My Newest Money Pit
 

As I posted a few weeks ago, we are moving to a new place. There are about 4 acres of pasture to be mowed there, and I am not doing it with a lawnmower. My 18 PTO hp Kubota might handle a 5-foot bush hog, but it's a stretch. So I decided to get a bigger tractor and dedicate it to use with a 6-foot bush hog. Git 'er done!

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It's got a few problems, none of them serious. The seller told me the transmission gets stuck between gears now and then. I ordered a new shift lever, and it was here by the time I picked up the tractor. Sure enough, getting it off the trailer the transmission jammed. I'm in the middle of changing out the lever, but got rained out. It's take longer to paint the new shifter than it will take to put it in.

It runs a little rough. The seller said he rebuilt the carburetor and it didn't help. As with everything else, 99% of carburetor problems can be fixed by tuning up the ignition, so that's on the agenda.

The 3-point lifted slowly, and he didn't know why. He didn't know there is an adjustable flow limiter in the hydraulic circuit. I adjusted it to increase the fluid flow and that problem is fixed.

It came with a brand new Tractor Supply scraper blade that I am going to sell to recoup some of the $3000 I paid for this little guy.

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This was the view from my garden a couple of days ago. I'm going to miss this place.

I do believe the little Ford went to the right home.

That was nicely done. IDK what it looks like close up but who cares? Good enough from here, as they say.

I spent some time as a teenager on a (Ford) Ferguson. Pretty much the same tractor except it would not have been newer than 1960. What year is that?

Wow, that seems like a helluva deal for that tractor.

I wouldn't know where to start with a tractor that needed work, although I imagine one like that isn't terribly complicated. If you can work on a car, I assume a tractor, especially an oldy like that, should be even easier, once you learn the systems and parts.

That’s really neat looking! What year is that.?

Looks vintage but I’m an doofus w farm stuff. I cant tell how big it is. Need it next to a 911. Haha.

Nice get...those things are work horses.

Always good to know the tricks to keep it running. Sounds like you know your way around it.

From the pics, it looks like someone did at least some cosmetic work at some point. Looks like new tires and such. Reminds me of looking for paint in the Ford/New Holland dealers- iirc- that white has a bit of a grey tint to it. Actually, a significant amount of grey, that you don't appreciate until you see it sprayed against something pure white.

I like the older blue white colors like that. Good memories of brain cell killing paint!

Good stuff!

Yeah, the guy hit the high spots to make it look good, but didn't really "restore" it. I'll be tinkering on it for years. This is a 1974 and there are parts on it that I swear are the same as the 1940 Ford I used to have. I wanted a tractor that was new enough to have live PTO and live hydraulics. This Ford 2000 fits the bill. 153 cubic inch 3 cylinder gas engine and 30 PTO horsepower is perfect for my needs.

If I had to guess, based upon the power steering, I would venture late '70s or early '80s. Good little machine. In a way, the ancestor of my 2005 New Holland.

Edit: it takes me too long to type. :D

100%.

Pat doesn't know much, but he knows old farm iron:D

Well done Patrick.

I have never had the three point attachment thingy in yellow in your pics...what is you opinion?

Looks like a beautiful spread, congrats on the new place! Also the tractor isn’t bad either.:)

Has Vicki driven it yet ... you might have to share "seat time" :)

We had a few Massey Fergusons at the family farm. One got traded. I rebuilt the good one. And one was a wreck we kept for parts. Until someone abused the hell out of the rebuilt one and then it got traded for a large old Kubota diesel. I miss the MF. It was a great tractor. Looked a lot like your Ford.

That is the scraper blade the PO bought to grade his driveway.

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It didn't work out for him. He thought could level his driveway using the tractor's draft control. I've never tried using DC with anything as light as this blade, so I don't know if it didn't work for him because the blade was too light, the DC is not sensitive enough, or it had something to do with the fact that he had the hydraulic flow set so low. I suspect that blade is just not heavy enough for the tractor's DC to recognize it.

Seems like he needed a rear box blade.

Nice score!

Where are you moving to? I didn’t think you had been at your place that long and you’ve made upgrades with the electrical panels, etc.

Working on a 1974 Ford tractor should be a breeze for a guy who restored a 1930s truck! We had one like that on our tree farm back in the ‘70s but it would have been old already at the time. The remark about 1940s parts makes perfect sense, I don’t think that they changed much over the decades. Incremental change if anything.

