Now that this is on the second page, I can add a bit. Mark, you're saying what I remember about the electrics and hydraulics on the small frame tractors. My first Cat training, 2 days after I started with the dealer, had a hydraulics class. The first thing the instructor said was "we know the hydraulics suck", or something like that. That impressed me as I've always experienced, how can I say this, "careful bulls**t" in order to dance around problems.

I think their deal with NH prevented them from doing wholesale changes to solve the problem. So, you ended up with three or four updates on the valve stack in three years, trying to make them work better on air seeders and the like. It was always "fix as fail", so I tried to make sure all the tractors we sold had failures to get the updates, even if the current owner was happy. Going to the parallel flow valve stack and the updated compensator should have addressed most multi-function problems. While avoiding the priority valve was a work-around (I used to put wing-fold or something on that valve to keep it from stopping flow to the other systems), it wasn't ideal to leave that valve alone when it had the best lever position. If only they had addressed the difficult flow rate adjustments in a better fashion.

And yes, the number one reason one of those tractors would stop moving in the field was the wire being pulled off one of the sensors. It didn't always happen, just often enough to annoy you.