Cub Manuals on CD

[VinceD]

Has anyone had any experience with the Cub manuals on CD available on E-Bay? Is the quality good? Are they searchable? I would like to have a set on CD to go along with the traditional paper manuals and parts lists but don't want to waste my bucks on junk.

Your feedback would be appreciated. Thanks.

[jostev]

I think most of them come froms Rudi's manuals on his sight, people just copy them and sell them...

Johnny

[FarmLadyWannaB]

I have been wondering about that too--whether they are image files ( ) or searchable, paginated Adobe Acrobat files . If the former, they would be no easier to use than the scanned manuals on the web site. If the latter, and if it were a full collection, they would probably be worth the $17.

[John(videodoc)]

most of those CD's on ebay are from rudi;s site, i got one, sent it rudi, and he verified,, not "searchable" per se , but printable. thinking i paid $25 for mine. every once in a while a guy puts one up for $5. that one might be worth it. other than than that, use rudis manual. or go to farmalcub.info

john

[Rudi]

People:

I am going to do my best to not be a whinney or be an ass about this ok. And I am going to try to be as brief as possible, but that is probaby a relative term.. I am opininated as many know, I have my principles and ideals.. which my parents taught me are right up their beside the words God, Family, Country.. Duty, Honour, Valour..... Honesty... I may be old-fashioned, but I believe that one's word is one's bond, and it is the ONLY thing that we truly have that is ours, ours alone, and the one true thing that WE CHOOSE to either have or not have..

I have been concerned about this for a very long time. And I am now going to make a comment, that may not seem nice... but it is true, and it is becoming more prevalent. Everybody wants everything when they want it and are not willing to wait....... Don't mean to hurt or anything ok, and not meant for anyone on this forum. But it is a general observation and one which actually is contributing to this problem.

Jim, Dennis, George and I had a long conversation about copyright etc., when I started this project 4 years ago... I decided that seeing as as long as I was notating that the Trademarks etc., belonged to their respective owners, and that credit for the material is given where indicated, and that the manuals themselves were not copyrighted at that time.. that it was pretty safe. Copyright is important, and I do not want to violate.. and I truly believe that we are not, as we are NOT selling anything. Hovever, when the items are for sale, then I belive that the copyright if not the spirit of copyright is then violated.

I have a copy from 3 or 4 of these so-called pirates. 2 I actually bought -- just so I could see if it was what I thought it was... unfortunately I wasted my money, cause it was exactly copies from my server. The other 2 were sent to my by John and another member. Thank you both for being eagle eyed. And many have been advising me of these pirates..

I have been trying to have these pirates removed from eBay, but so far my efforts have been unsuccessful. I guess the God of the Almighty Buck runs eBay.....

Yes, this is getting personal for me. It

I can give you an example. The one CD purchased by another forum member advertised 25 manuals..


HUGE -25- MANUALS Farmall CUB & LOBOY Service MANUAL CD

FARMALL Cub Lo-Boy PARTS Manual SERVICE -8- MANUALS CD!.

FARMALL CUB Maintenance Operation PARTS Manual MANUALS.

Here is another one: FARMALL CUB Manuals OWNERS Manual's & PARTS Catalog IHC.

IH Cub Lo-Boy & Farmall Service & Parts Manuals CD this one is even right click protected....

This particular guy is the latest.. and he has actually just stripped my server and copied ALL of the manuals. HE states that these are in the Public Domain, yet the server explicitly states that these manuals MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED.. Farmall Cub/Lo-Boy 50+ Service, Parts, Oper Manuals.

but all of this simple again amply demonstrate the old adage Caveat Emptor...

In the first offering of the first 3 links, out of the 25 manuals, 1 was missing entirely althought the title and link was there and another was corrupt. Out of the 23 manuals that remained on the CD, 21 of them were downloaded from the Cub Manual Server. Not only that, but he actually hi-jacked some of my daughter's work (original work) and burned it to his product as well, then had the temerity to Copyright his CD and threaten me with a lawsuit.

I had actually queried him about where he got the manuals, ... ok I admit, I was cranky and I was curious, and he said he bought all of the manuals in NJ and scanned them himself.

Now many of you also know me by my nom-de-guerre.. Spook291.. well I spent many years in that general field... and I do know what a tell-tale is and I do know what to look for to compare originals to copies. ALL of the manuals on the Cub Manual Server contain tell-tales and can be traced DIRECTLY back to those jpegs which are on my puter and many of the hardcopies are in my library. On that CD, ALL of the tell-tales are there.

