I was gonna say something about making a saginaw box out of a truck work, but then realized this thing doesn't have a tie rod, instead it was decided it was better somehow to have two draglinks and a steering box with dual counter rotating pitman arms, that would explain why they want $1000 for a rebuild.
Maybe pull it apart and see if there's anything you can do to improve it? What goes bad? A few off the shelf bearings and fresh grease might make things good enough.
The gearbox has to come off for the split anyhow. I will probably take it apart and see what exactly is the cause of the problem. It does work, just badly, so I will probably fix the clutch to get it mobile, then either keep it and hope for the best or sell it as is. Before I spend $1000 to replace a weak link part I would rather convert it to full hydro steering. The problem is the way the front axle is laid out it will be difficult. The steering ram would have to be mounted way below the axle. I have to spend the next few days working on my sister in laws house so I have some time to think it over.
I forgot that was a thing. Use two rams for full hydraulic steering, one on either side?
In reply to BrokenYugo:
The issue with that is keeping the tires pointed in the same direction. There is an aftermarket kit for them for hydraulic steering that uses one cylinder on each side, but you keep the drag links and gearbox to function as the tie rod. You remove the input gear from the steering box and keep the part that ties the two sides together. This is a problem for me for two reasons. First i dont know what part of the box is bad, second is the kit is about $1500.
The box has to come off anyhow and it looks like it come at least partially apart pretty easy so im going to try to assess the damage and come up with a plan moving forward.
Nice tractor for the money. EBay can be your friend at times. Troll the internet, forums etc. Check out Steiner for parts. I have a 1950 Ferguson TO20 12 volt conversion, that I use frequently, nice machine. Paid $2000 with York Rake, was serviced before I bought it from a local Mulholland dealer, delivered.
That's New Holland dealer, not the famous California drive.
You need to go to redpowermagazine.com ,they can help you with everything.
In reply to egoman:
I have been looking at that site a bit, along with quite a few others in my search for info. Its a little tougher than finding car info. The guys who are into old tractor dont seem to be that into the internet.
My uncle who is old tractor mechanic stopped over to check it out this weekend. He gave me some good ideas for a full hydraulic steering conversion. I did fill the steering box with gear oil and that helped so hopefully that will buy me some time while i stockpile parts for the swap.
Well all of the gear oil i put into the steering gear box is all over garage floor now. That is pretty serious leak consider the tractor hasnt even been touched since i filled it. Sigh.
Grease, the usual #2 chassis grease will work but I think a thinner one might be a better choice if it doesn't leak out too fast. Tractor supply sells a #00 (think apple sauce) grease for cheap, comes in a gear lube bottle. There's also #0 (more like mustard) "corn head grease" that's not too hard to find at tractor dealers and whatnot.
Ive actually heard that corn head grease was the way to go, but gear oil is what the manual called for, and i had it on the shelf so i figured it was worth a shot. I will give that a shot.
Most of the ones I've worked on use a recirculating ball system on the main steering shaft that acts on gears attached to the steering arms. They leak for whatever reason, then the balls get rusty and carnage ensues.
If you've caught it early enough that lube will free it up, you can probably clean it out and fix the leak and have it serviceable for a good while.
It really won't hurt anything to let it self destruct. None of the other bearings cycle enough to really ever go bad, and once the recirculating ball system starts to fail, the whole assembly generally has to be replaced anyway.
If it's lubed sufficiently and the bearings in the recirculating system are only mildly pitted it will take forever to cycle the steering enough to really chew them up. It's not until the recirculating bearings wear enough to start bunching up in the guides that you start having hard failures.
LOL, nope. This one apparently works straight off the shaft.
Parts for this are significantly cheap than my parents Massey Ferguson.
This is where I usually go for these sort of parts.
Make like a banana....
Here is the cause of all this work
And i think it did enough damage that iwill need a complete clutch kit
What are we looking at? Bad throw out bearing?
looks like there are bunch of shiny spots on the ends of the ring gear. might want to check those while it is apart.
