Cllutch Woes

Posted once before about this on the Allis forum, but this seems to be a more appropriate place for it.

(BTW, this is the same thing I need to replace the widow maker rims on)

Questions relate to a Deweze Hay Monster, which was a commercial made contraption used for hauling small square hay bales.  Built in the early 70's from a variety of sourced parts, but centered around a Chrysler 318 engine, New Process 540 truck transmission. Similar to a 30' school bus chassis with flat deck on top. But as for those parts.....there is no parts book for this thing. It could be anything. Cast number on the engine shows it to be a "race engine", with no VIN stamp on it. So just a generic small block 318 that could have been in anything. Worse, this isn't the original 318.....it is a replacement engine. No idea what was replaced......just the block, or an entire engine found somewhere. I suspect just the block, but hard to know for sure.

But now roughly 50 years old and passed down through who knows how many owners and now an accumulation of untold numbers of modifications......often of the hurry up variety to get it running ASAP by shade tree mechanics working without the benefit of the shade tree.....and for as little cost as possible. It came to me with no fewer than 3 bundles of baling wire lashed near the engine and cockpit, ready for instant use when needed. I'm in the process of restoring it to usable condition......and trying to do it right without the baling wire or chewing gum.

So we got engine running, but quickly found the clutch to be stiff to the point of being almost unusable. Dangerous......if so stiff you can't push in the clutch to stop it.

About the clutch......when it left the factory in Harper, KS, it appears to have had a hydraulic clutch. That had been replaced at some point with a mechanical clutch cable, running through a series of high friction blocks and turns.

Before it came to me, it had sat idle for the past 4 or 5 years. Throw out bearing and shaft looked "gummy" from old engine oil....so was stiff. Hit it with brake cleaner, then some Free All and it has loosened up a bit, but is still stiff.

Plans are to go back to the hydraulic clutch system. Found a match for master and slave.....but hit a snag on the install. Clutch yolk is apparently not right.

Should be a ball type clutch fork similar to this one........

http://www.brewersperformance.com/proddetail.php?prod=CF-BALL

Ad suggests that is 13 1/4" from tip to tip. Existing clutch fork is only 11 1/4" and because it is used with a cable system, does not have a ball end for the push rod from the slave.

As near as I can tell it is also reversed. Most of these clutch bell housings have the clutch yolk on the left (driver) side. This on is on the right. So probably not off a Dodge.....could be just about anything.

So looking for advice. This has to be viewed almost from the standpoint of this being something like an off road or  pulling truck or something shop built (which for all practical purposes it is).

I'm thinking the existing yolk is probably off a car or something, and if I replaced it with the one that is 2 inches longer, the extra leverage I'd gain would help ease the clutch pedal pressure?

Or.....does anyone have a truck transmission of this type to confirm what it is I have or what I need to get this working as it is supposed to?

(PS: Working with this thing makes a guy appreciate the Agco Parts Book website. Parts may no longer be available for your D15, but at least there is a schematic to show you what it was supposed to look like. I have found some Mopar parts sites, but many of the older models are not included.......1984 is as far as some of them go back).

I think Massey-Harris-Ferguson used Chrysler engines but they may have been 6 cylinder flatheads.

Best bet would be to find a big Dodge Truck (D400-D700) or Dodge LCF series which was more of an over the road semi from the late 60s,early 70s that would have a hydraulic clutch. But then again these are not just sitting around like a Ford from the same vintage.

This is the first I have heard of this brand of small bale pickup. The Dew-eze brand itself is not new to me,but don't know that I have ever seen any of there equipment in person. In the west NH has owned the market forever,with a Freeman brand machine every one in a 100  or maybe a 1000.  Now with big bales there maybe a few more options.   

I always found it odd that my dad "discovered" these machines after my brother and I moved off the farm. He also said I was special 'cause I got to work up in the the barn in the shade.

