[jdcrawler]

I'm sure all of you have seen pistons installed in and engine at one time or another so I'm not going to bother with taking photos of that.
So, with the pistons all in and everything tightened down, it's time to start putting the engine back together starting with the timing gear cover.

I haven't paid much attention to that part and as soon as I picked it up, I knew that I had another problem. That boss on the inside with the hole in it is suppose to hold the spring loaded plunger that rides against the end of the camshaft to keep it from sliding forward.

This is what that plunger looks like and I realize now that there wasn't one in there when I pulled the cover off.
A new timing gear has been put on this engine at one time and they forgot to put the plunger back in when they put the cover back on.
I can order one at $3.99 for the plunger and $12.76 for shipping and I wouldn't get it until Tuesday - at the earliest.
Naturally, this style of plunger is very old technology and the instructions for it says to be sure to grease it really good or it will make a nasty noise when you first start the engine.

Now days, there would be a hardened ball that would ride against the end of the cam with the spring putting pressure on it.
So I decided to up-date this old engine and I came up with a 5/8 diameter ball bearing and a spring just the right size.

There is already a chamfered hole in the center of the camshaft for the ball to ride on.
You can see here how good a condition the fiber cam gear is and you can tell that it has been changed because there are marks on the left side of the nut where they used a hammer and chisel to tighten the nut.

With the spring and ball set into the cover, I held it up to the engine and you can see that there is about a 3/16 wide gap for compressing the spring.
That should be just the right amount of pressure on the camshaft.

The rope seal is fit into the cover and it is bolted on.
This leaves quite a bit of the rope seal sticking up that needs to be trimmed off.

The ends of the rope seal need to be trimmed off so you leave a little of it sticking out, both on this cover and on the oil pan, so the ends will be compressed together when the pan is bolted on.
I use a washer that is about .100 thick and I've trimmed it to form a U-shape.

This is placed around the rope seal and then the ends can be trimmed off evenly with a razor blade.

This leaves a nice even amount of the rope seal sticking out.
A light coating of grease is spread on the pulley shaft so there isn't a dry surface rubbing against the rope seal.

The rope seal on the oil pan is trimmed the same way and the pan is bolted onto the block.

 

[jdcrawler]

Before and after.

Some of the other parts.

 

[jdcrawler]

I was in Walmart this morning and they had a " dark " hunter green paint.
This is a much closer match to the original Ford model-A engine color.

 

[hamman]

Thanks Ray.

 

[jdcrawler]

Here it is.
A 1965 Chevy truck transmission with granny gear and power takeoff, mated to a 1931 Ford model-A engine.
Tomorrow the yard art comes into the garage so I can start working on it.

 

[jdcrawler]

Hauled the tractor into the garage today.

Then I put it up on stands to make it easier to work on and stripped it down to the frame and axles.

Here is the pile of parts that were removed. Some of them will be re-used and some of them will not.

 

[tweidman]

Awesome project. I can't wait to see how it turns out.

 

[jdcrawler]

Both rear wheels were locked up on the tractor. Today I cut the drive chains off and removed the model-T rear axle.

Here is the rear axle on the lift cart. It turns freely when I turn the driveshaft and the pinion gears inside work properly when I hold one axle or the other while turning the drive shaft.

I was very pleased to find out that both rear hubs spin freely. It was the rusted drive chains that had everything locked up.

The front axle is removed from the frame.

The steering arms and the axle spindles are removed. I can tell right now that this axle will not support the weight of the model-A engine.

The back of the axle has a bar welded to it to keep the axle from moving forward or backward.
This part would probably work fine but I would feel much more comfortable with longer radius arms on each side that are mounted farther back on the frame. So I'm going to change that.

The size of the webbing of the axle is strong enough but there a weak area right in the center where the hole goes thru for the mounting bolt.
This area definitely needs to be beefed up.

 

[FrankIII]

Is that a homemade chassis? Can't remember now if you said it was.

 

[jdcrawler]

Is that a homemade chassis? Can't remember now if you said it was.

The frame is off a Ford model-T with the boxed part at the back that the hubs are bolted to added to it.

 

[jdcrawler]

A pair of soup cans make Interesting hub caps on the rear hubs. I will probably have to use the same thing, just ones that are in a little better shape.

