Thank you liquid wrench

[Joeandmack]

I removed my hood yesterday and had one heck of a time taking the hood bracket supports, under the dog legs out. [the bolts at the front end, at the radiator, I don’t know the proper name]. They are 5/16th Allen wrench bolts on my 58. Is that proper? I noticed that the dog legs had bolts and screws somewhat irregularly placed. So it cast a bit of doubt. Allen wrenches make me think of assembling ikea furniture for the wife, the Allen wrench bolt just seems out of place, and a tad bit hard to remove.

The long story is I started out just checking the transmission level and now I have the hood off. Didn’t want the muffler to get slicked with gear oil, so I removed it. Then found the exhaust pipe was just nicking the rockshaft because the elbow at the exhaust manifold wasn’t screwed down completely. Also found out the exhaust clamp was broken. All in all it made a therapeutic morning before work. Think I might take advantage of having the hood off and address other items too. Thanks in advance for the help and advice.

[ricky racer]

No socket head cap screws were used in the production of the Cub.

[Glen]

Hi,
The Cub and LoBoy parts manual says the 2 bolts at the front of the hood have 6 sided heads, 5/16" x 1/2" long, coarse threads.
It says they use lock washers.
They have to be short, the radiator is there.

Below is a listing at TM Tractor for new screws for the radiator side panels, it tells the sizes of them in the listing. There are pics of a side panel in the listing.
It's sort of common for some of them to be broken off.

http://www.tmtractor.com/new/sp/025fp.htm

Below is the listing for screws for the grille and rear of the hood, at the dash.

http://www.tmtractor.com/new/sp/1420fp.htm

The 1955 Cub operator's manual has lots of info about maintenance to do to a Cub.
It is at the top of the page at Cub Info, then go to Rudi's Manuals.
There are 2 manuals made in 1955, I would use the 2nd one, it is newer, and closer to 1958.

[Joeandmack]

Thank you Glen & Ricky. I am getting ready to put a new exhaust manifold on, having loosened the old one. A few follow up questions: Do people suggest any gasket sealant in between the gasket, engine and manifold? Should I use anti-seize on the studs and the elbow attachment? Any non cosmetic arguments for or against painting the manifold? I’ve read some old posts on some of these questions but appreciate any new (or repeated for that matter) advice and the reasons why. Thanks everybody

[Glen]

Hi,
The manifold gaskets are thick, they don't need any sealer on them.

You could put anti seize on the manifold nut threads, but it's not really needed.
I put motor oil on bolt threads where they don't get hot.
If the studs came out of the engine, tst has said on here that the threads that go in the engine need sealer, the holes go into the water jacket.
I wouldn't put anti seize on the exhaust elbow threads.
Be sure the elbow's threads are good, and clean, so it screws some distance into the new manifold.
Clean the elbow's threads with a die if needed.

The manifold was originally painted red like the rest of the Cub. The paint burns off the exhaust part of the manifold, but mostly stays on the intake part of it.
You could use some high temperature red I guess.

Before putting on the new manifold, you could use a long straight edge, and check the surface of it that goes on the engine to be sure it is flat.
If it's not made flat, it may not seal good on the engine.

[Joeandmack]

Appreciate the advice Glen! Unfortunately going to have to wait on the next step due to my latest hiccup. I purchased a new manifold and elbow from recommended websites, and found that the elbow screws only about one third of the way down into the manifold. I purchased the new pieces because the old ones were pretty rusty and I doubted my abilities to get them flush. I compared the old elbow to the new one, found the new one has four more sets of threads than the original. Tried all the combinations of old and new and got to the same results, one third of the way in. Which causes the exhaust to hit the hydraulic rocker arm. I am stumped and hope I don’t have to explain this boondoggle to the wife. Any ideas on a solution?

[Mht]

The elbow and manifold have tapered pipe threads. You could get a pipe tap and die and work on the threads until they screw far enough in to clear the hydraulic arm. Be careful with the tap on the cast iron manifold. I always use a good thread cutting oil and reverse direction on a tap or die often to clear the chips from any threading operation

[Glen]

Hi,
I would use the tap and die, and try to get the parts so they fit together better, like was said above.
It's probably not hard to improve the fit of them.

[Joeandmack]

Thanks for the info everybody between your advice and YouTube I think (and hope) I can figure it out. Probably be able to fix the old manifold now too