CA Project Pics

As for the March trip, the April trip was largely consumed by barn roof repair and some yard/tree work.  The roof was pressure washed and the first coat of primer applied.  The second coat of primer is expected today and the white insulating seal coating in the coming weekends (2 coats) (brother/nephew).   The 1 coat of primer alone seems to have stopped all but one leak.  

I also ordered 5 ton of gravel and spread about half of it in front of the barn doors.  The 4 inch lip is a little hard to get things in and out (like lawn mowers).  I'll spread the rest next trip (unless somebody else gets to it first :).  

My brother pulled several stumps from the front yard.  He was leaving a giant gash in the yard so we decided to try the CA rear forks.  It worked reasonably well on the smaller one.  Was able to lift it up about a little less than a foot (lots of mud on the root ball) and mostly carry it up to a wood pile.  The larger one was another matter.  It was so heavy that attempting to lift it was raising the front wheels off the ground and making it very difficult to steer.  I already had two front wheel weights (~200lbs).  I tried adding two 70lb weights to the side weight cradles but not enough.  Another two 70lb weights and I was barely able lift it enough to at least not dig a long trench and mostly dragged it to an area adjacent to the wood pile.  I couldn't back up because the forks were digging into the ground.

I added an oiler for the PTO adapter chain.  It seems to work ok.  I had some difficulty getting it to drip feed.  I ended up having to put an open standpipe near the brush (back side).  The brush touches the back side of the chain.  Not ideal, but it's a bit longer than expected and was proving difficult to place.  It seems to be getting oil where it needs to.  I can supplement by brushing some gear oil on once in a while.  I have to remember to turn the oiler off between uses, otherwise it drips all the oil onto the floor.  I've ordered a small catch pan that I'll add next month.  I'll probably attach it with magnets, atop the drawbar.  I also added a collar type clamp around the bottom PTO shaft to reduce shaft movement in case the allen set screws come loose.  I had one come loose again on the back side.  I'll have to watch that until I figure out whether I'm just not getting them tight enough or whether it's going to be a continuing problem.

Because of chain stretch from first use, I had to remove 1 link from the chain to keep it at around 18" from the ground.  It appears necessary to set the chain tension AFTER installed on the tractor because the top bearing flange does not support any side force at all.  I'll see if I can find a more appropriate thrust bearing, but that may force me to do the same for the bottom one since the sprockets must align (depends).  The bottom set has a bearing on the back side to support side forces.  I can't do that on the top since it has to attach to the tractor PTO shaft.

Edit:  I've researched alternative flange (roller) bearings and decided that I'm not going to spend $400 to $600 and then have to redesign the mounting point.  The base problem is that these flanges are 'self aligning'.  The bearing outer surface that's pressed into the flange housing is curved and designed on purpose to rotate in the housing.  Absolutely not what I wanted, but I'm not finding any that aren't designed that way or that overtly say that they're not self aligning.  I'll see if I can come up with a way to inhibit rotation.

I sealed the top of the grader blade with Sika silicone.  I think this will work fine to keep dirt and rocks out.  It's a pain to clean out otherwise.  The King Kutter blade contour doesn't quite match dad's homemade housing.  

The Dunham Lehr disc cylinder was finally rebuilt.  It took about 9 months.  The machine shop guy was out for months with back problems then I think got behind.  Anyway, I got a discount since it took so long.  I think I only paid for the machine shop, not the actual rebuild and test.  The machine shop created a new "head" part by copying the old one.  The original did not have an octagon end, it was round with one flat side for access to the snap ring.  I wasn't too happy with the internal cleaning.  I had to remove quite a bit of gunk before I cleaned it up and painted.

Possibly the best looking 70+ year old Dunham Lehr hydraulic cylinder on the planet :)  I thought it was originally "flambeau red", but after shining it up, it's more massey ferguson red, so that's what I used.

I made some adapters to position the KK dirt scoop further back to keep the scoop from hitting the drawbar, but my original solution had the lift points too low (scoop could not quite be lowered enough at the right angle) so I scrapped that design and began a new one to get the lift arms back up in line with the originals.  Since both the front and the back end need "anti-rotation" protection (because the add-on top link slides on the rock shaft and doesn't support pushing), I'll do something similar on both the front and the back.  The starting point is two long rails on either side that I can bolt the new brackets to when the material arrives.  The back doesn't need to be very long so I'll size that as needed once the brackets are designed.

I previously created some substitute "bail pinning" bars that work similar to pinning the hydraulic arms to the pin hitch bail.  I added two new "scissoring" bars that allow me to adjust how high the implement is lifted.  It basically adjusts where the "end of throw" is.  They may be slightly undersized but I don't generally leave the lever in the raise position, I get it to the right height then place it in the hold position.  This will just make it easier to stop it at the right place (mainly for PTO implements where you don't want an extreme PTO shaft angle).  I'm pretty sure they'll be fine when the high implement weight is already reducing the lifting force that will be applied to these bars.

The left lift arm ball has been quite difficult to use because the ball is extremely tight.  The right one limbered up well with a bit of oil, but the left one appears to have possibly gotten too hot when they welded it on and warped.  I used a 2 foot bar to try to limber it up but wasn't helping much.  I ended up trying an impact wrench on a 7/8 bolt to try to spin and tilt in all directions.  That was difficult but eventually it improved and I found at least one small position of rotation where it is almost free enough to be usable.  I'm wondering if I could add some polishing compound of some sort and spin it more with the impact wrench to try to free it up more.

I began experimenting with the MF41 sickle mower.  Last month I cleaned/fixed all of the adjustment rods/brackets, but didn't have time to check anything out.  It is clear that it's much improved.  I can now lift it up without the bar attachment end flopping down to the ground.  

I did identify one problem that had to be rectified before going any further.  The MF41 has a device on the left side that hooks beneath the lift arm.  Unfortunately, it hits exactly where the leveling arm attaches to the lift arm.  I had left those attachments loose to allow easy side to side sway of the lift arms.  However, the sway chains also attach at the same position and when sway force is applied, they can pull the bolt holding the leveling arms out and into the path of the MF41 lift attachment.  So I had to modify how the sway chains are attached.  I created new brackets to get the chains a little further back from the leveling arm attachment points and I used spacers to ensure that the bolt doesn't slide out under sway chain force.  I also smoothed a ledge on the MF41 where the bolt was hitting so that it now smoothly slides past.  The MF41 lift attachment is fairly loose fitting and can easily be pulled outward enough to miss but doesn't naturally do so.  I would have preferred a 135 deg strut rather than 90 deg, but this will work fine.  I'm waiting on some 3/4 inch eye bolts to attach the sway chain to.  This bracket tended to rotate downward when the sway chain was loose so I added a little clip that hangs over the lift arm to keep it from falling down and into the path of the MF41 lift attachment.  Hopefully, it doesn't get ripped off in operation, but I think it should work.  The sway chains are almost always higher than this bracket so I don't think anything will pull downward on it.