Farmall Cub

Well yesterday I put the tune up kit in.....Plugs, Points, Condenser,Wires,Cap, no not the rotor, ( had to use the old one as the cap was a chinese confab as was the rotor and they wouldn't fit with each other??????.....Anyhow I cleaned the rotor up and installed the old one....It still has a fault, a skip seems about every other cycle of the 4 strokes or so....If I use the new coil its more predominant than using the old coil....So I am going thru my archives checking out all my coils to see if I can find one that rectifies the problem....The coils I have been using are 6 volt coils with a voltage reducer in front of the positive lead on the coil....I've got to find my ohm-meter ( I think it may be in my truck box ) but I've also found a 12v coil that says use without external resistance....I am coil fused so I made another post which was answered and tomorrow I hope to try it in the scheme of things and see how it runs....I've adjusted the carb from one extreme to another and found the kinda sweet spot, but it still falters....Anyhow I'll see if I can isolate the skip with the ignition wires and go from there....As a redundant statement "it does run better,overall" but I'd like it to be near perfect it before I button it up....I did manage to build some barn doors for my shed and keep up on the garden in the 90 degree heat . ( the wife canned 21 quarts of beans) and the lawn still looks ok, which explains the time lapse in the tune up.....Jeeeez Any comments are appreciated as usual....Dave

Vacuum gauge testing to isolate the problem.

Thanks Eugene, I needed to add to my diagnostic arsenal anyhow...LOL....Dave

I finally got some time to check into the 57 "Cubby" and the starter wouldn't engage....Took it off and checked it out...Starter is ok but not making a connection thru the starter switch....So I cleaned the switch contact, but I have done that before and I guess the big ol contact whacth a ma jigger is wore out enough so when I put it back on it clunked and now back to square one....I'll see if I can band-aid it today but if not I ordered a new starter switch....Can't crank it, I messed my shouder up fighting with a tree limb ....I did get a vacuum gauge, timing light, and a bunch of other gadjets off Ebay, Eugene, so now I armed to the teeth and ready to find the miss.......If Only I could get it started Dave....Guess I could jury rig something to by pass the switch...Naw, better not

Gee Dave, Why don't you just take the starter off your other Cub and continue on... ....Boy its tough to get old....

Well despite some set-backs along the way....The 57 "Cubby" is running like a top....I took the voltage reducer out and used a 12 internal resistance coil I had and saved the 6 volt coil I bought for the 53" Chompers"....Then it got a complete tune-up, plugs points condensor wires and cap....But it still had a miss on occasion....I bought a tune up kit, timing light, tach dwell, vacuum and etc off ebay for 33.00 including shipping...." Vintage Sears" and wil work on Mag's should I have one on my next tractor ....Anyhow then the starter ka putted and I had to order a switch...So I took the starter off the 53 and proceeded back to work on the miss....The timing was off...So its set 1/2 between the 2 marks at 400 and ends up being on the 2nd mark at 1600....Runs great there so I left it there...A set back was also incured as the darn distributer wouldn't move....So like an idiot I removed the hard to get to bolt in the back towards the block completely...So with the 2 bolts completely removed I had a small pipe wrench and put it on and just gave it a little oomph ( very little) and it moved...( I will fashion something to turn a distributer with without removing the bolts in the future) So putting the bolt back in became a chore...But....My wife checked on me and I told her, had to walk away for a minute, says I , and pick some swiss chard for lunch( along with burgers)....When I came back she had started the bolt and I finished tightening it up....What a girl .....Small hands ....So Blair if you're reading, I believe the coil caused the breaking down when the tractor worked for an hour or so and the miss I had was a timing issue...I changed the starter switch, swapped starters back and its running fine....Of course I do have to mow tomorrow ....I'll PM you if something screws up.....Plus I managed to keep up on my other chores....Dave....Thanks to everyone for their help....

Wow, that's quite the story! Glad you figured it out and got 'er running good. Darned coil!!! Even after all that, ya gotta love them Cubs!

Yeh like all the others on the forum.......I'm addicted....

pickerandsinger wrote:So Blair if you're reading, I believe the coil caused the breaking down when the tractor worked for an hour or so and the miss I had was a timing issue..

Thanks Dave. Read every word. Glad you got her up and running.

I hate that hard to get to distributor bolt!

Blair