Removed the rear drums today and the bearings look to be in good condition.

I was surprised to find that both sides still have the complete brake assemblies and they are also in good condition.

This is the backing plate and axle with the brakes removed.

And one of the brake assemblies.

When I first got this tractor, I thought that they may have used a pair of front hubs off a car and bolted them onto the back. And that is what they did. These are front hubs off a car from the early 1930's with mechanical brakes.

These were positioned on the tractor with the brake lever behind the frame so the operator could work them by hand.

If I switch these hubs to the opposite side, then the brake lever would be in front of the frame and I could hook up linkage to a brake pedal.

At this point, the frame is stripped all the way down as far as it can go.

 

[jdcrawler]

I used my air grinder to clean as much of the rust off the frame as I could. Then I sprayed the frame with Eastwood Fast Etch and used a wire brush to work the liquid into all the corners and pitted areas.
Here is the frame after the Fast Etch has dried.

I'm reinforcing the frame with a piece of 1-1/2 inch angle iron welded to each side.

The angle iron is 1/4 inch thick wall and it extends all the way to the back of the frame.

The frame is now primed with Rustoleum red primer.

All the brackets and steel bars on this tractor have been cut with a torch so I'm cutting them on the saw to get the ends smooth.

The corners have been rounded on these parts and they are ready for primer.

 

[jdcrawler]

Getting ready to start putting pieces back together and get it up on wheels and tires. To do that, I need a set of wheel adapters for both the front and rear wheels. The front isn't a problem. I'll be going from 65 Ford mustang, 4-bolt hubs to 5-bolt wheels and I've already bought a set of adapters for them.

The back is a different story. The hubs are early GM 6-bolt on 5-1/2 inch centers and the wheels are tractor 6-bolt on 6 inch centers. I quickly discovered that they make 6-bolt on 5-1/2 centers to 6-bolt on 6-1/2 centers but no one makes an adapter for 6-bolt on 6 inch centers. There are companies that will custom make adapters but that is really expensive.

So .. I'm going to make my own adapters. My son got me a pair of 7-1/2 inch by 2 inch thick pieces of aluminum.
Here I'm cutting the center out with a hole saw.

I put the pieces on the lathe and finished bored the holes to the same size. Then I turned down two pieces of wood to fit into the holes.

A larger piece of wood is attached to one of them and it is turned down to fit the opening in the wheel.

This centers the aluminum ring to the wheel.

The wheel is turned over and the first hole is marked on the adapter ring with a center punch.

A small hole is drilled thru the ring at this point. The lug holes on the wheel are 3 inches apart so I turn the ring over and make a mark 1-1/2 inch over from the small drilled hole. This is to locate the holes for GM bolt pattern half way between the holes for the tractor wheel pattern.

The other wood block is turned down to fit the center in the GM wheel and the first hole is marked with the center punch.

This hole is drilled out to 7-16 inch ( the size of the GM wheel studs ) .

A 7/16 inch bolt and a lug nut is used to locate the ring to the GM wheel and the other 5 holes are marked with the center punch.

They are all drilled out to finish size and the ring is test fit onto the GM hub. The adapter is ready to have the counterbores drilled into it on this side to get to the lug nuts that will hold the adapter onto the GM hub.

 

[jhn9840]

Great work. You make it look easy, even though we know it’s not.

jhn9840
John

 

[jdcrawler]

I have ordered lug studs for the wheel adapters so I can't go any further on them until they arrive.
The rear hubs and backing plates were sand blasted and primed today.

Some of the bolts holding the backing plates and axles onto the frame were rusted really bad so I'm using all new mounting bolts.

For some reason, the lower part of the steel channel that the rear axles bolt to are angled out at the bottom.

So the upper two spacers are a little thicker than the lower spacers so the axle will be level.

The backing plates and axles are set in place and the four spacers for the brake hardware are slid onto the bolts.

Then the brake assembly is put on and everything is tightened down.

 

[jdcrawler]

Cleaned and greased the bearings and mounted the hubs today.

Then I turned the frame over to work on putting the bracing back on.

Initially, the pieces of angle iron that the front of the braces were bolted to were fastened to the outside of the frame with a spacer block between them and the bracing bar.

I cut a notch in the piece of angle iron so they fit around the frame and bolt directly to the bracing bar. The angle iron is then welded to the frame.