Should come in handy. I’m a city boy but Machinery Hill at the Minnesota State Fair was one of my favorite things as a kid. They used to have every farm tractor and implement imaginable on display and you could climb all over them. They probably sold a lot of equipment at the fair.

Yeah they seem simple but often very dumb design makes them hard to work on. My neighbor had a ford 601 the hood grill and dash were very much not meant to be removed and the hood is also where the gas tank was integrated. So if you need to get to anything in the valve cover or behind the dash its a nightmare. And the voltage regulator is buried behind the dash with 6v positive ground system. I hated working on that thing. Also had strangely high gears for a tractor. Definately needed a low range or atleast one lower gear. It left me wondering why they were so popular because it seemed a bit useless as a tractor.

Congrats, Patrick...these are the threads I enjoy reading! :)

My favorite thing about the Massey? Weight was a benefit. It had a cast iron carburetor. I bet the Ford is very similar.

I knew a contractor that would final grade topsoil with a box blade. Worked well.

I use a york rake for "freshening up" driveway stone.

That scraper blade may be good for snow?

You're right, it's only been 7 years. I poured my heart and soul into this place. Finally built a shop with a lift, had some land to farm, lots of space - I posted this thread on it a few weeks ago:

https://forums.pelicanparts.com/off-topic-discussions/1177972-road-again.html

7 years is a long time when you're in your 7th decade.

Just read through that thread. I see new place is all electric. The new high efficiency Heatpump-ACs are pretty damn good. We used to bury propane tanks when NG wasn't available, but used heatpumps in a new home last year and the bills last winter were similar to nat gas.

Yep. Every year that you are active and have some vigor left you are one year closer to having neither. This has been, and will certainly continue to be, a lost summer in a life where I don’t have a lot of summers left. I cycle between anger, depression, and resignation on a 3 to 4 day rotation.

I had no idea of the depths of this money pit. Working on it has been kind of fun, so I'm not complaining. It's just that I need it running, like yesterday, and I keep finding more and more wrong with it. The guy who "restored" it was a real piece of work. He really soaked the poor guy I got it from. He connected a couple of wires to the generator, twisted them together, and stuffed them up under the hood. I discovered this when I was looking for the voltage regulator. There wasn't one! The guy I bought it from put in a new starter and a new battery trying to fix it. :(

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I just assumed the generator was junk and bought an alternator upgrade kit.

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Whoever welded the bracket together got it upside down. The rounded corners are supposed to be on the top. A couple of minutes with the grinder and I got the top corners rounded enough that the alternator body would clear them.

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Hope it works.

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The battery tray swings out of the way for access to the engine. With the battery removed it makes a handly place to mislay tools. The space on the firewall is where a voltage regulator would be - it if had one.

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The genius who put this together put what looks like a new radiator hose on it. It was the wrong one, it's almost totally collapsed where it is stretched over the crankcase vent pipe.

looks like you are the right person to plumb things up!! wow...neat equipment.

Thanks for including us on this journey!

Funny, when I saw the gennie my first thought was 'This needs an alternator!'.

That hose will be an interesting fix if you can't find the correct hose to replace it.

As a related aside, I rented a trailer to bring the Ford home. Cost $95 for a day. I looked at all the hauling back and forth from here to the new place that I was going to have to do while maintaining two properties with 2 tractors and a mower. I decided I could buy a trailer and use it until I didn't need it anymore, then sell it. If I got $500 less than I paid, I'd be money ahead, not to mention the convenience of not having to pick a rental up and drop it off.
I got this 18 footer for $2000. New wheels, tires, brakes, and lights. The fenders are beat to hell, but it tracks well. I'm not a fan of surge brakes, but they do work. The sad thing is, a year and a half ago, I sold my 18 foot trailer. "I'll never need this thing again!" Famous last words.

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There is a Facebook group for owners of old Ford tractors. They are occasionally helpful, but it's not the caliber of Pelican's 911 forum. Reading through the threads can be hilarious at times because they rely heavily on autocorrect and AI. One guy was asking about a finish mower and autocorrect or AI changed it to Finnish mower. He never corrected it, and neither did anyone else. They spent a whole thread discussing Finnish mowers! :D:D
I have been trying to find the water temperature sender on my tractor with no luck, but I found a pipe plug screwed in near where the sensor should be. I wouldn't put it past the jackass who "restored" this tractor to just take the sensor out and screw in a pipe plug. I took a picture of the plug and asked about it and, well - this.

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