More work than I thought it might be

[dodge trucker]

but will be worth it in the end.

I have had a 129 for a few years, a 1X9 has been a machine I have been wanting since I was a kid, neighbor had one/ and all Dad would buy was another crappy cheap Crapsman LT, kinda jealous I guess.
I always liked the looks of that series of IH built tractor, the best. That, besides the neighbor down the street had his same Cub 1X9 (I think his was actually a 108 or 109, had green stripe) as several Crapsman LTs came and went, around my house.

I brought my 129 home and had to get it running "right away" when I got it. which I did. then it went to my buddy's barn til (I thought) the next spring, wound up being 3 springs coming and going, before I got it back home to get it all back together. at least the "got it back home" part.

In the meantime I acquired a "parts" 129, no engine, no trans, no wheels, for a couple of things it has that I need. cost me less than those few parts would have separately. It followed my original 129 to storage. Then I got a pkg deal of a 1200 and a 1650, 1200 was complete but hadn't run in years/1650 was engineless. Tried finding a Cub spec K341 last summer to no avail. only one that popped up was a bare block w/an asking price of $150. Forget that. tried to sell here and other places for what I thought was very fair and never got a nibble.

I found the Phillips gov gear retainer screw from the 1200 sitting on the frame, among old clippings soaked in oil/ so I decided to yank the engine and tear it apart, to see if anything was trashed within. It wasn't, but I still did a total overhaul. Got it running, got it almost debugged, and the guy who owns the barn where my 129 was stored, begged and pleaded me to sell him the 1200, so he would have a "backup" mower. then he proceeded to tear up the (new) clutch in short time, I have threads on the 2nd clutch rebuild on that machine, elsewhere here.
I know of 1 issue with the 129 from back when I got it, which was why I parked it for "later," in the 1st place. I wound up having to remove the driveshaft to allow the engine to start without the extra load of the tractor constantly wanting to lunge forward, no apparent neutral or reverse position. Yeah, the shift handle splines were stripped but hitting the neutral pedal would force the linkage back towards neutral, tried turning shift linkage with channellocks but never did find neutral or reverse.

so, this past weekend I got the 129, the parts 129 and the 1650 home, and started evaluating what I had out in the daylight with all 3 side x side.
plans are to take the ported pump and everything else associated with hydraulic lift off of the 1650, and the nice pit free hydro handle and any needed associated linkage from the parts 129 and put onto the running 129, then sell/trade/dispose of any good remaining leftover parts. I'm early in the process, so I'm nowhere near ready to start telling anyone what parts I may have left over yet. I have a bad habit of selling/ trading off good parts before I finish something, then having to pay more to re buy those parts than what I got for them..

got to looing at all of the different linkages for the hydro lift and though it still looks plenty doable, I didn't realize all of what would need swapped over to make the 129 a hyd. lift machine. more than I originally thought might need messing with..... still gonna go ahead with it.
though smaller than what I waned, I horse traded a guy some other leftover parts from past projects, for a very nice 42" triangle deck and mule drive that will look right at home on this machine. I have a 50A deck, 2 more 42" triangles and a 48" triangle deck in various conditions (all need stripping and paint) but for not much more than gas to run a 160 mi round trip, I got me a nice one that's very clean and don't need anything but a tractor to be mated to.... eventually would like to run either the triangle 48 or a 50, but for now.... this deck will do fine. Never have been much on posting pix to the various forums.... where's my kid when I need him?

any pitfalls/gotchas to be worried about in swapping the hydro stuff over to the 129? any feedback on the constant lurching/lunging forward issue? I haven't gotten the fender pan off yet, hopefully the cause of the lurch will make itself obvious once I get that apart.

and now I found a 109 that looks like a bailout after a partial (very nice apparently) start on a restoration that may eat up some of the other leftovers from the "parts" 129 and/or the 1650..... thinking of going after that one too.... the wife won't like that idea.

[sawdustdad]

That's a lot to digest. If I understand you want to put the hydraulic lift from the 1650 on the 129, plus some cosmetic stuff off the parts 129 to pretty up the target 129.

The hydro lift on the 1650 under the hood is basically the same as the 129, and the 129 dash tower should have the holes in it to accept the lift control handle. So swapping it out should work out OK.

Two approaches might be considered--swapping the entire rear end or just the hydrostat. Depends on brakes--if one has tractor has internal brakes and the other has disk brakes, then the linkages won't match up. So look at that.

The 1650 is such a nice machine, I'd tend to want to keep it in hopes of finding an engine. They are out there. Even if you had to put a 14 or 12 in it. It would be easier to find and install a 12hp in the 1650, than trying to get all the stuff working in the 129.

The 129 would work swell with a spring assist, a much less involved endeavor.

Go that route and you'd have two good tractors. That's what I'd do.

[CadetTommy]

I'll second the spring assist comment. My 126 has it and it works great, that's coming from someone whose other machines are all hydraulic lift too.