More views of the rear bracing bars.

Time to work on the front axle. .......
First thing is to cut that rear brace off.

Then spend some quality time in the sand blasting cabinet.

And finally put some primer on it right away before it starts to rust again.
Now I need to figure out how I'm going to add bracing to it and what I'm going to use to do that.

 

[jdcrawler]

I have a piece of 1-3/8 inch solid square steel bar that is bent at 90 degrees. I set it up against the underside of the axle and there was a 1-1/2 inch gap between the ends of the square bar and the axle.

I set the square bar in the press and heated up the center so I could push it down and spread the ends out to fit the lesser angle of the axle.

After sandblasting and trimming the ends off, the square bar is welded to the underside of the axle for extra support.

The support bar is finished off with gusset plates welded in place and then primed.
This is the front.

And the back.
The tabs at the ends of the the support bar are where the radius arms will attach to it.

The cross piece to mount the axle to is bolted back into the front of the frame. this is only held in place with four 5/16 bolts so I also welded it to the inside of the frame.

Setting the front axle in place.

Originally, this only had the axle pivot bolt going thru the single mounting plate with a second pivot bolt to hold the rear brace in place.
I have added a second mounting plate so the axle is supported between them.
Here I have chained the frame down to the wood block and I'm using a jack to lift up on the pivot bolt.

This tilts the axle forward to put some camber in it.

The rear mounting plate is welded in place and a nut is welded to it that the pivot bolt threads thru. Then a lock nut will be tightened down on the bolt so it doesn't move and the axle will pivot on it.

Everything is cleaned up and primed.

 

[jdcrawler]

......... BOY DID I SCREW UP. .........
As soon as I realized it, I knew that I should have known better right from the start.

I'll explain the screw up but first .. the front axle is mounted in place. With the amount of side to side travel that this axle has, this tractor should be able to go over some extremely rough ground.

I used a grade-5 bolt for the pivot mount and it is drilled and taped for a grease fitting.

Now the screw up. .......
The technology that I was going to use for making the radius arms is something that I, and thousands of other people, have used on thousands of hotrods over the years with the straight front axles. They remove the 3-point - wishbone radius rad and make individual radius arms that fit on the sides of the frame.

I had intended to use these old home made radius arms, that I had picked up at a swap meet a life time ago, to keep the axle from moving forward or backward.

I cleaned them up and added another steel strip to the front on each one to form a U-shape mount. These are drilled and tapped for 3/8 shoulder bolts.

This is how I intended to mount them on the frame.
The problem is that the mounting point on the axle is too far away from the axle pivot point. When the axle is rocked over to the side, this causes the mount on the frame to want to slide forward or backward about 1-1/2 inches.
Even if I raise the mount up on the frame, it still doesn't work because the radius arms are just too far from the axle pivot point.

The reason this style of radius arms ( one on each side ) works on the cars is because the arms are mounted close to the same plane as the pivot point of the axle and wheels.
With the center pivot point of the axle being so much higher then the wheels, I have to use a 3-point - wishbone style of radius arm ... just like whoever built this tractor in the first place used !

Oh well ... the day wasn't a total loss because I now have a nice clean pair of radius arms that are ready to be used on some other project.

 

[KennyP]

I have a pair of arms similar to those, just a bit shorter.

 

[jdcrawler]

This is the piece of channel iron that fits across the two frame rails that the bracket for the radius arm will fasten too.
One side of the channel has been cut off with a torch so I put it on the mill to smooth that edge down.

It is then bolted onto the underside of the frame rails.

This is the bracket that will bolt to the center of the channel and the pivot bolt for the radius arm will thread into it.
You can see the white lines where I will cut the ends off at an angle to make it look cleaner.

This is the wish bone radius arm that I cut off the axle.

The arm is sand blasted and the rough welds have been smoothed down.

The center of the radius arm is bolted onto the mounting bracket.

The outside ends of the radius arm has brackets welded to it so they can be bolted to the mounting tabs on the axle.
This radius arm also maintains the high clearance in the center.

Now the axle is supported so it can't move forward or backward but can still swing from side to side for going over rough ground.

The pivot bolt for the radius arm has a lock nut on the back side to hold it in place and keep it from rotating, just like the pivot bolt on the axle.