I lucked into a CII that is only about 10 miles from my house. 16' header with no special equipment (just straight bats) and some rust/rock holes in the bottom/floor that I will have to tackle. It has been inside and was supposedly last used 5 years ago. Other than the fans being packed with rat nest, everything seems to move. I did get it to run for 15-20 seconds but only with the choke on, so I pulled the carb off and am cleaning it up. It was converted to a Carter electric fuel pump at some point but after repairing rat-chewed wires and getting good 12V to it, turns out that pump is toast.

The cooling system took about 1.5 gallons and later on I discovered a pinhole leak in the radiator just below the top hose connection. The gearbox for the steering shaft at the bottom of the cab seems to be empty. Otherwise the tires all took air and you can steer it with no engine power fairly well. Trans and finals were all full up to the check plugs. I changed engine and air cleaner oil. Still need to hit all of the grease zerks, reinstall the carb, and wait for the new fuel pump to show up.

Anything specific on these that I should for sure check before I try to road it 10 miles home? I have done nothing as far as the separating mechanism is concerned - I don't plan on touching that until I have time to clean it out and change some sprockets, chains, and belts. I'll leave it shut off for now.

Will do. I got a bunch of spare belts, but I think the only wider belts I got were all the same PN and those were for the pivot drive.

I only have ~20 acres in tillable right now, but there's another 60 or so that used to be tillable decades ago but is now pasture. I may convert some of that back to tillable at some point. A CII is bigger than I need but storage wise, they're basically the same height as an A, F, or K. I'm looking at wheat, soybeans, oats, and milo.

You had one? What all did you harvest with yours?

Might want to check your brake quick also...make sure they are clean and dry and the linkages are all free...I think I have a NOS engine belt if you are interested.

Crud in the gas tank might be the big problem with the engine not being able to stay running - not the electric pump.

Over the years, my dad had an A, K and F.  All of them had issues with crud in the fuel tank.

Regarding the gas tank - it appears to be rusty probably up under the top side of the tank. The sides and bottom look okay, at least from what I can see through the filler hole. That support/baffle is going to make it fun to clean out, and I assume there's another one on the other side of the outlet between it and the other end of the tank.

When I got the engine started I failed to mention I was gravity feeding the carb with a short hose from a garden tractor gas tank. The carb is all cleaned up and half back together now (waiting on some gasket sheeting to show up).

I also picked up a 6 gallon boat gas tank today, with the primer bulb fuel line and everything. I think that plus a good working new fuel pump should get me home. If it burns through more than 6 gallons of gas in the ~10 miles, I'll have another 5 gallon container with me as well.

I actually think I lucked into a replacement floor that the guy must have purchased. Found it outside the shed and it sure seems to be the right dimensions. That will not be a quick fix so I may order some of that poly if I get into a time crunch.

I am seriously debating trying to plant some beans or milo for the first time but I have a few pieces of equipment to get fixed first.

Mike, that's what I'm worried about here with the baffles. I think I will just have to clean and flush the tank as best as I can - maybe acid wash? Then just keep changing sediment bowls and filters.

I'm not sure I would feel right just keeping the boat tank on there for eternity and constantly filling it... although for my acreage, that might work - ha.

I hit as many of the grease zerks for the steering/brakes/engine/trans drive as I could yesterday. The pedal shaft zerks under the cab sure are a bear to access. Filling the steering gearbox also wasn't great but it's full for now. I was unable to find one zerk, though. I think the I got the #20 clutch sleeve bearing assuming that's the one that's on the cast housing going from the pulley on into the transmission, and I know I got #19 on the end of the sheave hub. I don't think I found the #21 clutch operating shaft fitting so I need to maybe crawl under there with a flashlight. That might be on the linkage from the clutch pedal, closer to the clutch?

The power steering started working after about 1/2 mile which was nice. I think one of the brakes may be dragging a little as there was some slight lurching and rhythmic whining. It seemed to go away on downhills, though.

Thanks. I think your fuel usage estimate must be pretty close. I used about 4 gallons on the drive home, and I should've been going twice the distance in that time if the variable speed would've worked.

Now to save up for a shed to put all of this stuff in.

The gas motor on mine started instantly as soon as you hit the key. I always loved that part. 

You might want to  run it around the lot quite a bit before you hit the road with it and see if all feels good or not. I think you will have a lot of carb problems on your way home with it. That was always the problem with mine. I would drive it 50 miles 1 way between jobs and was always cleaning the carb along the road. No big deal but kinda a danger in traffic.

plummerscarin, thanks for the story! We don't seem to have foxtail too bad here - Johnsongrass and cheat are the main problems, but point taken. I'm sure at some point I will push the limits and find out what it takes to plug it, ha.

I did engage the separating side of things yesterday and augered out a bunch of chaff, baby rats, and nesting material. Got one of the adult rats but there is still at least one more and it's a big one. The raddle for sure was not moving so I have been chipping away at pulling out all the rat junk they packed into it.

