Farmall Cub

Hello all,

Following my presentation and running into a couple of slight niggles I figured I could start a "rolling restoration" thread. That should keep it all in one thread and avoid creating a new topic when I run into a new issue. Hopefully this is the correct approach, let me know if it isn't.

Technically my Cub doesn't seem to require any major work. Still, it's 65 years old now so, stuff will need to be sorted occasionally. Here's my intro thread and the 1st pics of the Cub : http://www.farmallcub.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=111371.

Aside from the maintenance topics I'd love to get a belly mower for it but they don't seem popular this side of the pond. The only implements I can easily find are ploughs & sickle bars. I may investigate finding a mowing deck and adapting it but I have no fabricating skills to speak of so I'll need a bit of time !

Here's where I'm at now regarding maintenance :

- Engine oil + filter changed
- Steering box oil changed
- Coolant changed
- Spark plugs changed
- Transmission oil drained (diesel cleaning + new oil planned ASAP)
- Ammeter changed (mine was partly filled with water)
- Some minor wiring connection corrections

Some of the issues I encountered on the way :

- Oil filter, fan belt, sediment bowl gasket purchased didn't fit despite being marketed for Cubs
- The bit of flexi pipe between the rigid pipe and the carb didn't fit either. It's bigger than the one between the filter and the rigid pipe rather than being the same size as on an american Cub.

It doesn't sound like much but, since I've been discovering those issues as I -slowly- went, it made simple tasks very lengthy as I spend more time looking for the part than fitting it. Somehow I feel like my tractor is "the odd one out". I'm thinking it may have had a couple of Super Cub bits fitted. The Solex 26VBN carb for instance was normally reserved for the Super Cub and yet there is one on my not Super Cub.



I may have a couple of questions coming soon mostly for the sake of curiosity.

Some news!

After buying 3 fan belts I eventually found the one that would fit so the tractor started again yesterday . Gave it a quick run with diesel in the transmission and then filled it up with 90W.

I then turned my attention to the sickle bar which was my excuse to buy the Cub in the first place so hopefully I can have it working at some point...

I decided to change all of the knives for peace of mind. Some of them are obviously shot but others probably salvageable. I'll keep the latter as back-ups.Taking the knives bar out was easier than expected:

Release the locking mechanism linking the Pitman arm to the bar by lifting the handle and then


disconnecting the ball joint.


Then the bar can be pulled out from under the tractor:


Some knives are really quite shot :


Since the back of the knives is flush with the supporting bar my plan to tap them out by shearing the rivets fell through. Instead I used a grinder on the head of the rivets on the knives side and then punched them out. A couple wouldn't come out and unfortunately this includes the ones closest to the tractor which are the ones with large chunks missing.

Any pointers toward an easy method to take the stubborn ones out? Drilling some out wasn't much fun so I'm hoping there may be an easier option?

Cheers

Try some heat.

Hi,
Below is the newer 22 Mower operator's manual, it has lots of info, and cutter bar maintenance.
It is for 3 different models of mowers, for 3 different models of IH tractors.
The cutter bar maintenance is the same for all 3.
There is a contents on page 2.
Page 11, illutration 11 shows how to remove the knives from the knife bar.
Leave the vise slightly loose, so the knife can go down through the jaws.
A heavy hammer like they show in the pic works well, I have found it is easier than grinding the rivets.

Wear your safety goggles when hammering on the knives, in case a piece breaks off.

The manual is for USA mowers, I think. Yours may have different parts, if it was made in France.

http://farmallcub.com/rudi_cub/www.clea ... index.html

I use serrated knives, they work better for me cutting grass.
There are light duty knives, and heavy duty knives, that is what Case IH had anyway.
All the knives should be all the same duty on the same knife bar, they have to slide in under the hold down clips. A heavy duty knife is thicker than a light duty knife, if you have been using light duty knives, a heavy duty knife probably won't go under the hold down clips, unless the clips are worn and not holding the knives down as much as they should.

When you are done replacing the knives, the knife bar need checking for straightness, before you put it in the mower.
I hold it by one end, and stand it up, with the other end on the floor, and sight down the bottom side of the bar. Use a good light.
The bar should be straight up and down, and forward and back.
You can bend it by hand up and down.
If it needs straightening forward and back, you may need to put it in a vise and hammer on it.

When you adjust the hold down clips, don't tighten them so the knife bar is held down too snug, when the bar is down on a level floor. When you use the mower, and raise the bar with the mower running, the knife bar can bind, and be too tight, because of the bar bending down at the outer end, the bar curves down at the outer end when raised.
Good luck.

The new fan belts I buy at Case IH make the fan shaft a little less than half way up the slot that holds the fan assembly.
They don't use the bottom part of the slot, except to lower the fan down, to loosen the belt.
I have seen on here that using too short a fan belt can make a problem with the position of the generator pulley on the fan hub.
If it's too low, the gen belt can rub on the governor, I think. This may not happen on all Cubs.