[dodge trucker]

Both the 129 and the 1650 are external disc.
I wanted to get the 1650 going in it's own right but tired of looking for a suitable engine. I have a couple of k 301s, a M12, an M14 and a tired but rebuildable k341. All wide base. No narrow base.
The 1650 is missing a few other things besides. I need to get rid of some of my "junk" as I have a feeling that my storage situation is going to change in a bad way later this year.
Besides my son getting married and I'm sure that I will have visitors to my place as a result. I'm going thru those engines to see which ones might be able to go on to CL.

So going to get the goody out of what I have. This is the best way that I know to do that.

I have been looking but don't see the same holes on the 129 towers as the 1650 has. So I'm probably going to swap those out along with the hydraulic valve and all that stuff.

Something weird is that the uprights on the tower of the 129 that I am putting the parts on to and the 1650 are white while the same parts on the other 129 are yellow.

Don't ask how I wound up this way, but I have 4 Ariens machines from the 70s and 80s with decks, and 1 each snowblower, rear mounted tiller, and snow blade. At least 1 of those things will probably be going away this season. Probably 2. One will be going to my son who just got a new to him house, with over an acre. The other one if it goes will be going to CL. I'm keeping the attachments though besides maybe a deck. I want this 129 as a keeper.
So I'm going to build a sort of custom machine from the best of what I have.
Always liked the cub cadets and for some reason the 70s/early 80s wheel horse but have never had one of those.

[ironman]

Now you got Johhny Cash singin' "One Piece at a Time" in my head. I just can't help it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18cW_yHo3PY

[dodge trucker]

But I have most of the pieces and then some on hand.
IDK if I said this earlier but the fact that there will be leftovers, I have my eye on a 109 that I discovered locally that looks like someone mostly restored but gave up on and the guy that has it now has made a parts tractor from. NO NO NO NOT another one, remember I need to thin my stash.....
I'm more of a Woodstock/early 70s rock/progressive rock fan, haha..... Last 3 concerts I went to (all in the last year) were Steve winwood, Hall and Oates, Paul mc cartney...... Though I love country living I'm not into the music associated with it, hahaha.

[dodge trucker]

Originally Posted by sawdustdad

That's a lot to digest. If I understand you want to put the hydraulic lift from the 1650 on the 129, plus some cosmetic stuff off the parts 129 to pretty up the target 129.

The hydro lift on the 1650 under the hood is basically the same as the 129, and the 129 dash tower should have the holes in it to accept the lift control handle. So swapping it out should work out OK.

Two approaches might be considered--swapping the entire rear end or just the hydrostat. Depends on brakes--if one has tractor has internal brakes and the other has disk brakes, then the linkages won't match up. So look at that.

The 1650 is such a nice machine, I'd tend to want to keep it in hopes of finding an engine. They are out there. Even if you had to put a 14 or 12 in it. It would be easier to find and install a 12hp in the 1650, than trying to get all the stuff working in the 129.

The 129 would work swell with a spring assist, a much less involved endeavor.
Go that route and you'd have two good tractors. That's what I'd do.

Huh. Just Huh.... I just got the body off of the 129 that I want to build up, and the fender pan is off, I didn't know this but this one has (had) spring assist on it already.

and there seems to be 2x the amount of dirt grease clippings and crap built up on this thing than I would think possible for its age... and yeah I know how old it is. Internally, the one that was less dirty outside, had more nasty sludge inside. The PO of this 129 did say that he had "just" changed the oil and fluid, and gave me a quart of Hy Tran to "top it off".... it was fuller and the fluid was cleaner, even though the outside was nastier.

I'm still gonna go thru with my original plan with combining the best of these 3 machines into one. but now that I see what I have, I may keep more of the remnants than I was going to originally, look around again for another Cub spec Kohler, and try to build up the other 129.... yet to be seen.... I don't have to be in a hurry to find an engine. there are a few other little pieces I'd need besides the engine....

I'm gonna leave the original rear end in this 129, and just swap out the hydros themselves. good thing that I got 2 sets of axle seals.

One difference between the pair of 129s, besides their completeness (or lack of) is that the one I am fixing up, has the serial tag on the rear end, the parts one has it on the side of the frame like the 1650 does, weird.
I ran the numbers on the fixer 129 when I got it, and it's a June '72 build. I haven't run the numbers on the other one yet. so I'm gonna just swap hydros and leave the original rear end in this tractor, both needed the cork gasket anyways, and this one is cleaner inside than the other one was. much less grime and sludge inside despite outward appearance. and I want the SN plate to stay with the machine.

and for those who said to fix up the 1650 instead of parting it, both 129s are in much better overall shape than the 1650 was, when I started. the 1650 looks like it was demo derby'd, and someone went crazy with a drill on its tower, too..... bunch of silly random ~1/8-3/16" holes below the key switch....