My dad and I were doing some in the field maintenance (many years ago).  We went to lunch.  Forgot  to tighten some chains.  Next thing we knew, the fan housing was full of wheat. Broke the spiders and fan blades.  The nice thing was my dad knew it was his fault and did not yell at me.

My CII runs on propane.

Near Udall.  Northwest of Winfield.

Made a run to Schmidt and Sons in Winfield, this morning.  

Great dealership.  The have the parts and the answers too.

Working the bugs out of  a F2 for a friend of mine.

The variable speed hydraulic seal started pukeing  fluid.  Getting ready to go to the field and install the new seals.

The a/c works great in the F2.  My C2 has a water cooler.

Mine didnt have many acres ever run thru it before I got it from the looks of it. Any I sold it to a friend who used for many years after that and he too liked it. Just stay out of the foxtail!!!! LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm not far at all from Clay. Schmidt and Sons must be one of the best AGCO dealers in the world for covering the older stuff. We are lucky they are so close.

Covers are all opened. I still have a mess in the raddle but everything else has been cleaned out and left open.

Thanks for the tip on the choke. I don't have that down yet but I can tell there is some magical combination that lets it start. It could still be that the ignition needs gone through better or the rings are just worn out, but even with a fresh carb teardown and cleanout, this was the most finicky starting gas engine I've maybe every touched.

I don't think I'd ever get a custom combiner into my 20 acres at a decent time, or maybe ever. Custom hay is just as bad here. You have to do it yourself or you're waiting until months after the time was right.

They also probably can't turn those huge headers around in half of my little fields. Ha!

I am curious how much loss I will have in soybeans with this rig.

I do have to look into the beater sprockets still. I keep forgetting to get a tooth count on mine to see what I have, but out here in wheat country, it may not be setup for what is ideal for soybeans. Maybe AGCO still has some of those and the cylinder speed sprockets available if I'm lucky. I hope I can make the 800 RPM slowest speed out of the belt drive cylinder setup work for beans, but it might be good to have the slowdown sprockets and chain setup in my back pocket. It gets awfully hot and dry out here.

The manual says to use 800 RPM on them, but I am suspicious that AC stated that mostly because 800 was the slowest you could run with the cylinder belt drive setup that was on the CIIs. To go slower you had to swap on a chain drive with the sprockets you wanted. Not sure if any of the AIIs had belt drive cylinders, so they may have all started off with sprockets and then you could change out easily for slower speeds?

The lurching was really bad - put it in first gear, let off the clutch, and it would just lurch over and over again even if you were going up a hill (constant loading on shafts etc.). Granted, I haven't run any other old Gleaners, but it felt abnormal.

I decided to pull off the steering brake covers today and I'm glad I did. I decided that milo leaves were wrapping around the axle shaft and were just thin enough to get past the felt seal on the axle. Of course the cylinder must have been leaking too.

That sounds more like what I would expect. Hopefully the chain drive setup isn't too expensive to find.

I know the book says to pull the false floor out the front but I pulled it out the back since I have the separator beater and straw walkers already out. It seemed easier since the header is still on.

Got the parts combine that came with the running one home today. I had pulled the axle couplings for the flat tow, but the steering brakes didn't work and the thing rolled way easier than anyone expected. So, after the scariest 30 seconds of my life with the combine blasting down a hill and steering that takes 2 spins of doing nothing and then all of a sudden turns the wheels, I reconnected the shafts and the trans brake at least worked even if we were backdriving the transmission for 5-6 miles.

This one is a 19XXX serial number and the air cleaner and other loose parts I found nearby indicate it was a diesel (engine long gone). That must have been a closer to end of production, top of the line Gleaner back in the day and I have to assume it was on the custom cutter circuit when it was new. Then the G replaced it in the lineup if I recall correctly. Lots of parts are worn out but I should be able to pick enough good stuff to cut down on my impending parts order with AGCO.

The cab seems decent too but not sure it's worth going to the trouble of swapping it over to the running combine any time soon.

I hate to disagree with your vast Gleaner knowledge, but I can for certain say that the 262 turbodiesel was an option on the CII (not sure if it was available yet when the straight C was in production?). Both the gas and diesel 262 motors are covered in my owner's and service manuals, and it's also in the AGCO parts book online. You just don't hardly see any of them so there must not have been too guys many that ordered the diesel back then.

Speaking of the parts book, I did eventually find this exact high-low transmission option shown in AGCO's parts book. My paper service manual only mentions the "low speed auxiliary transmission" which has to be what you are referring to. The high-low must have come out later in production. I am not sure if you had only 2 total high and low ranges or if there was a high-direct-low for 3 sets of speeds. I can't find much info on it.

I am finding these had a lot of neat options that Gleaner probably didn't make too many of in total over production.

We'll have to get you into a CII sometime! They seemed to have been a really popular combine out here in wheat country. I have lots to learn about the other models as I've pretty well been laser focused on the C/CIIs since I brought this one home and always enjoy reading your posts.

CII is a good machine.