Many Cub 22 Mowers use the IH tapered head bolts to hold them on the Cub.
It looks like your mower has a bolt with a washer there in your pic on the left side.
The mowers vibrate, and the tapered head bolts help hold the mower in position.
If the mower brackets have a tapered area around the hole, they are supposed to have the tapered head bolts.

Below is a listing at TM Tractor for them.

http://www.tmtractor.com/new/gb/324fp.htm

The rear bracket may have 1 hole using the tapered head bolt. It is a longer bolt than the front uses.
The drawbar is supposed to be used with the mower, if it has the later rear mower bracket, which has 2 mounting bolt holes, and a spacer welded on at the upper hole on the bracket.

http://www.tmtractor.com/new/sp/445fp.htm

The upper rear bracket hole uses a regular bolt.

A few comments on the cutter bar:

According to IH, what you called a "knife" is a "knife section". What you called a "knife bar" is a ""knife". The different terms may be from the hazards of translation.

Be careful with the latch that couples the pitman to the knife. It likes to pinch fingers. I use a punch in the round hole to start uncoupling it. I also use a well-protected foot whenever possible. Knives are easily and safely pulled out by hooking a log chain to the knife head (the ball) and pulling the chain from the other side.

Your knife has some extra pieces (wear plates?) that appear to end up below the clips. I have never seen anything like that. Are they a modification or maybe a French version of a cutter bar? Likewise, your guards do not look like anything I have ever seen. Are they a French design? On all knives I am familiar with, the sections do project behind the knife back. Hitting the back edge of a section with a hammer to remove them works well. Grinding the heads off as you did is usually a fair second approach.

Well, thanks for all those answers !

Glen wrote:Hi,
Page 11, illutration 11 shows how to remove the knives from the knife bar.
Leave the vise slightly loose, so the knife can go down through the jaws.
A heavy hammer like they show in the pic works well, I have found it is easier than grinding the rivets.

That's how I started but, since the knife sections are flush with the back of the knife, I can't really hit just the back of the knife section. That's why I went with the "grinding the rivet" technique.

Glen wrote:I use serrated knives, they work better for me cutting grass.

Ok thanks, I guess I'll look at what I had on and what's on offer at the local shop.

Glen wrote:When you are done replacing the knives, the knife bar need checking for straightness, before you put it in the mower.

As you will see from the pics at the bottom it will definitely need straightening... in both directions... in a couple of place!

Glen wrote:Many Cub 22 Mowers use the IH tapered head bolts to hold them on the Cub.
It looks like your mower has a bolt with a washer there in your pic on the left side.

Well I may have a peculiar setting here because the flat washer is actually welded on the bracket. Just by the look of it (I'm not sure how unlikely it actually sounds) I would say it came like that from the factory. The weld is really clean and there doesn't seem to have been paint touch up on there either :

Jim Becker wrote:According to IH, what you called a "knife" is a "knife section". What you called a "knife bar" is a ""knife". The different terms may be from the hazards of translation.

Ok noted, I'm not utterly convinced about calling a knife something with no cutting edge whatsoever but I don't think I'll build a case against IH . I'll stick to the defined vocabulary from now on, tanks for the correction!
It seems that most of the time "Knife section" is either called "knife" or "blade" over here while"knife" is a "blade support". Anyway...

Jim Becker wrote:Be careful with the latch that couples the pitman to the knife. It likes to pinch fingers. I use a punch in the round hole to start uncoupling it. I also use a well-protected foot whenever possible.

I used a small prybar to unlatch it, I 'm always cautious about not getting my fingers pinched by something which unlatches suddenly. Even more so when old an rusty!

Jim Becker wrote:Your knife has some extra pieces (wear plates?) that appear to end up below the clips. I have never seen anything like that. Are they a modification or maybe a French version of a cutter bar? Likewise, your guards do not look like anything I have ever seen. Are they a French design? On all knives I am familiar with, the sections do project behind the knife back. Hitting the back edge of a section with a hammer to remove them works well. Grinding the heads off as you did is usually a fair second approach.

Unfortunately I won't be able to answer most of your questions since this is pretty much the very first sickle bar I've ever seen/looked at in my life !

Are the guards the claw like bits ? They didn't look that specific to me. One of them actually needs some TLC (with a hammer probably) or replacing.

Regarding the "wear plates" I believe you are referring to the small plate which are riveted with some of the sections ? Like we can see on sections 3, 4, 6, 7 (left to right) on this pic ?


These actually stick out a bit at the back contrary to the sections. They made the initial "rivet grinding" method a bit difficult since they are counter sunk for the rivet (like the bottom of the knife). This means that even after grinding the head of, punching won't do because the chamfer is still holding the rivet (hopefully I'm clear enough ?!?).



So, as you may have deduced I managed to get all the sections out. I'm not too proud of how I did it as the knife got a bit scarred . I usually get good results with heat but here I didn't see a difference unfortunately. A bigger hammer helped (I've never had to use such a heavy hammer so much with so much force) then I drilled as little and as centered as possible and finally I took the grinder out to pretty much eat away the sections from the back until the disc approximately reached where the rivets are. Not a pretty process, the knife has some marks from the grinding disc but it seems it can still work.

