Oops! I've Bought A Tractor

Alan Barnes talks to a man who made an accidental purchase.

It is quite likely that when it was new the Ford began its days with the Council cutting grass in parks and roadside verges and today, over 30 years later, 

The tractor, which had been used earlier in the week to top the grass in Ray’s paddock at his home in Meopham in Kent, is a highly original machine with the bare minimum of restoration work having been carried out since he bought it in 2008.

Ray recalled: “It was not a model I had ever considered adding to my small collection of tractors and when I went along to the sale at a farm in Kent I was actually more interested in some of the other bits and pieces which were on offer. During the course of the sale, which I attended with my nephew Dennis Belton, we had successfully bid on several lots and these had been loaded on the trailer in readiness for the journey home.

“The farm tractors were among the last of the items to be sold on the day and Dennis and I very nearly left before they were auctioned. While Dennis was checking that everything on the trailer was secure I wandered back to the auction to watch the proceedings. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending the tractor is still being used to cut grass” observed Ray Cleggett during my visit to see his 1982 Ford 334 Highways Tractor. on your view I suppose, I stood next to the Ford as the sale progressed. Some of the tractors were attracting some reasonably high bids and I was not really tempted by any of them and anyway I had not gone to the auction with the intention of buying a tractor.