John Deere H tractors designed as low-cost option for farmers

DAVENPORT, Iowa — The goal for the John Deere H tractor was to offer a low-cost tractor to farmers.

“The H was the smallest tractor Waterloo made,” said Dan Price, who spoke at one of the workshops held during the Gathering of the Green biennial conference.

“The sales target for the H was $500,” said Price, who owns a John Deere Model H tractor acquired from the original owner in the mid-1970s. “Deere believed they needed a general purpose tractor that was smaller than the B and larger than the L.”

The engine on the H ran fairly fast at 1,400 RPM.

“It has three speeds and a foot accelerator pedal that when you pushed that down, you could increase the engine to 1,800 RPMs,” Price said.

“It was the only tractor made at the Waterloo plant that had the belt pulley/clutch on the camshaft instead of the crankshaft,” he said. “That meant the belt pulley ran backwards with respect to the crankshaft rotation.”

Four versions John Deere H tractors were made from December 1938 to February 1947 — H, HN, HWH and HNH.

“The model H is a standard tricycle front-end tractor and the HN has a single wheel front end,” Price said. “The HWH is a wide front end, high crop with 38-inch wheels and the HNH is a high crop, narrow front — a pretty rare tractor.”

The largest production month for H tractors occurred in April 1940, when 1,891 tractors were made at the Waterloo facility.

“The H had a couple of interruptions due to World War II material shortages,” Price said. “World War II really hit the H’s hard and after the war, the John Deere B was a more appropriate tractor for the farm.”

The John Deere H tractors were designed with several new features.

“It was the first tractor to use stamped steel rear wheels and the first tractor with live hydraulics,” Price said. “It was also the first tractor to have 18 millimeter spark plugs that became common for the As and Bs later.”

At the start of production, Price said, the first 104 tractors were built with cast iron crankshafts.

“It was determined they wouldn’t cut it so those tractors were put in storage and they continued production with forged steel crankshafts,” he said.

The first tractors were rebuilt and new serial numbers were issued to these tractors.

“They reworked the tractors in lots of 10 from late February to late March in 1939,” Price said.

“The power shaft was not available until March 1939 because they started making tractors before the parts were available,” he said. “The same way with fenders so by March they were available.”

In May 1939, the first visible change was made to the H tractor.

“The original drawbar had two z-shaped tabs and you could flip the drawbar to get a high or low hook-up,” Price said.

“For the new drawbar, they got rid of the z-shaped tabs,” he said. “Now the drawbar had two holes at the front so you could pull the drawbar in four inches or at the extended position it is at the same position as the original drawbar.”

In August 1939, front wheel weights became available for the John Deere H.

“One of the interesting changes happened when the flywheel grew from 16 1/4 inches to 17 1/4 inches in diameter,” Price said.

The change in the flywheel is an example of forward and backward compatibility.

“If a part changed but you could fit it on the older tractors, they did not introduce a new part number,” Price said. “So, if a person is interested in correct restoration, you must be really careful.”

A slew of major changes occurred on the H tractors in October 1939, which was the beginning of the 1940 model year.

“One of the changes went on all the tractors,” Price said. “A paper oil filter replaced the old brass mesh oil filters.”

The 1941 production was the largest production year for the H when John Deere made 14,443 tractors.

“There was a mid-year change starting with serial number 27,000,” Price said. “That’s when electrics were introduced and it was a big deal with 278 new part numbers.”

Production of the H tractors stopped in April 1942 due to World War II.

“Twelve months later, they started the 1943 production, but only 885 units were built, which was the smallest production year for the H,” Price said.

War caused production of the H tractors to stop again in September 1943 until October 1944.

“During that time they had been redesigning the tractor,” Price said. “Now we have replacement of the cast iron front wheels to stamped steel front wheels.”

The last John Deere H tractor was built at the Waterloo plant in February 1947.

“The H was a bare bones tractor,” Price said. “Anything other than the drawbar and tires were an extra price through the whole production run.”