Would one of these that was self propelled have they clutch system you are looking for?

hey maybe i can help you out with the break bleed thing

all you need to do to bench bleed the master cylinder is clamp it in a vice and make some lines to run from the fitting holes back into the reservoir,,,,so it makes a circle of fluid,,,the end of the line needs to stay UNDER the fluid level so it does not suck air back into the line,,,fill the reservoir with fluid and push the piston in and out a few times till you dont get any bubbles coming out,,,,take the lines out and put your plugs back in and you are ready to go,,,,,do the pumping slow,,,if you leave the top off,,,,,or you will have break fluid all over the place,,,,lol,,,,go ahead,,,ask me how i know this,,,,lol

as for bleeding the breaks,,,after you get the master back on and the lines hooked up,,,,,MAKE SURE TO KEEP THE MASTER CYLINDER TOPPED OFF,,,,go to the farthest bleeder from the master cylinder,,,put a short hose on the bleeder so the fluid can run into a pan or bottle to catch it,,,,,,open the bleeder valve and let the fluid run for a while,,,the longer the better,,,,it will push out all the old fluid and the air,,,,when you think it has run long enough,,,( i like to let it go for at least 12 hours ),,,close that bleeder and move to the next longest line,,,do the same with it,,,and the next longest line,,,,and then the last line,,,,,just make sure to keep an eye on the fluid level in the master,,,,at this point you should have new fluid in the system and have breaks,,,,until you blow one of the old rotten lines out that is,,,,,but the gravity bleed will get you good breaks and it is pretty easy to do

hope this can help you out on your project and get you running till you can get your hay in

my daughter lives in Ohio and has a horse operation,,,she was telling me hay is really high,,,,they have around 40 horses and i think they use about 4000 bales a year,,,,wheeew ,,,i dont want that feed bill  

hope this helps you out,,,good luck with your project

ocharry

Finally got around to putting together a video on the monster......

[TUBE]onIsfsSXRXc[/TUBE]

Got the brake lines bled and purged.....so working brakes....if you keep the reservoir topped up.  Still working on the parking brake and replacement clutch fork. Came with an electronic mico parking brake system, but NP 540 transmission has a band type parking brake on the back......and I have a source of a manual "over center" parking brake lever and cables, so thinking of going that route. Previous owner just chocked the wheels.......cement block, hay bale.....whatever was handy.

Clutch issue has finally been resolved.

History is previous owner had abandoned the hydraulic clutch in favor of a high friction, high effort cable system due to a strong clutch spring. I was able to find replacements for the clutch master, clutch slave and the lines were found to be clogged, but still OK, so once I got those cleaned out, it went back together and all worked.

Complication for me was bad advice from a guy at the NAPA store who told me I'd need to use a cutoff bolt on the slave. That would have meant the clutch fork was wrong. It wasn't. All I needed was the correct type linkage bolt for the clutch fork. Discovered that when I found this replacement clutch fork.....which is identical to the one already on it. That simplified things greatly......

What I needed was that bolt. But then ran into problems when I found out the bolt wasn't long enough. Likely the guy who took it off the salvage yard truck didn't get it all. There is another piece that is needed for that bolt to be long enough to reach the clutch slave cylinder when fully compressed. Like 4 inches too short. That came with a clutch fork adapter kit.....which included a yolk for the clutch master, push rod for that, plus parts for the slave that I didn't know I needed. These parts....

Universal push rod end on top would have worked, but was too thick to fit through the slot in the fork, but could have been dressed down on the grinder to make it work. Once I could finally see how it was all supposed to work, lights came on and things went together pretty fast.

Before.....

And after.....

And the clutch master installed and rigged.......

As previously stated, although I've got a small selection of wrenches, it has been over 40 years since anybody paid me to use them on things mechanical.......so as long as it is simple, I can do it. But with any of it, helps to know what you are doing. I didn't before.....but do now. Mostly.

But as for the clutch, it's working......and is less than half the effort of the cable system. A guy had to stand on that pretty hard to get it to work. Much easier to use now.

By end of day tomorrow, it may also have an Orschlen over center mechanical parking brake installed on it.