Monday, April 1, 2019

Shaw Du-All Model N 8 Garden Tractor

What did Elgin watches  and this Du-All tractor have in common? Answer: Stanley Wilbur Shaw.




Shaw was another of those talented tinkerers that seemed to be everywhere in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Legend has it that he built his first steam engine at an early age, but said legend doesn’t elaborate on how successful or practical that engine turned out to be. By the dawn of the Twentieth Century he was operating a watchmaker’s  shop in Galesburg, Kansas where he sold Elgin watches and a couple of other brands. In 1902 he developed a gasoline engine and by 1903 he had established Shaw Manufacturing Company to build them. In 1905 he patented a small gas engine to convert a bicycle into a motorbike. The conversion kit met with a degree of success and he sold 13,000 of them. 




Stanley plowed much of the profit back into his company and expanded the engine line to include air and water cooled stationary and marine engines. In 1908 the Shawmobile entered the  rapidly expanding automobile marketplace. 1923 saw the introduction of a conversion kit to turn the farmer’s Model T Ford into a tractor. Conversion kits were still being offered in an ad placed in Popular Mechanics magazine in February 1932. The ad copy read in part, “Make a tractor from your old car.” and “Anyone can attach Shaw equipment quickly and easily using only a monkey wrench and a screwdriver. You don’t have to be a mechanic.”




Now we get to the meat and gravy part of the story. In 1928 Shaw Manufacturing offered a motorized lawn mower. Sometime around 1932 or 33 a walk behind cultivator and a garden tractor version called “The Happy Gardener Du-All” was introduced. This developed into the walk-behind D series that was available in five horsepower ratings; D2, D3, D4, D5 and 2D5, the number corresponding to the horsepower. Briggs & Stratton provided the motive power for all models which proved to be a good thing for Briggs because Shaw Mfg. was ordering a boxcar load of engines per week. 




1938 saw the introduction of the riding tractor version with the RD model available in 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 horsepower options, designated as RD3 etc. The Du-All tractor line lived up to its name with a full line of accessories being available. Attachments included: sprayers, a 12” moldboard plow, 20” disc plow, 10” X 16” disc harrow, cultivators, 5 ft. cutter bar, 6 ft. cutter bar, 10’ hay rake, bulldozer blade, trailers, potato diggers, hydraulics for attachments like loaders and power saws. There is even a photo in the 1953 catalogue of a Du-All pulling an  8’ International Harvester Combine. 




So where does the Model N 8 fit in this picture? The short answer is,  I don’t have a clue. The only reference to it that I could find was a very brief comment on smokstak.com that the original power source was a Briggs 23 8 hp. Engine. There is no mention of an N model in the 1953 Du-All  catalog provided courtesy of oldirongardentractors which by the way, is a site worth visiting by anyone interested in these tractors. 




According to David Beattie in his Gas Engine Magazine article, Shaw sold the company to Bush Hog in 1962 and Bush Hog discarded a large portion of the information that was then available  about Du-All products. N 8 documents may well have been among the victims of this purge.  If anyone can provide more information, your comments would be welcome.




The N 8 shown here was exhibited at the 2018 Steam Expo in Cumming, Ga. No information was displayed about this tractor. To learn more about the show that will be held on Nov. 8, 2019 visit : www.capa-ga.com . 




Sources:

www.gasenginemagazine.com  Shaw Manufacturing Company History by David Beattie , Aug / Sept. 1997 
https://oldirongardentractors.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/shaw-catalog-no-25-compressed.pdf 
www.smokstak.com 
Books.google.com Popular Mechanics Feb. 1932 P. 141 


1 comment:

  1. Great info. I’ve had this 8hp du-all since I was about 12. I’m now 73! My uncle bought it with a drive issue which he fixed easily. Over the years it was mine to use. What a work horse & loads of fun. I just took it from storage and within the next few weeks will start a restoration. Your info will provide great input for a product bio. I hope to bring it to a couple shows next year.

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