> Farming equipment was built ruggedly in those days, and it was simple enough that you can keep fixing and patching and welding it up almost indefinitely.
Interesting thing about the little old tractors, they were generally just the engine & transmission, with a seat stuck on top of the transmission and wheels attached. No real body or frame to speak of, it was all drivetrain. See this pic for an example: https://cdn1.mecum.com/auctions/gf0311/gf0311-103923/images/...
I am using little Japanese tractor (Kubota) built in 80s on my farm. There is thriving industry importing those directly from Japan. They are very simple, there is basically no electronics, everything could be repaired by hammer and will last lifetime. Only downside is that even 25 years old tractor is still more expensive then my car, but it is still worth it.
If somebody want to improve the world and help poorest they should just invent ways to produce those inexpensively and sell them in poor areas. Productivity will skyrocket.
Even modern large tractors, save articulating ones, have pretty much the same basic design. Granted, now you get a nice comfortable cab instead of a hunk of metal to sit on.
I grew up on a farm in the 60's, before the era of AC and GPS controlled tractors. Most everything was fixable on the farm with a pretty minimal tool chest
As far as tractors go, the primary function is localization for automatic steering and other function automation (raising an implement on the headlands, for instance), and, especially in older systems, simply being aware of where you have already crossed the field.
Once you attach an implement, then there are all kinds of other functions that it may be used for, like variable rate application. In harvesting applications, there are systems where the combine can take over control of the grain cart tractor while unloading on the go to make sure it stays in the right spot, again localized via GPS. The combine itself will also map the crop yields by its location, and of course automatic steering like the tractors have.
With RTK these tractors can achieve centimetre accuracy and repeatability which opens the door for all kinds of possibilities.
Plowing, planting, fertilizer and picking can be done within inches. A farmer can now plan on the contours of the land and the tractor can steer. This allows for higher yields and better land usage.
Not to say that plowing, etc isn't exciting work, but with the tractor doing most of the work, you can rock out to tunes in your AC environment. When they install the GPS steering, there is a free minifridge. :-)
Interesting thing about the little old tractors, they were generally just the engine & transmission, with a seat stuck on top of the transmission and wheels attached. No real body or frame to speak of, it was all drivetrain. See this pic for an example: https://cdn1.mecum.com/auctions/gf0311/gf0311-103923/images/...