Many equipment dealerships offer annual inspections of tractors, combines, planters and other big-ticket machinery. For a flat fee, a dealership mechanic checks all aspects of the machine, then gives its owner a list of suggested repairs.
Some farmers value annual inspections. Others consider them a rip-off and a waste of money. Here are my experiences and opinion.
After college I spent 15 years as the equipment manager for a large corporate farm. We had a nice shop and employees who were excellent mechanics. Aside from complete engine and transmission overhauls, we did our own repairs. We were confident we could check machines for leaks, cracks and worn components and the mechanics at the local dealership could do the same. Our machinery costs were consistently below Iowa State University’s annual average estimate of machinery cost per acre.
Circumstances changed, and I’ve spent the past 30 years as a mechanic at a large farm equipment dealership. I admit, because of my on-farm experience, I did my first inspection of a combine with extreme confidence. I’d checked all the belts, found a couple loose bearings and spotted some worn sprockets. I’d checked everything I’d ever seen go wrong with a combine.
Then a veteran tech wandered past the machine, paused and asked, “Did you check the half-moon keys inside the variable-speed feederhouse sheaves?”
“Umm … half-moon keys … inside the feederhouse sheaves …?
“Yeah, and the wooden bearing block under the cab that supports the inner end of the upper tailings elevator auger?”
“Umm … not yet …”
He nodded and walked away. Message delivered, lesson learned.
An average farmer is familiar with fixing the breakdowns they’ve seen on their machines. Dealership mechanics are familiar with problems they’ve seen on dozens, maybe hundreds, of machines. Plus, the dealership gets service bulletins from the equipment manufacturer about known or developing problems on machines reported by mechanics across the country.
Prevention vs. Repair
Annual inspections are by nature nit-picky. The goal is to find every potential problem, from damaged decals to coolant in the engine oil sample.
We don’t expect the machine’s owner to have us fix everything we point out. We just want customers to be aware of things that could be fixed. It’s entirely up to the customer whether they take the machine home and fix all or some of the problems themselves, whether we fix all or some of the problems, or whether they decide, “It’ll run another year.”
The big thing is we don’t want the machine to break down in the field. Preventing breakdowns is as much a part of our job as repairing breakdowns. .
