GTtalk's Featured Tractor of the Month for January 2012!

The time was November of 2010, I had decided to get a snowblower, I started to look around and Found a Ford LGT145 that was pretty nice it had a nice blower attached and was going to be perfect for my application. So, I went to look at it and was pretty impressed. At the same time another tractor a Case 224 showed up on Craigslist about 2 hours from my house...so I did what any normal red blooded American would do I went to the tractor forums and asked a 'general' question. I only had a couple of photos of the two tractors they were downloaded from Craigslist. Since I wasn't really a regular I didn't know what to expect.



Within about a half hour of the post I got a Private message telling me to 'take the photos off the site' and to go get the tractor no matter what. The guy explained to me that there were collectors that would and I quote "Throw their mothers under a bus for that tractor", and if I bought it and didn't like it he would drive up from KY and double my purchase price for it. I live in NWest Ohio. I am like What? for a Garden Tractor? Simply did not make any sense to me...



So I then thought let me see...what my buddy 'Google' has to say about all of this since I didn't know much about the topic. and at the time the GW McGrew company wrote and I quote "Very rare 1974 Case torq 224 tractor with 48” mower deck. Tractor is all original but is rough, features a high torq orbital drive motor on the transaxle. Is one of three total Case torq tractors known to exist and one of only two Case 224 torq tractors." (Mine was unknown at this time, and as it turns out mine is in the best original condition of all!)



This peaked my interest, I called the man at once and talked with him about the tractor. He said it was sold to him very cheaply by his neighbor who bought it new in 1974 from a local dealer. He said his son had been cutting his grass for about 15 years or so using his own tractor so the Case tractor has been sitting in the barn covered. When he told his neighbor he was going to buy a tractor to cut grass because his was broke...the neighbor said 'I have this one sitting in the barn, hasn't run in many years but was good whenever he needed it. So the guy bought it. Well he decided he wanted a loader tractor to to real digging' so he decided to sell this one. He had it up on Craigslist for since Halloween and had 2 inquiries both looking for big wheel tractors. He said it had a deck, a blower and chains with it, plus an extra generator.



I told him I would be up in the morning to look at it. So I looked at it and was amazed at its 'originality' and 'condition'. I decided to purchase it, actually because of the conversation with the internet guy...who subsequently he and I became friends, we exchanged numbers and he talked with me and put me in touch with 'other Case collectors'...After I purchased this tractor I had a conversation with no fewer than 3 collectors and I wasn't even home yet. Little did I know the best was just coming.



The guy couldn't get it started so he dropped the price by $50 :-). But I could see it was awesome. With the guidance of another Case collector it was determined that my tractor needed basic stuff...so I did the fuel lines, filter, cleaned the carb, flushed the tank, and my coil was bad. So 2 days later it was running. I mounted the snowcaster and the steering wheel was stripped which is why the snowcaster looked new. So I put on a new steering wheel. By the time the first substantive snowfall hit the tractor was ready.



Last year we had a lot of snow and I had fun on my new 'Torq'...in fact that little tractor has led to me owning 20+ tractors. I primarily use it for snow removal, although from time to time I use it to drag leaves from the backyard to the front.