Here's the state of the last 2 sections, pretty chewed up. As for the knife, as I said it will need straightening. To be honest this experience made me rethink my plan to use rivets again rather than bolts...


Thanks again for all the answers

If you haven’t already done so, you can get a pretty good idea of what a “normal” Cub-22 setup looks like on this side of the Atlantic, at the following link.

http://www.tmtractor.com/tm-tractor/gim/cub22_001.htm

I doubt that the flat washers on the mounting bracket were factory installed. That’s a common “farmer fix” here.

Don McCombs wrote:If you haven’t already done so, you can get a pretty good idea of what a “normal” Cub-22 setup looks like on this side of the Atlantic, at the following link.

http://www.tmtractor.com/tm-tractor/gim/cub22_001.htm

I doubt that the flat washers on the mounting bracket were factory installed. That’s a common “farmer fix” here.

Didn't know that page, there's really quite an impressive wealth of information available. One thing I noticed is also how the mower is stored is slightly different. The holding rod is attached to the tractor and stored on a hook near the steering box. Actually the system seen on the TM tractor website would be better since it seems it would work with the homemade plateform on mine (which needs to be removed if I want to hook the holding rod).

I'm really on the fence about those countersunk screws. It seems they are indeed on most tractors (and I actually have one available on the free thread just above) but I'd also be surprised by such a clean farmer fix (in my experience these type of fixes are usually pretty crude). That said, the homemade plateform is really well made so maybe he did both at the same time.

Anyway, I'll look into that once the knife, guards are all good.

Premlal wrote:Are the guards the claw like bits ? They didn't look that specific to me. One of them actually needs some TLC (with a hammer probably) or replacing.

Hi,
The guards are the pointed parts that stick out the front side of the cutter bar, and are bolted to the bar.
It talks about them in the operator's manual.

Below is a listing at TM Tractor for a new guard, this is one style used here in the USA. There are others. You can look at the pics.

http://www.tmtractor.com/new/sm/489fp.htm

Some things look slightly different on your mower than the USA Cub mowers have.

If the knife sections don't stick out the back side of the knife bar, when riveted on, you probably can't hammer them off like the manual shows.
I didn't know yours are that way.

Below is a listing for a new serrated knife for the USA Cub mowers. You may need different ones to fit your mower.

http://www.tmtractor.com/new/sm/491fp.htm

Hey,

I didn't expect to take so long to get back here unfortunately I obviously have too many projects.
The Cub sat for a while partly because my sickle bar operation seemed never ending and frustrating : When I received the bits to put it back together I discovered that the rivets got lost in the post and meanwhile the Cub it wouldn't start anymore. So I switched to other projects which are honestly not going that much better for now...

Anyway, enough with the useless whining, let's get to some useful whining
Today I investigated why it wouldn't start. Firstly I sorted the leaky sediment bowl which really annoyed me. I renewed the packing (a sealing method I had absolutely no knowledge of) and it seems to do the trick. Then I checked that the fuel line to the carburettor was clean, hooked up a healthy battery ... and it pretty much started right away!

Then I set my views on that damaged rock guard, only to find out exactly what you warned me about Glen, I ordered the "basic" ones and mine are vastly different :


Then I did that awful beginner's mistake, I started the Cub with the handle ... while in gear. So the Cub neatly nudged me into the 1985 Panda which was parked in front of it and eventually stalled (thankfully I was in 2nd gear, not sure what would have happened in 1st...). That feeling of stupidity and helplessness while you are being rammed by your own tractor is really quite unique... I only ended up with a bruise on my thigh and the poor Panda with a dent in the bootlid and a cracked bumper. It just shows that ... it does happen

I'll leave you with that for now and I'll try to give more interesting and frequent updates

Don't feel toobad. Any of us who have hand cranked to start has done the same thing at least once. Maybe not to your extent, but it was definitely an "oh crap" moment. Happy you weren't too injured and it didn't cause any more damage.
It looks like you're making good progress. Keep it up.
Just a suggestion as far as the sediment bowl goes. If it is available to you, you may consider making your own cork gasket. I tried replacing one of mine with rubber, but with the 10% ethanol gasoline we have here, it caused it to leak after about a year. Made my own cork gasket, and no more leaks. A roll of cork gasket material here is readily available and fairly inexpensive.

Good luck
Hutch

Say a brief warning of a greeting to a horse before hopping on.
Shake hands with your Cub before starting it.
The reverse is not always conductive to a good ride.

You'll be so familier with the sickle bar it'll be a breeze to take care of.

Hi,
Sorry if the new guards don't fit on your mower, after I talked about them above.
I'm not sure if you meant they don't bolt on, or if you meant they are a different style.
If they don't work, you could try heating the bent guard to red hot, and bend it straight, or use it like it is in your picture.
If the mower is all the way up in your pic, you could raise it 1 link of the lift chain, the bar looks sort of low to the ground.