Ryan McEvoy Restores Old Tractor

DCHS Journalism

by Cindy Murray and Danyel Jeffrey

April 27, 2008

She may be 66 years old, but she looks good now!

Junior Ryan McEvoy has totally redone a 1942 Allis-Chalmers C tractor. He got the tractor from Buss Wurm, after trading in one of his own.

The tractor had nothing that worked on it; "It didn’t run, it was missing pieces, and it had broken parts," said Ryan.

According to Ryan, the radiator leaked, and it also had no rear wheels. It had tons of dents, rusted sheet metal, bad bearings, and it also had oil and gasket leaks.

To redo the tractor, Ryan said he had to completely disassemble it, clean, repair, or completely replace certain pieces. He had to wipe, brush, and sandblast the sheet metal, and he had to repaint it. The original color and the new color are the same, Allis-Chalmers orange.

AFTER! Nathan Baker, Logan Fortin and John Meitl take Ryan's "new" tractor out for a test drive. Photo by Brian Simonsson

Ryan said he will be taking the refurbished tractor to antique tractor shows. "It does not have a major functional purpose," said Ryan. "It was just for fun.”

Ryan has been working on this tractor since the beginning of the school year, but still has “a few odds and ends to finish up.” However, the majority of the project is finished.

“I needed a project for Ag Mechanics, and I had always wanted to restore an old tractor," said Ryan. "When my dad found this one, I thought it would be a good one to start with since it did not have a lot of pieces to lose, and it was in too good of shape to throw in the junk."

"My dad has helped restore multiple tractors before, so he helped me out a lot," he added.