Tractor Manufacturing: From Fordson Lines to ABB Cobots

Tractor manufacturing from Hart-Parr workshops and Fordson lines to welding robots and cobots at New Holland, and where ABB welding and paint robots fit.

INDUSTRIAL ROBOTICS

Chat With Robot

10/8/20265 min read

Tractor manufacturing has always been heavy work. Frames, axle housings, loader arms and cabs are thick steel, and a plant may build dozens of variants in small batches. That mix kept a lot of welding and painting in human hands long after car plants filled up with robots. This post looks at how tractors were built in the early 1900s, how the Fordson brought assembly lines, and how plants such as New Holland's Zedelgem works in Belgium are now moving from fixed welding robots to cobots. Along the way it covers where ABB welding, painting and collaborative robots fit.

A row of half built tractors with black cabs standing on stands along a long factory line
A row of half built tractors with black cabs standing on stands along a long factory line

Tractors taking shape on the main assembly line of the Minsk Tractor Works, Belarus, at its 2021 open day. Photo: Homoatrox / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

How the first tractors were built by hand

The first petrol tractors came out of small workshops. In 1892 John Froelich of Iowa put a gasoline engine on a running gear and used it to drive a threshing machine. A few years later Charles Hart and Charles Parr started building tractors in Charles City, Iowa, and their company is often credited with popularising the word "tractor". Machines such as the Hart-Parr 30-60 of 1916 were huge. Skilled fitters riveted and bolted each one together, and a single machine took a long time to finish.

A large old black tractor with big red spoked wheels and a Hart Parr nameplate in a museum
A large old black tractor with big red spoked wheels and a Hart Parr nameplate in a museum

A Hart-Parr 30-60 tractor, built by the Hart-Parr Gasoline Engine Company of Charles City, Iowa, in 1916. Photo: H. Zell / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Henry Ford changed the pace. His Fordson Model F went into production in 1917 as a light tractor made of cast iron sections bolted together without a separate frame, a design that suited assembly lines and large numbers. The first ones went to Britain, which needed to grow more food during the First World War. Ford also built a plant in Cork, Ireland, and its staff posed outside the factory in 1926. Cheap Fordsons quickly took a large share of the American market in the early 1920s.

Hundreds of workers standing in front of a factory building with a large Fordson sign
Hundreds of workers standing in front of a factory building with a large Fordson sign

The staff of Ford's Fordson tractor plant in Cork, Ireland, gathered outside the factory in 1926. Photo: unknown photographer via Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

After 1945 tractor plants grew into long conveyor lines. The Standard Motor Company built Ferguson's TE20 at Banner Lane in Coventry from 1946 and turned out hundreds of thousands of them. Engines, gearboxes and axles were machined in-house and assembled by teams of fitters, as in a 1974 photo of workers putting engines together at a tractor factory in Aleppo, Syria. Welders built frames and cabs by hand, and painters sprayed whole tractors in booths. For decades, automation in these plants meant conveyors, jigs and machine tools.

Men in work clothes fitting parts onto rows of red tractor engines on stands
Men in work clothes fitting parts onto rows of red tractor engines on stands

A team of workers assembling engines by hand at a tractor factory in Aleppo, Syria, 1974. Photo: unknown photographer via Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Welding robots and cobots on tractor plant floors

Robots reached farm machinery plants later than car plants, and welding was usually the first job they took. On 5 October 2026 Valor International reported from New Holland's plant in Zedelgem, Belgium, where Leon Claeys started making small machines in 1906 and built Europe's first self-propelled combine harvester, the Claeys MZ, in 1952. The CNH site now builds combines, balers and forage harvesters. About 3,000 people work there, and the plant turns out 16 combines, eight balers and three forage harvesters a day, which are shipped to 130 countries.

A wide factory hall with orange overhead rails and hoists above a line of tractor chassis
A wide factory hall with orange overhead rails and hoists above a line of tractor chassis

Overhead hoists and tractor chassis on the main assembly line of the Minsk Tractor Works during its 2017 open day. Photo: Homoatrox / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Plant director Stefaan Van De Walle told Valor that the first welding robots arrived in 1997, because workers are hard to find in Belgium, and that the plant is now moving to cobots. At least three robots move, cut and shape the steel sheets used in New Holland machines. The site received 150 million euros of investment from 2022 to 2025, and teams use a virtual reality room and 3D simulation to test designs before anyone builds a prototype. At the Minsk Tractor Works in Belarus, photos from open days in 2017 and 2021 show workers fitting tractors together along a long main assembly line.

A green tractor cab on a cart next to a line of tractor chassis in a factory
A green tractor cab on a cart next to a line of tractor chassis in a factory

A tractor cab waiting beside the main assembly line of the Minsk Tractor Works, 2021. Photo: Homoatrox / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

The Zedelgem report does not name ABB, though ABB robots do the same kinds of jobs. Arc welding robots such as the IRB 1520ID weld frames and brackets held on positioners that turn heavy parts, and the IRB 6700 can handle large steel parts or carry a spot welding gun. The GoFa CRB 15000 cobot with ABB's Cobot Arc Welding Package suits short batches, because a welder can guide the torch by hand to teach a seam, as our post on cobot welding explains. For finishing, the IRB 5500 paint robot is built to work in explosive paint booth air and can cover large surfaces such as cabs and hoods.

An orange ABB robot arm with a welding torch beside a large orange positioner holding a steel part
An orange ABB robot arm with a welding torch beside a large orange positioner holding a steel part

An ABB arc welding robot with a positioner that turns heavy steel parts. Photo: Ana 2016 / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Where tractor factories go next

Expect the number of variants to keep growing. Electric and autonomous tractors, new cab designs and machines built for specific crops all push plants toward short runs, and short runs are where cobots and quick reprogramming help most. Van De Walle said he would like to see more automation in the coming years to get higher quality and larger volumes. Simulation will matter here too, since welding and painting paths can be built and checked offline in RobotStudio before the first part is clamped.

A welder guiding the torch of a white ABB cobot arm over a welding table with clamps
A welder guiding the torch of a white ABB cobot arm over a welding table with clamps

ABB's GoFa Cobot Arc Welding Package on a welding table. Photo: ABB

Cost and safety are the open problems. A robot welding cell with a heavy positioner, fume extraction and guarding is a big purchase for a plant that builds many models in modest numbers. Cobots lower that barrier because they can share space with people, yet a cobot holding a welding torch still needs a risk assessment, screens against arc flash and fume control. Painting large tractor parts with robots also needs booths and conveyors big enough to take them, and every welding fixture has to be reworked when a frame design changes.

A row of tractor bodies with black cabs fitted standing along a bright factory line
A row of tractor bodies with black cabs fitted standing along a bright factory line

Tractors with their cabs fitted moving down the main assembly line of the Minsk Tractor Works, 2021. Photo: Homoatrox / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Skills may be the hardest part. Zedelgem already recruits widely, with people of 30 nationalities on its staff, and its director says workers are hard to find. Teaching a cobot by hand makes programming easier, but someone still has to judge weld quality and keep the cells running. Farmers will see the result in the tractor itself, in more consistent welds and longer lasting paint, and perhaps in shorter waits for machines that come in many versions.

Two orange ABB robot arms welding a long yellow steel frame with sparks flying
Two orange ABB robot arms welding a long yellow steel frame with sparks flying

ABB arc welding robots at work on a vehicle frame, from ABB's Robotic Arc Welding brochure. Photo: ABB

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