[Farmall] O-12 chronicle, part 3

Bob Currie tracturs at att.net
Sun Nov 16 20:47:38 PST 2008


Great job Karl. That is an enormous amount of work you did on that tractor. 
It'll be fun to see how it does as The bright, new movie star from 
Inyokern!! Speaking of fun to putt around on, I took my 36 W-12 to a plow 
day last Saturday. It hadn't run in about two years, so it was touch and go 
for the first few passes with a one bottom plow. With some help from a 
couple other great plowmen, a few adjustments, and burning all the old fuel 
out of the system, it finally settled down and did quite nicely. It was the 
only tractor there that ran on steel, and I think that little tractor had a 
good day playing in the dirt. The drivers area is pretty cramped, and you 
learn fairly quick to keep your feet tucked in, as the inside of those steel 
lugs will nip at the outside of your shoes as the wheels go around, 
especially if there is some straw or clods on those lugs...

bobcurrie,
Greenwood, CA


----- Original Message ----- 
From: <olmstead at ridgenet.net>
To: "Farmall/IHC mailing list" <farmall at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Sunday, November 16, 2008 4:08 PM
Subject: Re: [Farmall] O-12 chronicle, part 3


>A quick update.  Finished up the O-12 today and filled the radiator.  Used
> water, because I knew it'd leak if I used antifreeze.  Murphy, y'know.
>
> I made a serious blunder.  I used a good-looking used radiator core that I
> cleaned up a couple of years ago instead of a new core.  In fact, the new
> core I ordered showed up when I was about halfway done with reassembly.
>
> The radiator leaks.  Steady dribble from one tube.  Slow enough that I can
> use it for the documentary, but the radiator will need topping off every
> hour or so.  The leaky tube is behind the left frame of the radiator, so
> there's no way to fix it w/o disassembly (at least pulling the frame off).
> Maybe I'll do that and haul the radiator to the local shop.  I won't have
> time to do much more than that until Thanksgiving.
>
> Other than that, the O-12 is a great machine.  It idles well, revs nicely,
> sounds great and the overcenter clutch works perfectly.  As noted back
> when I first described this tractor, it doesn't have a great deal of
> power, but it's such an easy tractor to putt around on that I'm very
> happy.
>
> The oil pressure responded to my 'farmer fix'; I shortened the relief
> valve spring and that dropped the pressure to about 34 pounds at idle, 60
> at full rpm.  No serious leaks, unlike before.
>
> So the tractor is doing its part; it is up to me to fix the problem I 
> caused.
>
> -karl
>
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