Many of these manuals I have bought myself. I have been searching eBay for a long time and have purchased many. I have bought 2 lots of manuals from my dealer when they went out of business, many which are dupes of what I had only scans of and many still need to be scanned. There are some good ones.

Also many of these manuals have been GRACIOUSLY donated by our Forum members, and y'all know who you are... And I am still looking for more as there are many that I do not have. Some of our members have access to these manuals that I do not have, and I want to be able to get them and offer them free.. but they may shy away because of the piracy.

These manuals actually belong to those who own or donated them. They should not be copied and sold by some delinquent who can find no better God to worship than the Great God of the Almighty Dollar Bill. I take great exception to theft, and false advertising as well as out-right lying.

I personally made a promise, which turned into a global committment to EVERY member of this forum who donated manuals to the server, that I would NEVER, EVER sell these manuals or allow them to be sold. That is why there is a copyright statement and a prohibitive statement on the server.

People such as this have already been reported to eBay. What will happen I do not know, but I am trying to keep my promise to all. If you want a list of the Manual Pirates on eBay, email me and I can give you user names and some references...

Personally, it is no skin off my nose if you want to waste your money on these CD's. It is your money after all. But what doesn't add up, is why anyone would want to spend that kind of money or any at all plus the double and triple the actual shipping costs to get a product that you can have for ABSOLUTELY FREE just by right clicking on the jpeg and saving it to your harddrive....

By the way. Allen's FarmallCub.info is primarily a Mirror of the manuals that are on the Cub Manual Server. He has used some of his computer wizardry and made them available in a different form.. I appreciate his work, and his offers of help. I also like what he has done... some are actually searchable. (He pretty much asked for permission, and that is ok... he is a member and is trying to help as well...very admirable)

I will never be able to do that, I am not that talented, nor do I have the health, time or energy to be able to do that much work. I still have a couple of years worth of scanning ahead of me to add all the manuals that I currently own, plus finish the dozen or so that are on loan. Yes Larry and John, they are almost finished there are in some manuals 2 to 300 or more pages and it does take some time.

My youngest daughter Kristina is now helping me with a complete re-build of the server. We have a couple options, but Kristina is good at code, and she may actually be choosing to go into web design and language at university. Seeing as she is permanently disabled, this is a good field for her and she loves it. So, we have a deal.. she will help me rebuild the server and I give her a computer upgrade.. we are both happy then.

My other daughters are artists and contribute to our hobby with their passions as well and much of their work will also be on the new server.

But I have a problem.

1. I want these manuals to be available to each of you, with no strings, and by simply being able to right click and save to your harddrive. If you create a directory called Cub, you can actually download all of the stuff including the indexes and actually have a fully functional webstyle directory on your computer. How much simpler can you get

2. If I leave it this way.. this means anyone can download the pages. And I mean anyone including unscroupulous scoundrels as well.

3. There is a solution... lock the server and prevent anyone from saving any of the documents. The IHCC site I think is like that... what a shame... but they need to protect their work... me, I am different.. I just want to give back a little.

So, if I lock the site.. then to get a copy.. you MUST print them. Not all are printer friendly at the moment -- mostly because I still have a lot to learn about web based resources... but I am getting there, and my daughter is helping..

I don't want to lock it up... that is the second to last thing I want to do. The last thing I want to do is shut down the server, cause then these pirates win and WE ALL LOSE!

Forgive me for the length, but it is as short as I can make it.. and I gotta run..

[Into Tractors]

Rudy, I agree with you 100%. I hope I speak for all the members of the forum, that we appreciate all the efforts that you have taken to scan the manuals, and post them so that we can all benefit.

Allen too deserves our thanks, as his computer wizardry is amazing in what he has done for us as well.

I think it's a shame that people are trying to profit from someone else's work, especially when they are breaking the law to do it.

I also have seen the manuals on sale on eBay, and on more than one occasion posted a msg on the forum stating such. I also have contacted eBay more than twice giving the numersous information in hopes that they would kick the folks off eBay, but of course that hasn't happened.

Thanks again for all you have offered to the rest of us Cub owners.

Mike D

[VinceD]

To Rudi and the other Forum members:

Before I posted my question, I tried searching for “manuals” and “CD” and “Ebay” in different combinations. Unfortunately the search system didn’t like the two letter search string of “CD” so I didn’t get any good hits. That’s when I went ahead and posted my question.

I really opened up a can of worms on this subject and I apologize but I am glad for all the info.

