1959 D17 diesel before and after

I’ve been repairing this D17 for the past 6 months and searching for correct parts for the past year. Over the years the previous owner changed out the shroud and grill due to damage to the original so my search for the correct shroud and grill began. Luckily a forum member was parting out his 59 diesel and had what I needed and it was in really nice shape. A few dents but no rust, grill only had one small damaged area, and the correct head lights. Really pleased and lucky to find the shroud let alone a grill and head lights. Also purchased another new grill from Don Snow. He makes a beautiful replica which will be on my D17 after I get it painted. The other grill has knock outs removed in case I want to add my grill guard.
I want to thank everyone that responded to my questions on here as I was in new territory since I’ve never owned a D17 or a Buda diesel. Similar to our D15 gas in some ways so being familiar helped. Also want to thank Steve at B&B Custom Circuits for the generator rebuild and great wiring harness. And to Ed Guenther of Guenther Heritage diesel for rebuilding my leaky pump. Both of these guys back up their work and always answered my questions. I’ve dealt with them both in the past so it was no doubt who I was going to for my repairs.
I started using the tractor late last spring after I purchased it, summer, and fall mainly with my 82 S sickle mower that I removed from my WD. Luckily found the necessary belt pulley mount for it and had my local machine shop make the support bracket from the pto drive to the drop housing. It’s a great mowing tractor with the 82 S and much safer than my WD. I had a pretty good idea of all the things that needed to be repaired when I purchased it but of course found other things along the way as well. It already had a new clutch and throw out bearing which was good news. Brakes were in need to be replaced, gauges were crap, and although the tach worked the hours were almost unreadable. I could tell it the first digit was a 5 so it had a lot of hours on it which looking at the pedals I would agree with. After Haim rebuilt the tach it had 5,584 hrs on it. I bought it for a good price preparing myself to put some money into it. I finally found a 59 black bar D17 that I had been looking for. After using it I repaired some things when time allowed and then got serious back in February. After delays of all sorts, she is almost complete. It’s not a show tractor, isn’t meant to be. It will be used on the farm just like the rest of our AC’s. It just looks better, drives better, and runs smoother than when I purchased it. A lot of my own choices such as color that may not make everyone happy but that’s ok. Lots of pictures to follow over the next few days, hope you enjoy.

Edited by AC720Man - 14 Sep 2023 at 12:40pm

Tach drive cable was rusted in place. Worked fine but I wanted to replace it with a new tach cable Haim at Star Speedometer built for me while restoring my tach. I had been soaking the drive and cable head for weeks but It just would not come out. So I removed the drive completely from the engine and was able to finally to separate the 2. The Kroil did its job but there was so much dirt and rust that it was really wedged in the drive.

Keep the story and the photos coming.  I am finding this very informative and entertaining.

After multiple degreasing and power washing the tear down began. First after timing the engine the injection pump was removed and sent off to Ed for him to rebuild. I can’t stand leaks and it leaked around the throttle and fuel shut off linkages. Full rebuild and it starts and runs better than it has since I bought it. Removed the cobbled up electrical wiring to recycle. She got stripped down and anything that I found in need of repair or replaced due to wear got done.

I can’t say enough about my local machine shop. My friends Randy and Ron were of incredible help. I was able to sandblast all my sheet metal in their sandblast cabinet along with wheel centers and front rims. Thanks also to Ronnie for his spectacular welding and the repair of my battery box where a battery leaked and had eaten away a 1/3rd of that bottom out. He cut it out and welded a new piece in. I cut a floor mat to make a rubber bottom for the battery box. They also fabricated a new generator cover that usually gets tossed. I went by a picture in my manual, guessed at measurements, and am very pleased how it turned out. I did receive pictures and measurements from a forum member later on but I had already had this one fabricated.

Edited by AC720Man - 14 Sep 2023 at 10:56am

I mentioned the pan seat earlier but forgot to show the product that I used to repair it. It’s a metal reinforced filler. Works just like Bondo but is stronger. Very pleased with how it worked.

After some more degreasing I borrowed my brothers needler tool. I have never used one before and wow what a awesome tool. It made fast work of the cast areas and wheel centers. The centers were latter sand blasted but I wanted to get as much of the layers of paint off as possible. In less than 3 hours the entire tractor was done.

Myron that’s the first thing I did right after these pictures were taken as I noticed some oil seeping out the right side. Verified in my parts manual that they were actually studs. Picked 2 up, applied some Teflon tape, and no more leaks. You will notice them installed in the last pictures I post.
Dana, a matching D14 black bar would be awesome. I gotta build a building first, ran out of room at the farm! My family keeps asking me how many tractors do you actually need? Lol...all of them

After arriving at my buddies farm paint shop I gave everything a good coat of etching primer. The engine received high temperature primer. Quite a few of our tractors have been painted here. As you can tell, the last one was blue lol. I told him he spent too much time testing the gun on the walls and was wasting paint lol

Now you know my choice of color. I was on the fence between PO1 or PO2. As much as I wanted to go PO1 all my tractors are PO2 except my old WD. 6 months later this tractor would have PO2 on it from the factory, although not a black bar. So I choose PO2, the color I really wanted all along.
This also is the time when I regret watching the factory video of the D17 being painted. I always paint my fenders off the tractor, for some reason I decided to try it like they did at the factory. It made it very difficult to paint them and the rest of the rear of the tractor. Although it turned out well I will never do this again!

Edited by AC720Man - 14 Sep 2023 at 8:39pm