In reply to Crackers:
Yep, bad throwout bearing. It looks like it boogered up the release arms on the pressure plate too.
In reply to cdowd:
Ill take a closer look, but just from a quick glance last night they just had a little wear, nothing too serious. I think the flash from the camera makes it look worse than it is.
I picked up my clutch kit saturday. It is a different style, the old one had the standard car style friction disc. I believe its called woven, whereas the new one has the individual pads on the friction disc. Forgive me for not knowing the proper terminology. It is actually a very heavy duty clutch considering the engine is rated at 32 hp. I would be comfortable putting that clutch on an engine with ten times that much power.
I got the two halves back together. The next step is to roll it outside and pressure wash the crud and grease and grime off of it while i have it so far apart. Then i need to decide if i should paint it.
How much of a struggle was it to separate the pieces......prybar??? What is the yellow support thingy ???
In reply to 759NRNG:
The yellow thing is a splitting stand. It bolts up to the side of the tractor and in my case held up the rear half of the tractor. I say in my case because this stand was made for a JD 3020, I'm not sure if its used on the front or the rear of those. I used a variety of shims to make if fit my tractor. It uses big studs as feet so you can adjust the height in tiny increments.
The two halves weren't bad to get apart. I used a large engine crane to support the rear end of the front half. The crane is a very duty version that came from a guy that used to own an implement dealership. I wouldn't recommend a Harbor Freight unit for this job. Also I had to make some big wood wedges and hammered them between the front axle and the frame. This keeps the engine from toppling over. Anyway, once everything was unbolted I just shoved on the front tires, switching from side to side, and it rolled apart pretty easy.
Going back together was a little more difficult. It is basically the same as lining up the input shaft on a car trans, except it is too big to manhandle, and there are two sets of splines you have to line up. There is normal input shaft, and then another set of splines outside of that which engage on the pressure plate. That shaft runs the PTO. What I ended up doing was getting it almost all the way in, then had Dad stop over to help with the rest. We each grabbed a front tire and nudged while I used a big channellocks to turn the front of the crank to line the splines up. It popped right in using that method.
MILESTONE: It moved under its own power tonight
This makes me very happy, hence the multiple smile emojis. The clutch needs adjusted, something isnt working in the governor, its leaking from a bunch of places, and i still need to put it the rest of the way back together, but by god i drove that thing around the yard without any assistance.
For those keeping score at home, purchase price $650, starter rebuild $70, clutch kit and alignment tool $280, hyd fluid and ignition switch $50. Thats $1050 so far.
Now that i have that small victory out of the way its time to move on to some of the other issues. This tractor has more issues than National Geographic, but I am trying to prioritize. Thats more or less what this post is about, thinking out loud through the problems.
I think the first order of business is the front axle issue. The axle consists of the main tube across the front, and u shaped tube that runs back a few feet to keep the axle from folding up under the tractor. The main tube mounts to the tractor with a large steel pin in the center allowing it to pivot in the center. This seems fine. The rear u piece has a bolt through it with a pivot ball for mounting. The problem is where that bolt goes through the tube. The hole is completely wollered out to the point that it is about to get into the oil pan. This is now my top priority problem. I will get some pics. When i get into work mode i forget about pictures.
So the other night I figured I better take my youngest son for a tractor ride before I tear it down again. He's 5 and he is nuts about tractors. So we are putting around and I go to do a u-turn, crank the wheel off, and it sticks at almost full lock. I can't get it go back. It steers better moving, so I keep going, and we do four complete little circles before I can get the wheel straightened out. He thought it was hilarious. I guess that idea of using the stock steering for a while is out. I talked to my uncle and lined up all the parts (I think) to do the hydro steering swap from a parts combine he has at his farm. I just have to take them off the combine. His asking price was a case of beer. Can't beat that. And yes, in our family we use beer as currency pretty often.
On a lot of tractor front ends the steering arms on each spindle are splined and can be installed in different orientations. In your case, going hydraulic, I'd point them both slightly inboard of straight forward and run a tie rod between them in front of the axle. Hook your hydraulic cylinder to the axle and the tie rod and done.
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