I have made good use of the manuals on Rudi's server and am very grateful they are available. I have consulted them many times. I would never considered downloading them without permission.

I was hoping the CDs on E-Bay were from the original digitized documents. I hoped Case might have digitized these old manuals and converted them to text to make them searchable and allow for better quality reprints. (Yea, I guess that was a pretty silly wish.) When I buy a new tool or electronic gadget, the manual is often available in PDF format from the manufacturer's web site. I download it (when allowed) and file an electronic copy in my computer for future reference.

I thought it might be nice to have an original quality CD available as part of my paper manual library. I never dreamed that anyone would steal from Rudi's server and try and make a dollar with the stolen goods. I guess I am more naive than I thought possible.

I should have thought a little more about the question. As I think about it now, I am sure Rudi would have listed the E-Bay manuals on CD as a resource in his welcome messages if they were legit.

I agree with everything said about the folks that steal from the server. I can’t believe anyone could be so presumptuous as to threaten law suit against Rudi after stealing his hard work. Simply unbelievable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hope the manuals never have to be locked or their access otherwise restrict for forum members. I hope there is another way around the problem. I also hope there is someway the thieves can be stopped and appropriately punished. (Maybe we could invite these thieves to a Cub pull and use them as a link in the chain!!!! What’s the expression I am looking for? Oh yea, “Drawn and Quartered!!!!!)

Again, I apologize for hitting on a sore subject.

I also want to add my thanks for all the hard work Rudi and others have gone through to make such great information available.

[t jackson]

ditto to rudi hats off to him have a great day

[Mac from NS]

Vince I don't think you opened a can of worms,I think this is something that needed to be said and there is a lot of people that don't know what was going on. THANKYOU RUDI and ALLEN and all the others that made it posable.

[Rudi]

Precicely. No can of worms.. just exactly the kind of questions one needs to ask and get answers to.

I first found out about these Pirate CD's whilst searching on eBay for more manuals for the server. Been around a bit, and has been a source of frustration.

The frustration comes from this:

I promised that for all who donated their manuals to be scanned, uploaded to the server and for the sole use of Cubbers, that I would do everything in my power to ensure that no one profitted from THEIR generosity.

Unfortunately, there seems to be little I can do about this except keep informing eBay. But, one or two voices in the wilderness cause little noise. Much barking needs to be done to rid eBay of these types of purveyors of illicit info....

Also, just refrain from purchasing. Obviously many are buying them. If you want a local copy, email me if you have questions on how to do this. I can help. As the guy with the funny accent (kind of German/Austrian) for ING says... It's Your Money :!: Lack of customers translates into lack of CD's on the market.

Jocelyn wrote;
I have been wondering about that too--whether they are image files ( ) or searchable, paginated Adobe Acrobat files . If the former, they would be no easier to use than the scanned manuals on the web site. If the latter, and if it were a full collection, they would probably be worth the $17.

They are not for the most part Adobe root files. They are jpegs imported into Adobe. So I do not know how searchable they are. Allen is working on that project.. but the ones I have seen are just my jpegs imported into pdf format. Many of them, you actually have to read them one by one but as a pdf.. takes much longer.. kinda useless..

I wish I had the time to be able to do all this for everybody. I wish that I had the skill level and the means to provide instant access in whatever format one prefers.. but I don't. I have things I want to do as well.. and things that are important such as taking care of my family etc...
This is one of my hobbies and one I spend a great deal of time on.. but I can only spend what I do.

I receive lots of emails, asking me if I know of sites that have THIS kind of information for other tractor models.. from the Letter Series to other IH and of course other brands. One will see that I even have a couple of MTD manuals on the site. That was done as a special request for a guy in Europe who cannot get access to those manuals period. One of our fellow Cubbers donated them, so I scanned and uploaded them. They are there, so I leave em.. even those got scarfed..

We are fortunate that we have http://www.farmallcub.com and that we have OUR community. But we can't have it all. Maybe some day. But if that day comes, I will have to have permission from those who donated manuals to be able to compile them and distribute them on media.. but if that does occur, it will be used to support the servers we have come to depend upon.. Cub Manual Server and FarmallCub.com and most definitely not to line the pockets of the people currently offering them for sale on eBay.

