Farmall Cub

wow, i am impressed. think i got most of the issues worked out. she mows nice. im really pleased at the way this tractor cuts. i mowed yesterday and i had allot of clippings. so i went over the lawn again with the deck a little lower and it did a great job of chopping up all of the clippings. these are really great mowing tractors, i dont see the new for another machine for mowing just to keep the cub in the barn. maybe i should sell my cub cadet 147. i have too much stuff, i just sold a mower deck today that came off of a john deere 112 that i used to use. im loving the cub and its mowing performance... also did a pretty good job plowing the driveway over the winter. i might get rid of all of the other crap i have and just keep my cub, mabe i will add buy another spare engine for my cub so i have a backup C60. when my current engine gets tired, i will have a backup engine and rebuild the engine i am using now. that way i would always have a spare engine.

i also do not know why allot of people on the forum say that a cub doesnt handle a 60" mower well. i really didnt have a problem and i mowed some pretty deep grass. i kept her in 2nd gear and she chugged right along. i also noticed that these engines dont get very hot, they run fairly cool and i think thats due to the fact that its liquid cooled. most air cooled engines run hotter and spin at a higher RPM which is why i dont think they have the durability that the C60 has. one thing i was not expecting, when you push on the clutch to disengage the PTO the tractor will contiue to move until the mower stops. when you let you foot off the clutch the RPMS will drop quite a bit and then pick back up once the engine catches up. when you are once the RPMS catch back up it takes the load of the large mower well. as far as cut quality goes, they are as good if not better then any new lawnmower.

i had a question about the gauge deck wheels. should the mower be all of the way down supported by the wheels or should the mower be suspened by the chain and only using the wheels to prevent scalping? are the wheels desinged to support the weight of the deck and are they designed to withstand the ruts in the yard or am i going to hurt them using it that way.


in finishing this post, i think i will say that i feel the farmall cub is one of the greatest tractors in history and probably one of the greatest peices of manchinery you can possibly mow with.... i think its pretty cool to be mowing with a cub, i wonder how many people drive by and give a second look. its something you dont see every day, i wonder how many people drive by and realize what it is that i am mowing with. from this point forward im going to stick with vintage IH farm tractors for mowing my lawn.... either a cub or maybe someday i farmall super A. either way tired iron is the only way to go.

ad356 wrote:should the mower be suspened by the chain and only using the wheels to prevent scalping?

That is the best way to use it. Like any mower deck, the wheels are to prevent scalping. Leaving the mower weight on the wheels could cause wheel damage if they drop into a hole.

From reading your post, it is apparent you have contacted Farmall Cub syndrome....Unfortunately there is no cure, the best you can hope for is to keep yourself surrounded by implements and perhaps another Cub or two down the road.....The good side is that you have a support group called Farmall Cub.com to discuss your "illness" with....Welcome to the Club.... Dave

The proper way to set up the deck is to establish the cutting height you want and then adjust the guide wheels so they touch the ground. For finish mowing, part of the weight should be on the wheels and part on the hydraulics. You can read3about this in the Operator's Manual for the C-3.

I do a lot of cutting of rough ground and for that I have to have the deck up as high as it will go, but on the lawn I drop it down on the wheels to track the ground better.

ad356 wrote:................i also do not know why allot of people on the forum say that a cub doesnt handle a 60" mower well. i really didnt have a problem and i mowed some pretty deep grass. i kept her in 2nd gear and she chugged right along................

Define "doesn't handle well" and "pretty deep grass". That is those terms are subjective. To you "pretty deep" may be "fairly short" to me and "in between" to someone else. As well as relative condition of tractor (compression, tuning, and power, etc.) and mower deck, including being setup correctly and having sharp blades. Along with variables of type and density of grass, how much water content, etc. all contribute to how well the cub handles it.

Having used an IH C-3, Woods 59, and Woods 42 on comparable running cubs, the 42 will handle taller and thicker much better. The 59 and C-3 leave a much cleaner cut on the lawn.

i was cutting grass 3" tall right down to normal cutting height. it handled tall grass better then any single cylinder garden tractor i have ever ran. i was quite content with it. it probably doesnt have the power of a newer kubota diesel engine but for a 60 year old gas that probably has allot of hours on it and only has a factory rating of 12hp. my tractor isnt too tired but i bet a freshly rebuilt C60 would have allot more power

That's exactly what I was referring to, you consider 3 inches tall grass, I consider 3 feet tall grass. It really depends on your perspective and what you (or anyone else) are trying to do on whether or not it works good. That is the point I am trying to make. If I take my Woods 59 and try to cut a hay field it's not going to work well, where the Woods 42 does a pretty good job. And yes I have done it.

The blanket statements made on the forum about which mower works better are misleading and basically useless without some type of clarification on what is being done at the time.

Glad you enjoy the Cub and I could use a rebuild on a couple of mine also but they are workers and still get the job done.

as i said i am very please with its cutting performance. now maybe un an unkept lawn or on a farm the 60" might struggle a little more in really heavy grass that isnt mowed normally but if you're using it to mow once a week in a residental lawn, i think they work great; and i would prefer the larger cut. maybe it would be nice to have a 42" if you need to mow an area that isnt mowed on a regular basis but for a reguarally mowed lawn the 60" mower saves allot of time.

Nice Cub, Nice Deck, Nice lawn

No two properties are alike, conditions will always vary, that's why there are different implements for different conditions. It looks like for your lawn/acreage that the Danco C-3 does a rather nice job. Seat time no matter how you get it is wonderful... keep enjoying your Cub