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Les Kerf 
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Joined: 08 May 2020
Location: Idaho
Points: 1310
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 Topic: Another Model C
Posted: 27 Aug 2025 at 12:02pm |
A 'Friend' of mine showed up last Friday with this Model C on his trailer and refused to leave without unloading it 
The engine is stuck, the tires are poor but they hold air, it rolls freely and the brakes seem to work, and the transmission shifts into all gears. The radiator is either brand new or has been rebuilt, it has a new temperature gauge and a new oil pressure gauge. It also has a 1-3/8" PTO shaft.
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ACinSC
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Joined: 16 Dec 2015
Location: South Carolina
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Posted: 27 Aug 2025 at 12:06pm |
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My kinda friend!!
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plummerscarin
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Joined: 22 Jun 2015
Location: ia
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Posted: 27 Aug 2025 at 12:08pm |
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Looks like it’s been in a sand storm
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Les Kerf
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Location: Idaho
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Posted: 27 Aug 2025 at 12:24pm |
 plummerscarin wrote:
Looks like it’s been in a sand storm |
The color doesn't show well in the photo but it was painted silver 
He got this tractor thinking it would be a good parts machine for the derelict Model C I have been tinkering with, trouble is, this one looks to be in MUCH better condition  My Grandson is already making plans for it 
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Les Kerf
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Location: Idaho
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Posted: 01 Sep 2025 at 7:27am |
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Grandson got the engine unstuck yesterday afternoon; it rotates freely with the handcrank and makes enough compression to push your finger off the spark plug hole on all four cylinders.
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wjohn
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Joined: 19 Jan 2010
Location: KS
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Posted: 01 Sep 2025 at 8:59am |
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That does look better than the other tractor - and now the engine is free. What's the serial number?
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1939 B, 1940 B, 1941 WC, 1951 WD, 1952 CA, 1956 WD-45
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Les Kerf
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Posted: 01 Sep 2025 at 3:31pm |
wjohn wrote:
That does look better than the other tractor - and now the engine is free. What's the serial number? |
82029 I think that puts it as a solid 1949 model?
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wjohn
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Posted: 01 Sep 2025 at 3:37pm |
Les Kerf wrote:
82029 I think that puts it as a solid 1949 model?
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1950! That should be within the last couple thousand built - about when they were changing over to the CA. I was guessing it was a later model so that makes sense. I'm not sure what year they went to 1 3/8" PTO shafts and AGCO's parts book doesn't show a SN break.
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1939 B, 1940 B, 1941 WC, 1951 WD, 1952 CA, 1956 WD-45
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steve(ill)
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Posted: 01 Sep 2025 at 3:50pm |
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my 1940 B had a 1-1/8 pto... my 1942 had a 1-3/8 pto... Dont know if it was original, but that what i got..
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Like them all, but love the "B"s.
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Les Kerf
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Location: Idaho
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Posted: 17 Sep 2025 at 1:54pm |
It runs!
(kinda sorta) 
A fresh set of plugs and a borrowed magneto from Mr. Cato's tractor got it going. I did a very minimal cleaning of the carburetor (it actually looked pretty good) and was able to hand-crank it to start. It wants a whole bunch of choke to keep running and there is significant exhaust blast blowing down behind the manifold so I suspect a manifold leak. But it makes noise now!
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Les Kerf
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Posted: 17 Sep 2025 at 5:00pm |
Grandson managed to drive it about 50 yards to get it to the shop. It doesn't need any choke so long as it is kept throttled back, so it putt-putted in first gear quite nicely. I may be wrong about the manifold leak as it looks like it was just burning off some oily reside. More investigation is warranted.
The engine sounds good and doesn't smoke. The oil pressure is in the upper region of 'NORMAL' on the gauge; I am draining the oil which is nasty black so a fresh filter will likely drop the pressure a bit.
We didn't run it long enough to verify the temperature gauge.
The transmission is noisy which isn't surprising considering the fact that there is no rubber boot on the shifter and the transmission was full of mostly water. I filled it with ISO 46 hydraulic fluid because that's what I had available. The PTO and hydraulic pump seem to work, the cylinder extends nicely but has nothing attached to push against. It does have the little two-way valve to allow running different circuits. The belt pulley leaks oil.
The starter is AWOL and the generator appears to be just a placeholder, the wiring is junk.
All in all I am quite pleased thus far
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Les Kerf
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Posted: Yesterday at 9:59am |
wjohn wrote:
Les Kerf wrote:
82029 I think that puts it as a solid 1949 model?
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1950! That should be within the last couple thousand built - about when they were changing over to the CA. I was guessing it was a later model so that makes sense. I'm not sure what year they went to 1 3/8" PTO shafts and AGCO's parts book doesn't show a SN break. |
Curiously, this tractor does not have the two bolsters on the front for mounting a cultivator, nor does Mr. Cato's tractor which I believe to be a 1942 or earlier.
There is no telling what parts may have been swapped around in the past 70+ years.
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Les Kerf
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Posted: 1 hour 36 minutes ago at 9:22am |
Grandson jacked up the left front wheel and inspected the wheel bearings because it had a lot of slop, it looked like someone had recently serviced it with fresh grease so he adjusted it and put it back together.
The right front wheel is missing the cover and they had a juice can stuffed over the spindle and held on with a hose clamp. When he jacked it up the wheel was quite difficult to rotate by hand. Hmmm, not a good sign.
At first glance the 'grease' looked weird, sorta brownish-tan and VERY stiff. I commented to Grandson that I had never seen the like. There was some dust embedded in the surface, which isn't surprising due to the poor dust cover, but the dust didn't seem to have penetrated very far. I had to use an old broken-bladed pocket knife to literally cut the 'grease' away from the nut in order to access the cotter pin and get a wrench on the nut; the nut required using the wrench all the way off rather than being able to spin it by hand like a normal situation.
I could then pull the wheel/hub assembly from the spindle and could see that the entire hub cavity was stuffed full of this goop. The large inner bearing on the spindle could only be rotated with considerable difficulty by hand, and the outer bearing was 'glued' into the hub so tight that I had to push it out with a stick.
As I was cutting, digging, scraping, and prying this 'grease' out of the hub cavity I was puzzling over what kind of grease could possibly harden in this manner, it looked more like wax than grease. Aha! Eureka! That's what it is! This stuff looks, feels, smells, and sticks to your hands exactly like the wax toilet rings used to seal the base of a toilet to the pipe underneath.  One thing for sure, it most certainly is NOT grease!
Repeated heavy spraying and wiping with brake cleaner soon had the bearings freed up and spinning nicely; they have discoloration from sitting in one place too long and slight pitting. Normal folks would replace them, but since this tractor isn't going to be driven very far any time soon (like in my lifetime) they are going right back in.
I have no idea how someone managed to stuff that much wax into the bearings and spindle cavity, it was so completely full that it almost had to have been melted and poured in. Perhaps they removed the entire spindle assembly from the axle and did just that. I dunno. 
In conclusion, I do not recommend using toilet wax as a suitable replacement for wheel bearing grease; on the plus side, however, it did not leak out!
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