[FarmLadyWannaB]

Personally, it is no skin off my nose if you want to waste your money on these CD's. It is your money after all. But what doesn't add up, is why anyone would want to spend that kind of money or any at all plus the double and triple the actual shipping costs to get a product that you can have for ABSOLUTELY FREE just by right clicking on the jpeg and saving it to your harddrive

Amen, Rudi--THANK YOU for all your good work, and especially for clarifying the status of these scam-CDs I suspected they were just .JPG files (images), not the "next generation" which would probably be Adobe Acrobat files, which would have to be scanned (using Adobe) from the original manuals or from very good copies. But actually just downloaded from your work , which is a GODSEND for everybody on this site, especially newbies like me Awful, awful, awful Low-life thieves There are so many instances like this with the Internet, which is impossible to regulate completely without destroying the "free access" nature of the beast. I have had strangers email me out of the blue asking me questions about my own original authored class notes which they found on the web (I'm a professor). HUH

I am very glad someone asked this question--we should all be forewarned and NEVER buy those things. "Consider the source!" Unfortunately, to prosecute for piracy you need the resources of a large company for the lawyer bills (e.g., the difficulty of stopping the rampant global piracy of audio CDs and movie DVDs).

The Tractor Lady

[Jack Donovan]

I agree with you totally Rudy" But may be the time has come for you to reep the profits insted of some one else for all your hard work and the generosity of others that sent you manuals ect. I remember when you first started on the board here and started the manual site, The work you put into it was unbelieveble. Thank you for it and your hard work, But I would Gladly pay you for a cd rather than copy it or buy one off E-Pay. I think others on the board here would agree, That would flood the market and the E-Pay sellers would be lucky to get any thing for them. Thanks again .Jack Donovan

[Dale51]

Rudi,

On another site we had the same problem.
Their cure was to make it so you had to join & sign in to access the files.
There was no fee but you had to give a current address & PH# to join.

[Jim Becker]

Having to join and sign in to get the information would slow down new pirates but unfortunately the current pirates already have their copy. Rudi, another possibility would be to start selling copies yourself. Set the price to cover expenses and maybe a buck or two for your trouble. Put them on eBay with a "buy it now" option. That should undercut the pirates to the point it won't be worth while for them to continue.

You can even put something in your description like "This is the only version of these files that was not pirated from my web site."

[Rudi]

Jack:

It has never crossed my mind to ever sell a CD for a profit. I am trying to figure out how to do this, and do it so that it benefits our community. Right now I have enough data for a 6 CD set and that doesn't cover it all yet. And I still am missing manuals, so the set will be incomplete.

OH would I ever love to have access to a certain library ..

I am hoping that when I can get a copy of say 95% of all the implement manuals and the rest of the Blue Ribbon Service Manuals that I might be able to offer a CD set via the server and through Dennis so that whatever proceeds are generated after costs, that those proceeds would be used to keep the servers operating and maybe help out with upgrades or whatever.. but even those costs would be like say $10.00US for a complete set. I mean, how much does it cost for a blank recordable CD A spindle of 100 costs about $34.00Cdn.. so that is about $0.34 cents a piece... so 6 would cost about $2.00. Plus the sleeves.. say costs all told would incur no more than $5.00/set.. then $5.00 would go to the servers....

Me, I don't want a dime period. All I want is MANUALS TO SCAN

I have my eye on these 3 manuals at the moment.. hopefully I can get them cheap..
Owner's Manual - Farmall Cub Vegetable Cultivator


McCormick-Deering Cub-3 Cultivator Manual Farmall Cub

and
McCormick-Deering Cub 53A 53AA 53B 53C 54A Manual


But that will have to wait until I can get everything rebuilt. I even have a rudimentary Auto Run file ready for the CD's. Oh, and I have a Light Scribe Burner, so the labels go right on the CD and not on a paper disc...

David:

Nice idea, but there are enough barriers on the net already. The net is supposed to be for the free access to information. It was never envisioned as a place to make a profit.. or charge for access etc.....

Also, I just do not have the knowledge nor the resources to implement that kind of protocol.

There are two things I kinda wish I could do though..

1. Get all of our farmallcub.com members to list their City and State/Province in their profiles.. so that we could have a snapshot for CubFests and stuff.

2. Make access to the server available only to farmallcub.com members.. but then again, that would go against the principles of free access to info that I strongly agree with..... too many people get rich off of controlling access to information, and that irritates me immensely..

So, with that said, I guess running the risk of pirates, is something I have to put up with.

But in the meantime.... Please, refrain from buying the pirated CD's and instead, just download the files to your computer if you need them for the shop or something. However, remember they are not to replace actually owning a copy of a manual that you need..... such as those 3 primaries. Please visit Binder's to get a licensed reprint.