Farmall Cub

Hmmmm........

Good observations and opinions by everyone. We'll get to the last of it.

Do we agree that the fender in the parts book is a fender with a relief for a lo boy ?

Agreed.

I'm gonna go out and look at my early 60's round nose Lo-Boy with the trencher tomorrow. Maybe it has the special fender. FORTUNATELY (haha), for me....it's the only offset LoBoy I have!

Boss Hog wrote:Do we agree that the fender in the parts book is a fender with a relief for a lo boy ?

I don't think so. I would have thought so at first but after seeing Jim's on an angle and the line you drew Jim's looks just like the one in the book.

We will have to agree to disagree then.

I guess nobody even looked at the additional pictures I posted from the manuals(on pg 5 of this thread) and I wasted my time even posting them . To believe the manual drawings are always (take it to the bank) exact would mean we have a bunch of additional fenders with weird shapes and sizes. Also, If someone would place Boss' picture in a "paint" program and erase the part that was cut off, you'd see a way different picture. Way different than even the badly shown original manual picture. Looking closely at the additional pictures should put the cut off manual fender saga to rest.


Whoever ends up with the fender of Boss' needs to (1)remove the paint from the front section. (2) look closely at the 1/2" round piece on the edge and make a conclusion if it's a piece of tubing, a piece of solid roundstock, or if there is a machine out there that can roll heavy sheet metal to form a tight complete round curve and also be able to form it with a compound curve of the fender. Least this will determine if a piece was indeed added and we can agree on something Remember, a good metal man can lay a piece along the edge, form the sheetmetal with a body hammer, weld/grind weld/grind and do a good enough job that you'll have to look pretty close to see the evidence. There's guy out there that could add a piece and never use any filler, just takes more time. To find a flaw when inspecting the piece takes wanting to find the evidence and really looking closer. My money is on a piece of solid roundstock. The guy would have form the rounstock to lay in place, tack welded it, trimmed off the sheetmetal carefully with the cutoff wheel, then started to carefully weld things up and grind. Repeating the process till he was satisfied with his work.

I don't know about the rest of you, but lately it's been exciting to visit the site to read the latest I probably won't reply any more to this thread, I'm about out of things to say My wish would be that others not reply till they take time to read all the given material.

Rick

Boss Hog wrote:Do we agree that the fender in the parts book is a fender with a relief for a lo boy ?

Lots of interesting discussion. Back when I was in college and had no money my hobby was looking at my Super A and Farm Implements for Use with the Super A parts books. So no I haven't seen it all, but the illustrations in those manuals were pretty dead-on to the real thing. To me there is no way the two fenders pictured from the parts book look the same. In real life they may be, but I don't see how anyone can argue with what's there in black and white. I am talking about the illustration, I realize the book still calls the same part number for both. In my opinion this was another one of those things that IH didn't document. Maybe like the '48 trimmed dash they tried some trimmed fenders to see what it would look like and how they would work. Maybe the original plan was for a modified fender but the plan changed after the parts books were done (I think about the '84-'85 Super 70's--they made less than 40 of them before the buyout but all the parts books, manuals, literature were already printed). I haven't see it up close, but I am a little less inclined to think some welding shop did it. If an owner got tired of climbing over that fender, odds are he would either just take it off, or grab the torch and start cutting. If it is fabbed up from steel tubing or whatever, again who's to say someone at Louisville didn't do it? Again maybe a prototype part, test part, etc. Again thinking about the trimmed dash, it's a neat little "detail" but everytime I see one I think "What were they (IH) thinking??" So if they would take that much time to fiddle with a dash design, I see no reason why they couldn't fiddle with a fender.

We may never know for sure but it is fun to talk "what if." I see no harm in doing just that. If anyone is troubled by it, stop reading.....

Al

Wether or not Boss's fender is factory or custom made, it is hard to dispute that IH did have the intent (emphasis on intent)on two different fenders. The parts manual definately shows it. They do reserve the right to change the design of there parts at any time. just deal with the facts and dont assume hypothetical ideas. The facts speak for themselves. Not trying to hurt anyones pride. IT is what it is. Lets see if we can find any parts manuls or documentation that supersedes what we have seen.

I looked into the service bulletin question. I don't know of any comlete compilation of IH bulletins. I did check the most complete index I know of. I found one bulletin on Cub fenders. It is dated February 21, 1956. So it was released just after the 1/56 parts catalog that includes the drawing we have been discussing. Clearly this bulletin applies to fenders as in that drawing. It itemizes the changes to both the left and right fenders and changes to the platform. Nothing about sawing off the end off.

Thanks to the Wisconsin Historical Society for sending me the bulletin.

Across the 13 years from '56 through '68, the most likely time frame for a Cub fender bulletin, there were about 2,700 bulletins and about 95% of them are accounted for. (I checked all years, these numbers are just to indicate relative likelihood another was missed).

Guys, this has been a very interesting conversation, but I want to identify something I thought was obvious way back when Boss posted it. On Boss's 3rd post (Jan 7) where he showed the close up photos of the fender. On the third photo down, you can actually see at the bottom of the filler rod, where it was welded and ground off, at the bottom. There is a little angled piece that is obvious weld that has been ground off, right above the nut holding the plate onto the fender. I'm sorry, but I'm not a great metal fabricator, but I could have done this cutoff job and welded in a piece of bent rod then ground it out smooth.

I submit to you, not so good welding job that you couldn't tell it had ever been welded, from my 65 Lo-boy that had a loader on it, and someone chopped off the seat bracked so the loader mount would work:


And after:



It would be a simple job. Also, I can assure you that it's HIGHLY unlikely that IH did this at the factory, or we would see MANY more of them, and would see an obvious part number difference, neither of which are there. As Rick said, the rest of the fender is stamped, and this is obviously a piece of rod welded to the fender. There's NO WAY that they would have stamped a fender, then taken the time and money to weld in a filler rod. They REALLY would not have cared about the access to the platform, or they would have done it back when the Lo-boys started production, along with all the other changes they made to actually build a Lo-Boy Cub tractor. Re-tooling the fast hitch, rotating the final drives and adding/utilizing the extra holes needed to make it work, etc. I'm certain they would have done the fender at the same time if it was important (or even a care) of theirs. The second fender that was posted by Chris D actually backs up this, as it's even cut more different, back at an angle. No, this is something that someone has done at home! Like I said, it's been a great conversation though.

I meant to go out and look at my loboy to see what it has, but haven't really been home long enough to walk up and look. Been busy pickin' and gatherin'. haha, I'm not trying to go into the Cub Cadet business, but a friend of my grandfather had these and isn't able to use them or fix them. Might have paid too much, but I really like the late model Diesel one. I will be sure to look at my Loboy tomorrow.

For whats it worth I looked at a late 67 loboy today, it had the normal fender
Tim

I'm looking forward to seeing this fender up close again at this Springs Va. Fest. Looked original to me at the time we broke it down but we were pretty busy switching low boy parts for standard F cub items.
I think the next step will be to have this part looked over by several painters who will be attending at that time. I know one of them who works that line for a living and I'm wanting his input on if it's factory paint/ primer or not.....When he looks the fender over he'll also have the whole tractor on hand to see the rest of the paint. Boss has 20 plus running cubs I looked over while visiting last time, this was the only one I drove and like his 64 red and white, it sure looked like original paint to me.

When I first saw Boss's fender I thought it may work well with the inclosed cab on the cub or lo-boy. Did they make a factory cab that could have used that fender that would allow better room for mounting and dismounting the tractors?

FYI: The 61-62 Loboy (Trencher Cub) I've got has the standard fender with the peice of plate under it.