[AT] Bad grease fitting

[Len Rugen]

 They all lived happily ever after :-)
First, someone probably tried to tell me this, and I missed it, but 1/8 NPT fittings ARE the big ones, and my bad one, the small ones are 1/4-28.  Sigh.....
I knew last night I didn't have the right tap, so I got what I needed today, the helpful hardware store had their zerks properly labeled, so I verified the thread size.  

Like I'd planned, I ground off the old zerk tit, drilled a #3 hole, and tapped 1/4-28.  The new fitting started easily, tightened and took grease like it should.  

Ready for another 100 hours :-)
Thanks


Len Rugen

rugenl at yahoo.com


 

    On Thursday, March 3, 2016 8:35 AM, Len Rugen <rugenl at yahoo.com> wrote:
 

 It is one of the fittings under the tractor on the axle pivot, the front one, into the cast frame of the tractor.  

It is a 1/4" fitting now, I'd put one like it back, if I could get this one out and had good threads.  I don't have a 1/4 NPT Helicoil kit yet, they seem to be $150 - $200 each time you need a different size :-(  

If the bushing has turned, how would I take things apart to fix it?  Everything seems tight, I've made sure it gets greased over the years at each service.  There is still old grease around the pivot point from the last service. 

I do have the tractor jacked up, so the axle is "hanging" by the pivot, not supporting the weight of the tractor.  Yes, another old mechanic told me to always do that for king pin type things.  

This is a fairly new grease fitting, I tested my theory on another new fitting and it drilled easily with one of my suntanned cobalt bits :-)  
The history of this tractor, it's a 1979 model, with the AD236 diesel.  I bought it 15 years ago (I misread and said 19 before) with about 1500 hours.  It became our "big" tractor, between Dad and I, we had 2 IH H's and 2 AC WD-45's, one of each pretty much worn out and the other in OK condition for what they were.  My sons helped him the last few years farming, they were in their early teens, he was in his late 70-80's.  We got rid of the cattle in the late 90's for various reasons and needed less equipment, at less I needed less equipment upkeep.
The MF255 has been nice to me, I've had to replace the radiator (bad when I got it), have the injector pump rebuilt (bio diesel cleaned the junk out and it started leaking), replace the water pump, a few new seats and tires.  It's up to about 2900 hours now, still pretty low for it's age and I've kept most things working, I just noticed the hazard flashers aren't working again. 

I sold his old tricycle WD-45, the FE was shot.  My oldest son moved to a farm about 25 miles away and the wide-front WD-45 is on "TDY" there.  One of the H's (his first tractor) is worn out so bad that when it quit starting, we just let it sit.  That left me with the MF255 and one H for farm work.   I live on one end and another son lives on the other end, his end was quite lacking in a useful tractor :-)  

I just bought a 2003 MF 471 to put in as "king of the hill" on my end and plan to move the 255 to the other end, hopefully to actually be production when we want to do something instead of spending time fiddling with a tractor first :-)


Len Rugen

rugenl at yahoo.com


 

    On Wednesday, March 2, 2016 11:58 PM, Cecil Bearden <crbearden at copper.net> wrote:
 

 When you get the fitting out check the hole to be sure the bushing has 
not turned in the housing and you do not have a hole for the grease to 
go through.  Also, a grease fitting is very hard,  You might heat it to 
a cherry red and let it cool slowly and the temper would be out of it.  
Then a left handed drill might work.  If you do not have a set of left 
handed drill bits, then you can sharpen a cheap carbide masonry bit 
backwards for a left hand turn and it will drill those hardened steel 
fittings.  I keep a bunch of those cheap carbide masonry drills around 
just for such things.

Cecil in OKla


On 3/2/2016 10:25 PM, Mike M wrote:
> You're not talking about the fitting on top of the steering shaft are
> you Len?
>
> Mike M
>
>
> On 3/2/2016 9:15 PM, Len Rugen wrote:
>> I've got an ongoing problem with a grease fitting on the front axle pivot of a MF 255.  When I got the tractor, the fitting was missing (19 years ago....).  I put one in, but it fell out before the next service, the threads were stripped.  Being a poor young guy back then, I put JB weld on a new fitting, put it in the threads till it was snug and let it set up.  All was fine till the past few services, at first it was hard to get it to take grease, now it won't take any at all.
>>
>> The problem is the shoulders of the fitting sit down in a hole in the casting, probably deeper than original since the threads were bad and I can't get on it to get it out.  This is a 1/4 NPT straight fitting.  My thought is to grind off the tit, pull out the spring, drill and tap the old fitting for a  new 1/8 NPT fitting, clean out and hard grease and start over.
>>    Any predictions of this working?  If the old fitting falls out during the grinding/drilling, I'll do a helicoil fix.
>>
>>
>> Len Rugen
>>
>> rugenl at yahoo.com
>>
>>
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