On the hydro situation... the #1 problem with this 129 when I got it was that it would go forward like gangbusters/ no neutral and no reverse. no matter the linkage position and yes the linkage did move the full expected range of motion... anywhere within that range it wanted to lunge forward and pretty hard, too. With both tractors of the 3 that had a trans and rear end intact, I don't see anything that jumps out at me to cause that.
When I got this machine, the PO did say that "it needs relief plungers, all of those machines need that" I don't believe that a problem with the relief plungers would cause this issue, when I have seen bad plungers, it would just "neutral out" when linkage is moved that way.


The corners of the trunnion that hold the springs has some wear in the very corners, probably 2x as much as the one out of the 1650, while the "chevy emblem" half looks good on both sets of linkage, I don't think that wear in these corners would cause that, or would it? I took a pair of channellocks and moved the linkage thru its complete range of motion while that tractor was running w/ the rear wheels jacked up and I couldn't get them to stop moving forward or go backward at all.
From what I see, I am guessing that I may have to go inside this other hydro itself, to find the issue.
I will be welding up the corner grooves in both trunnions and file them down flat and square.

[dodge trucker]

doesn't seem to be too many people commenting on this/ telling me what to look out for (pitfalls etc) or encouragement, etc but that's OK. Just so you guys know, I put a lot of what I do in this thread as a reminder later that I can look back on, in case I have any issues with this machine later so I can remember what all I did/didn't do to it.... as I get older I CRS any more..... and I am only 51...

I know you guys like pix but I'm a lot more "mechanical" and not so "techy". I'd still be happy w/a flip phone if I could find another... but enuf about me.


well, going back together... all cleaned up the best I could with butyl based degreaser, my (not so powerful) power washer, and a lot of good old scraping/scrubbing.... have the ported pump mounted, new engine side cup and coupler, new fan blade, new driveshaft (Thanks Jeff!!!)

I only had 2 QL rag joints on hand, I see that the older WF machines call for different one, IDK what the difference might be, bolt spacing on QL rag matched up so that's what I have in there at present.... don't know what might have been different with the "right" rag joint for a 1X9....

rebuilt the steering column from the 1650 and put that in there, cleaned up 40-ish years of grunge and crap out of the inside, bearings looked good, put in "steering improver" thrust bearing, regreased, put in new lash adjuster screw (thanks again Jeff) and it's mounted. I used this column because the hydro control valve already mounted to it, thought it would save me a step, gonna have to cut the bottom corner from the mount plate so the cylinder has room to mount..... the factory 1X9 hydro valve must mount different....
nothing a Sawzall won't fix.... structurally won't miss that corner on the mount plate/ see some on Ebay missing that corner anyways.

waiting for my son to finish making me new hoses from the valve to the cylinder, just because of the age of them.... nice he has the job that he does...
original wiring harness not too bad, 1 regulator wire has a bare spot that needs fixed, not bad enuf to replace the whole harness at the moment, just want the machine running again..... plan to pull back completely apart later once mechanical bugs are gone and I get to mow with it a bit for complete sandblast and repaint....
spirol pins missing from lift rockshaft on inside if frame... PO put bolts and nuts, shaved the bolt heads for clearance, good and tight, no slop....

ready to put fender pan back on, swap parts from the beat up 1650 tower to the 129's original tower... it's the nicest and straightest of the 3 towers that I have.

once I tear into the original 129's hydro pump and check out that spirol pin being broke idea, if that's all it winds up to be, that helps make up my mind as to what to do with the other partial 129 that I have.... I already have all new seals and gaskets in the 1650's rear end and have new material here to reline those brake pads.... and I have the spring assist that I didn't know was on this 129 to put on there as well.... the "parts" 129 frame seems the best of what I have here...
I have the new seals and gaskets in the 129s original rear end too, , all full of Farm and Fleet's version of Hy Tran....

In case anyone is following... can I wire in a newer (like what would be on a gear starter equipped Kohler) regulator or am I stuck with the points style regulator with a starter generator?

[sawdustdad]

Following but not commenting much 'cause it sounds like you're on a roll and extremely capable of doing anything you put your mind to. So carry on!

There are after market electronic ignition kits for these engines. kirkengines.com is one source, though I've never used their stuff. I've heard good stuff about them.

If the swash plate to control shaft pin in the hydro is broken, I'd be surprised but it could explain the inability to control the hydro and that situation would, I believe, cause it to run away forward.

The service manual has very specific instructions on swash plate removal, so my advice is follow carefully. If you mess up and drive the pin too far, you'll have much bigger problems.

The hydro is a fascinating device. So ingenious, yet so simple in concept.

Yeah, pictures or it didn't happen, BTW

[ironman]

Originally Posted by dodge trucker

In case anyone is following... can I wire in a newer (like what would be on a gear starter equipped Kohler) regulator or am I stuck with the points style regulator with a starter generator?

Generators and points style regulators have been working fine since before you were born (you said you're 51) so why you'd use the term "stuck" makes no sense. But the short answer to your question is yes, you're "stuck".