Shannon Valley Group, the civil engineering contractor run by Mick English, has bought Ireland's first 552hp Fendt 1052. The 14-tonne tractor was supplied by Dublin-based dealer Farmworks Machinery, which said the 1052 is the largest Fendt in the country.
Mr English, who is from Co. Leitrim and has 35 years of earthmoving experience, said the machine is a massive tractor when seen in the flesh.
Engine and output
The 1052 is powered by a 12.4-litre, six-cylinder MAN engine producing 2,650Nm of torque. That output was one of the main reasons Mr English moved up to the new model, having first seen it at Agritechnica.
The purchase follows a 1050 bought three years ago, which has now clocked 4,000 to 5,000 hours. "We are happy with it so we went for the new model," he said. The business has run Fendts for seven or eight years, he added, because "a Fendt is a Fendt".
Working duty and attachments
In service the 1052 will carry a 3.5t weight on the front and a 9t hybrid stone-crushing and soil-stabilisation machine on the rear.
Mr English said he takes the advice of the manufacturers of the equipment he runs. "No matter which one of them you speak to, they will all tell you to buy Fendt," he said. "Fendt is the Rolls-Royce. It's not our say; it's their say."
Not bought 'for show'
Large tractors are sometimes described as being bought for show, but the new owner disagrees. "That tractor is on her limit when you drop into the ground to mill limestone boulders and hard clays; the whole tractor gets pulled down," he said. "The more power you have, the easier it is on the tractor."
From Massey to Fendt
Mr English's family history with machinery stretches back decades. His father started in 1976 with a Massey 35 and then a Massey 165 — machines that came without the luxury of a cab. He remembers climbing onto the 165 at three years of age when it arrived into the yard, and jumping straight back off in tears at the noise when the throttle was pulled. The family still has those tractors.
He said that in the 1970s a Massey 165 was the equivalent of today's Fendt 1052 — "in Co. Leitrim, it was anyways". His father's 165 was a mark one model with round axles and a small Perkins 203 engine.
Buying new machines runs in the family: his father started the business in London in 1966, where he bought brand-new JCB 3C diggers, and moved it back to Leitrim in 1970 along with the JCBs and other equipment.
Today Shannon Valley Group runs more than 200 diggers, including a 75t Hitachi Zaxis 690-7 bought in 2020, which at the time was the first of its kind sold in Europe.
Mr English said he will "probably buy another Fendt 1052 next year as well".