The majority of last week was spent finding and ordering needed parts for the Cletrac General. The tractor is missing the serial number tag. However, I found that the born on date for the engine (IXK3) is 2/13/41. Out in the sunshine the paint under the red is clearly Cletrac Orange. The oil pressure gage has the Cletrac logo on it.
Saturday my friend Bigdog (Darrell) & cousin Mark came over for a workday. We changed oil, pulled out the broken oil tube in the filter base and replaced it with a new one. (Special thanks to Oliver Chris for the fast turn around and shipping on the oil tube) I replaced the cracked sediment bowl, Darrell cleaned the points and found that they were gapped .020 when they should have been closed. After being set properly we had spark.
The tractor had a replacement Carter UT carb with a really bad Id tag. After some research I found that the type of top Aluminum vs Cast Iron top determined which carb kit to order. This one was the cast iron top. We soaked the carb in the parts washer. The gaskets were shrunk up and the bowl had a good bit of sand in the bottom. While the carb was soaking we worked on another project of putting new seals on the tiller axle. Afterwards Darrell finished cleaning and rebuilding the carb.
The battery looked like it was shot. It was faded gray and there was no date on the battery. However, it had enough juice to slowly crank the engine last week. During the week I let it sit on a trickle charger and finally Friday night it had a full charge and it held the charge. After everything was ready we flushed out the radiator, added gas and hit the starter. She wanted to start the first try. A little playing with the choke and she took right off. Oil pressure came right up the generator was charging. Everything is tight on this tractor. No transmission noise. It shifts nice no grinding and the shifting is very positive. Steering is good an tight. You wouldn't know you were on a 75 year old piece of equipment. That old Hercules engine sounds good. If you can't tell I am extremely tickled with the way this project turned out :)
I don't know how long the tractor sat before I bought it. The story from the seller is that I belonged to an older gentleman that used it to cultivate his garden. It had quit running on him and he couldn't get it going and it sat for a couple of years before he bought it The man I bought it from got it and made an attempt to get it running. However, he didn't work very hard at it. He seemed to be a wheeler dealer and had enough projects setting around to keep him busy for a few years.
I will say that getting on and off of this tractor isn't as easy as I remembered it being when I was 10 years old. I am going to have to replace that missing step. As you would expect with any 75 year old tractor there are some oddities. I will post about them later on.
Thanks for putting up with my long winded post.
Doug
She's a nice lookin tractor for her age Doug. One thing to watch if she's going to sit outside any, on most of the early tractors the exhaust pipe was a slip fit into the manifold, held in with a thru bolt. This allowed rain water to run down the OUTSIDE of the exhaust pipe & end up in the manifold & cylinders. Rusting & seizing the engine & in cold weather breaking the manifold. I was able to thread the inside of my manifolds that are slip fit with a 1 1/4 inch pipe tap after removing the ridge inside the manifold. You can thread it without removing the ridge, but you can't tap it far enough into the manifold to cover the holes for the "thru bolt" without removing the ridge. Thanks for sharing the pics. Scott R
Sounds good Doug!
Nice job :) and great to have the cultivators.
Doug, if that light lens is cracked I have some new originals here (assuming they're 115 204).
Still looking for a step...have fun, Chris
Quote from: oliverchris on March 31, 2016, 06:32:32 PM
Doug, if that light lens is cracked I have some new originals here (assuming they're 115 204).
Still looking for a step...have fun, Chris
Thanks Chris. I looked at the lenses tonight and they are KD 853 from Cincinnati Oh. I should have measured them. I also forgot to look at the back lense.
Doug
Tonight I took a couple of pictures showing the orange paint showing up under the red.
Doug
Re. the Cletrac paint — the cream always rises ;D ;D
My spare lenses are 853's too :)