about sold out too. Whether the rumoured new release will appear later this year, your guess is as good as mine

Well that certainly shows up the difference in colour very clearly. Another one to add to my list \

The most noticeable thing in the last 3 or 4 years is the ridiculously wide booms that seem to be all the rage. In the space of three years I went from using 12m to 24m, and then, with a change of job to 30m. Now there are 40m+ around. My own opinion is that anything over 24m is not really practical. Even at 24, it is very difficult to keep the boom at a constant height across its width. Coupled with uneven seedbeds and undulating fields, this in turn makes it well near impossible to keep to the optimum 50cm above the crop, thus creating problems of drift. As you go to wider and wider booms, the problem becomes worse (unless you can achieve a bowling green level seedbed). Even self levelling systems struggle to work effectively with 30m+ widths (and drift only increases slightly up to around 70cm above the crop, but beyond this, drift doubles for every 10cm increase in boom height according to trials done by Syngenta). Eliminating drift has to be the number one priority for the future - otherwise we will end up with unworkable restrictions being imposed on spraying near houses (a very big exclusion zone is one threat hanging over us) I don't think there is a lot to choose between manufacturers nowadays, Househam, Bateman and Sands seem to be very well thought of, but my opinion of Chafer has been clouded by the appalling contraptions they produced a few years ago (I worked on one farm that ran a Chafer SSV - without a word of a lie, it broke down virtually every time it went out of the yard: blown wheel motor seals, burst hydraulic pipes, split hydraulic tank, decaying copper wire in the loom, broken springs, and to finish off, the top of the boom carrier broke away - all this in its first season). My recent experiences have been with Sands, (a manufacturer I had previously not thought much of), but I have to say all 3 machines I have used were well built, and pretty reliable - the back up was superb. The only big problems were with the first 30m one - they used the same frame and hinges as a 24m, and they wouldn't take the weight and kept cracking. The next machine had a much beefier frame and hinges (also used on their 36m boom), and were much better.

I don't think there was an 1135 special edition, I have never seen or heard of one. The box sounds like the one that was shown for the special edition 3185 in the 2002 catalogue (edit: just been and checked and the silver box shown in the catalogue does have '1135' on it - I hadn't noticed it before ), but that box was never released. In the end, the actual collectors editions were not released until 2003. They did make a protype of the 3185 in silver chrome as well as one in gold chrome and G&M had both those prototypes on display at their autumn open weekend in late September 2002. In the end Britains didn't produce the silver chrome version of the Fastrac, but used the silver chrome on the 1CX.

Well done that man The brighter colour is much clearer in that picture than the one on eBay. I'm not sure that it necessarily came with the Ford though - that may just be how he has displayed them (for instance: the yellow version in the middle is the Macau made version that came in the JCB Fastrac set, not with a Ford). Now!......who has the deepest pockets? \

You have to draw a line in the sand somewhere There was a limit to what could be included in the book and a system of defining what constituted a Britains tractor had to be devised. The scope of the book is for the tractors that were marketed and packaged under the Britains brand, or, in the case of US issues, the dual Ertl - Britains branding. The Britains logo has never appeared on any of the packaging for the precision models, and so do not count as a Britains model, thus they were not included. The Toy Farmer/National Farm Toy Show did carry the dual branding of Ertl - Britains on the packaging, added to which, several of those models were also issued in the Britains range in their own right (with different decals, wheels or other features and in standard Britains packaging). That situation has now been complicated of course - since last year, Ertl no longer use the Britains logo on any US issue Ertl packaging, but those models are included for completeness. David has actually explained this on page 6 under 'Book Scope and Layout' You will also find a small number of versions which are not listed seperately, but are mentioned under the 'parent' model (Gold Chrome versions for example). There are also Loader versions not included where the tractor was also available without one (eg Renault Cergos and MF 6140HV where the tractor and model number were the same for both loader and non loader versions)

Except that the rear dump body was coloured plastic, rather than paint, and it also was a similar shade that was used for the Twose transport box and the re issue of the Grays buck rake. I think you may find they were a similar shade of green to the Deutz tractor (but the Deutz trailer was significantly darker)

I'm not sure that Britains 'lost out'. If you look back over the Siku and Britains ranges over the last 25 years, you will find several examples of both companies producing a toy/model of the same make, or even same machine: Renault 145-14, JCB Fastrac, New Holland 35 series, Deutz-Fahr DX92/DX4.70, Massey 7200 series combines for a start (originally, Britains were also going to make a Fendt version too). At the same time as Siku were preparing their Claas Lexion 480, Britains also were rumoured to have a Lexion pencilled in for production, but it sadly didn't appear.