13th January

One of the first jobs I had to take a look at as soon as we got back after the Christmas holidays, was to take a look at the auld Fergie tractor.

This tractor is over 55 years old and works every day, it will do more work through the year than the big John Deere tractor does.

But just before Christmas I was out harvesting beetroot with the Fergie and on the way in it lost power, it was only running on two of its 3 cylinders.

So last week I changed all the filters, took of the diesel tank and checked the filter inside the tank, checked the fuel pump filters and it was still running poorly.

The last simple thing to check was if it had a stuck injector, but they are all ok.

But it is now blowing oil out of the dipstick, that is really bad, and will either require an engine re build or a replacement engine.

The poor auld Fergie’s engine has retired.

The other problem this causes, is that we are really needing it at the moment with all the jobs lining up. I can’t do the drainage without the Fergie pulling the trailer, we also need it to resheet the tunnels and we are away to start blocking soon.

So I have been looking at some second-hand compact tractors to get us going, and will probably put the Fergie aside for the time being, and sort it later in the year.