CC 149 Winter Projects.

[ironman]

Thank you for pointing out your superior education and talents and my obvious lack of such. Congratulations on your big balls and ego to match.

I apologize to Ambush for hijacking his thread, now lets get back to it.

[Ambush]

I've survived fifty years, hands on, in heavy industry and still have all my body parts intact and functional, so I'm fairly confident in my ability to asses and mitigate dangers. But thanks for the concern.

And I always appreciate all the solid, free and generously given expert advice I've gotten here on OCC. And there are Experts here, professional or not!

I don't worry about show quality because I'd have to drive an awful lot of miles to get to a show anyway even if I could find one. I've never even seen another CUB for sale closer than five hours drive and most are a full day one way. So yeah, it's just for my enjoyment and pleasure since there's nobody else around to to like or dislike.

I've been gone for a couple days. Did an eight hour one way road trip to see a friend and pick up a tig welder. They decommissioned the tig welder at my old workplace and I've been missing that capability.

Hopefully I can make some progress over the next few days. A PO had rattle canned a light layer on the underside, but that sanded off pretty quick. I'm out of glazing putty for the small nicks on the topside, so have to pick some up before priming the top. I've got a month of winter left and another month of early spring and in reality it will be May before I can do any ground work, especially tilling. Kind of anxious to try out the modifications on the tiller!

[garydee]

Must be tough up there in BC during the winter...very cold! Don't know how you do it!

You seem quite ambitious for seasoned veteran. Hearing you tell about all the work you are doing on your 1450 made me think that you were some young, give it hell kind of guy not aware of all the hazards involved when working indoors. Glad to hear you are a very experienced individual who knows the dangers of lead paint and fumes etc...

I look forward to seeing your 1450 when it's finished. It's always nice to stand back and look over the results when all is said and done. Very satisfying!

Sorry that Ironman and I got into some elephant dung and hijacked your thread. He must know you better than I and is confident that you are in no danger doing what you like to do.

I apologize to both of you for pressing my safety point a little too far. I'm sure both of you are nice guys and I appreciate each of you sharing your knowledge and experience with everyone, myself included, on the OCC site. Thanks for understanding!

[Ambush]

It’s been a few days with some other demands in my time, but a few things are moving along. The second coat is on the underside of the pan. The fuel tank, bands and brackets have one coat.

I had a couple of surprises, one being a minor annoyance. I bought a rattle can of high build primer and as I was shaking it, I thought ”that doesn’t feel full”. On looking at the top and nozzle, it had been used and cleaned. Some cheap weiner bought it, used half, then whined his way into a refund. Some people.

Then came a pleasant surprise. I figured I should give the inside of the fuel tank a good clean and inspection. I stripped the outside bare and it is basically pristine. Nice! I pulled the petcock and it’s clean as a whistle too, no rust, no debris and not crushed, torn or damaged in any way. And this inside of the tank is bare and super clean. Not a spec of rust to be found. Now I can’t see past the baffle, but I have no reason to think it’s any different there. With all
the horror stories I’ve heard concerning old fuel tanks, I was pretty happy!

I’m probably going to start some engine work now between painting. My first chore is to get the exhaust elbow out without damage to the block, but that’s easy enough.

I’m also going to reengineer the whole rear lift system. I much prefer that kind of work compared to painting and I’m kinda eager to get to it.

[Ambush]

I decided to get the elbow out first. I cut it off at the top of the threads with a Sawzall which left enough to grab and collapse the thread remaining in the block. I first crushed it some with vice grips which is sometimes enough on tapered pipe thread. It wasn’t. At this point I should have taken a hacksaw blade and put a slit in it as that’s the safe thing to do.

But I decided to run the risk of crushing it a bit more all around then welding a thick piece of bar onto the pipe, hoping the combination of crushing and heat would convince it to say “uncle”. I poured some extra weld to it to cause more heat and in turn more shrinkage when it cooled That worked and it gave up fairly easily. If that hadn’t worked, I would have had to zipcut the metal block off and slit the nipple.

When the time comes, I’ll just weld part of a black pipe nipple onto the elbow at the desired length.

[garydee]

Making good progress on your Cub!

Just wondering, what kind of loader you have for your 149 and how much weight will you be able to lift with a ballast box on the 3 point? Is it a Johnson?

Also will you need to beef up or replace the front axle to take the extra weight carried by the loader. As I recall from my Dad's 149, most of the older cubs had a front axle that didn't look as though it could easily carry a very heavy implement.

What will you have to do to be able to make your 149 capable of handling the loader attachment?

[Ambush]

I built the loader three years ago and it has moved a lot of dirt and gravel. I've made no mods to the steering knuckles yet and may not. So far everything has stood up very well. The hydraulics are capable of lifting way more than the tractor should/could handle, but that's where the human brain should takeover. I'm not shy about using equipment but I find it wrong to abuse equipment.

With fluid filled tires, 75 pounds per tire of wheel weights and 360 pounds of suitcase weights on the back, the loader will lift the back end. System pressure is 1,500 PSI. When breaking out, just heel the bucket and save the overload on the front end.

I built a foot control so I could have both arms to steer as its a bear at low speeds with a load up front.

[garydee]

Wow! That's sure a tough tractor to be able to carry a heavy load in the bucket with all that ballast on the back and not break the front axle!

Do you have hydraulic pump running off the pto to supply the hydraulic lines? 1500# is a fair amount of pressure, so it sounds like the loader can lift an curl reasonably fast. Where is the joystick located? Also, the foot pedal is a great idea to free up your hands!

Have you posted any pictures of your loader build? It's always fascinating to see how things are made. You have a lot of talent and skill to be able to fabricate something like a loader. I bet many OCC members would enjoy seeing some pictures if you have some. You take good pictures BTW!

I have restored 4 tractors thus far and I appreciate all the that goes into into each project. Nice that you are documenting your progress together with many explanations of how you are doing things. Lots to learn from and lots of fun to see! Keep up the good work!

[Ambush]

I chronicled the whole loader build on OCC.

You can google “OCC Ambush loader build 149” and that should take you to it.

That was one of my Covid Projects. I had a lot of landscaping to do so it was a fun and worthwhile project.

[Ambush]

Busy day today but not much tractor time. I got a first coat of paint on the topside of the pan. Got the engine stripped enough to give it an initial degreasing. But with wet paint in the area I didn’t want to kick up too much dust, so I moved on to other small things.