Substantiating Day of '39 H Manufacture

[Kelly in tx]

Here's my research (from Wisconsin Historical Society Digital Collection):
Farmall H manufacturing began July 21, 1939
Three H's were made in July of 1939
On Tuesday, August 1, 1939 serial number 504 was produced (FBH 504)
On Friday, September 1, 1939 serial number 1346 was produced (FBH 1346)
That seems to be 842 H's made in August (20 work days) or about 40 H's produced each day.
My serial number 1315 seems to me to have been produced on Thursday, August 31, 1939.
This may be incorrect, but it is the best calculation I've been able to come up with.
kelly

 

[redforlife]

You know the song 'that's my story, and I'm sticking to it'??? Sometimes you just got to go with the research you can find and call it good.

Sounds like you made a really fair presumption to me though.

I got an F-20 with a serial number real close to the paint change in 36. I don't think it was the last gray one or first red one, but serial number puts it fairly close to when that change happened (just going by production numbers for that year). I sandblasted and painted it red. It was red before, but had gray underneath the red. I actually think it was one of the last grays. It was traded back into dealership when not very old, and I'm thinking the dealership painted it red which was common for them to do after the paint change occurred at the factory and the new ones were red.

 

[shaun wallace]

Did International have line that just ran Hs and one that ran Ms and lines for other models available at that time or did they run random models useing convective serial numbers and just change model numbers on same line ?

 

[Crazy Horse]

I'm not suggesting you do this but I sure would. I'd park it and try to forget all about what day it was built. In the scheme of things it's reallyl just another Farmall H and likely no more valuable than most others in the same condition.

 

[DR. EVIL]

I worked at THE FARMALL PLANT from October 1976 to December 11, 1981. ALL the 86-series tractors ran down the single assembly line in a mixed order, two assembly lines, the Start Line and the FINISH line. When they pulled the 686 off the main line they built them in an area by the west tractor shipping dock. The 4100, 4166, 4156 and 4166 series were built there too starting on a pair of heavy steel saw horses.
I've seen pictures of tractors going down the assembly line in the H & M Era and it looked like both models went in mixed order down the same line. The H & M being so much simpler than a 1486, the assembly line was shorter, it ended where the Start assembly line ended. Tractors in the 66 & 86 series Era went through a repair loop hanging off hooks from an overhead rail system. Tractors were released from repair in random order, the branch & region order number was broadcast to the finish line and the tire room so the proper tires & wheels could be mounted and ready to install by the end of the finish line. The tractors had no sheet metal on them when they came off the start line, that all got installed on the finish line. If you saw pictures of the FARMALL PLANT the finish line ended right about where the Huge water tower was located along the South drive. They had a fleet of Hydro tractors, Hydro 186, Hydro 100, Hydro 1066's they picked up the front ends of new tractors with their 3-pt hitches and pulled them to the west yard and parked them. 2+2's were built in the building further west of the water tower and had to be driven to the west yard.

 

[BarnyardEngineering]

(quoted from post at 11:43:51 09/07/23) Did International have line that just ran Hs and one that ran Ms and lines for other models available at that time or did they run random models useing convective serial numbers and just change model numbers on same line ?

However they came down the line, each model had its own set of serial numbers starting at 501, and incrementing one for each tractor of that model that came through.

If you look at the serial number records the numbers diverge too much over the years for them to have been numbering them any other way.