[AT] Out with the new, in with the old

[rlgoss at twc.com]

Get some "00" Snapper grease, Herb. We used it at the dealership to prevent bearing burn-out on some particular hydrostatic drives that had concentric I/O shafts.  

I owned a Kubota for a number of years and learned the lesson to never buy one again.  It's the only company I know that will change specs on a component just enough so a replacement item of the same part number will not fit in place of the original -- and then not tell anyone about it or claim it didn't happen!  If you keep a tractor long enough, you will run into that again and again. 


Larry
---- Herb Metz <metz-h.b at comcast.net> wrote: 
> Recently was at local Kubota (only tractor dealer within thirty miles), 
> looking for some thick gear oil/grease for my old leaky Troybilt tillers. 
> Some Kubota owner from half hour away was hoping for some 'magic whatever 
> gizmo' that would bypass all safeties so he could retrieve his tractor from 
> "out in the trees".  Some safety was preventing his starting the motor; he 
> would need a sizeable whatever to pull his dead tractor back to the shed, 
> etc.  This was the seventh time this had occurred since he bought the 
> tractor new four years ago.  He wasn't mad, but he was understandably upset 
> about repeatedly being in such a helpless situation.
> Not picking on Kubota; the other companies probably have similar problems.
> Herb(GA)
> 
> -----Original Message----- 
> From: jtchall at nc.rr.com
> Sent: Saturday, January 17, 2015 8:17 AM
> To: Antique tractor email discussion group
> Subject: Re: [AT] Out with the new, in with the old
> 
> In some cases its good to be able to change out entire units as opposed to
> rebuilding the old one. If the cost of the new unit is only slightly more
> than the rebuild, you'll be money ahead and should have better quality too.
> Small 2 cycle carburetors are a good example of this. We've learned to price
> a kit vs. a new carb before determining which way to go. The downside to
> this practice is on any given machine, there tend to be problems unique to
> that model. Often the problems are simple and cheap to fix, but are hard to
> identify. When we develop a culture of wholesale changing units, the
> detective work to find the problem behind the problem is lost. Once the
> machine gets old and is not owned by someone using it a lot that can justify
> large repair bills, it becomes not worth fixing. I just don't see a lot of
> machinery and automobiles made today having as long of service life as our
> old iron. Don't believe me, stop by your local Ford, GM, or Dodge dealer and
> see if they even have parts list access to a 25 or 30 year old truck.
> 
> The boss bought a new to us forklift a couple months ago. We had a 30 year
> old Cat in great shape but it had an oil leak that was going to cost more to
> fix than the machine was worth. He traded it in a refurbished Clark.
> Evidently that thing has more electronics than a new car. Dealer has been
> out 6-8 times in 2 months trying to get it to run correctly. I can't
> understand for the life of me why a forklift needs anything other than
> bore-bones mechanical technology. The Cat we got rid of had old school
> gauges and a back up alarm tied into the shifter. It was simple and it
> worked. The Clark has a bunch of digital gauges and even some sort of alarm
> that triggers the horn if it isn't shut off in the correct sequence.  All
> that crap does is cause headaches and cause us to be down a machine.
> 
> This morning I've got to rebuild the 2 master cylinders on a 42 year old IH
> tractor. It was $70 for the kits or $200 for new master cylinders. I'm
> hoping the pistons and shafts aren't worn too badly so that new wear items
> will solve my problem.
> If the parts come today, I've also got to put a kit in the brake
> equalizer--$85 vs. a few hundred.
> 
> John Hall
> 
> 
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