EVERYBODY NEEDS A SPOOL TRACTOR!

By Norris Chambers

Back in the old days we made a lot of toys. I reckon one of the most popular was the spool tractor. The materials were readily available because all you needed was an empty spool, a rubber band, a slab of soap and two matches. The construction was quite simple. Take the spool and cut notches along both edges to provide traction over rough terrain. This also makes it look a little like the old tractors with the steel lugs on the wheels. A notch is cut across one end of the spool for the match to hold the rubber band that is placed through the center of the spool. On the other end of the spool the rubber band goes through a hole in a thin piece of soap that has been rounded to size a little smaller than the spool end. A full match, or other stick, is placed through the rubber band.
When you wind up the full match the rubber band is knotted inside the spool. The short match on the other end keeps it from turning and lets it wind up. After a few turns, you can place it on a surface and the rubber band will unwind. The long match presses against the surface and causes the spool to move along slowly, like a tractor.
The purpose of the soap is to provide a smooth bearing that permits the unwinding. If the soap is too dry or too rough, it might not unwind properly. If it is too slippery, the tractor will go wild and turn a few flips. A longer stick than the match will help to stabilize it if it tries to go too fast.
Clifton and I were hunting one day when we saw an abandoned cable spool that some drilling operation had discarded. This spool was about 18 inches wide and probably about two feet in height. It looked a lot like a regular spool. There was a hole through the center about two inches in diameter. Of course we immediately thought of a spool tractor.
Clifton had the first idea. “We could use a bicycle inner tube for the rubber band and a thin willow stick for the match.”
I agreed that it sounded like a lot of fun to build.
“We might even find a good use for it,” he suggested. We couldn’t think of anything at the time, but decided to build it.
We rolled it about a mile and pushed it into the blacksmith shop. We thought we could build about anything in the shop and we didn’t lose any time getting started. We quickly made a notch on one end with a wood chisel. A little work with sand paper got the other end smooth so the soap would turn on the wood. A saw soon made the v-notches in the round ends. The soap presented more of a problem. We found an old round hoop off of a keg about eight or ten inches in diameter and about two inches wide. We borrowed several chunks of lye soap from the smoke house and melted it. We poured it in the hoop and leveled it off. When it cooled we had a beautiful round soap slab. We cut a three inch hole in the middle.
A short willow stick, a bicycle inner tube and a longer willow stick completed the operation. The bicycle tube was long enough for us to double it and thread it through the hole in the spool. Our tractor was finished. The next thing was to take it outside for a test run.
We placed it on end and turned the long stick around and around, winding the rubber tube. After many turns we had it double knotted and ready to go. We straightened it up, holding on to the stick to keep it from unwinding. If we had turned it loose it might have slapped us around quite a bit. After pointing it toward the barnyard we turned it loose.
The contraption moved a few feet and slowed to a crawl. The trouble was quickly diagnosed as a bearing problem. The soap wasn’t slick enough to permit a quick unwind of the tube.
“I’ll get a little water and loosen it up a little,” Clifton volunteered. He came back with a small can and poured a little water between the spool and the soap. The machine started moving and was rapidly gaining speed. It was soon evident to us that it was out of control. We tried to catch it and slow it down, but it was too fast. Before we could do anything it hit a setting hen pen. Setting hen pens were just a wooden frame with net wire covering it. There was no bottom on the pens so they could be easily moved for cleaning. Setting hens were kept there until they gave up and were returned to the free range. The runaway tractor climbed over it, kicking it backward and throwing it upside down when it went down on the opposite side. Old clucking setting hens scattered in every direction.
And that wasn’t all! It continued a short distance and hit the low hog pen fence. That fence was also net wire, and the tractor lugs climbed that fence also. This scared the four hogs almost out of their wits. Then the thing turned over on its end with the long willow stick on top, spinning around like a merry-go-round and bouncing up and down banging the hogs in every direction. I never knew hogs could make so much noise. The old setting hens hadn’t calmed down any.
My mother came running out of the house to see what calamity had befallen the chickens and hogs. It took some patient explaining to get her to see the importance of our tractor experience. Actually, I’m not sure we ever did. We parked the nice tractor and postponed any more tests to a future date.
I’m not sure if this tale has a moral. Just be careful with your spool tractors!