[AT] My little tiny tractor runs

Henry Miller hank at millerfarm.com
Fri Nov 24 19:32:39 PST 2017


Subject is as my 4 year old says. 

As you might recall, I have been trying to get 3 tractors that my great
uncle made running again. The "John deere" built around a 1.5hp John
deere e was today's project.  The Magento magnets were weak so this
morning I called Don Petty who has a magnet recharger. He was in the
shop so I loaded the tractor on the trailer. 

I'm getting ahead of the story. When I tried to put my shoes on my
daughter (2 years old)  sat on my lap and insisted she wanted to go with
daddy. So after the adventure of getting her ready (getting a girl
dressed is always an adventure in my experience) I was able to load the
trailer up. The magneto was already off, but I was hoping for some
assistance. 

The trip was about 45 minutes, plenty of time for my daughter to fall
asleep in the car seat. Charging took longer than it should, the magnet
was stuck on tight. Not very long, but enough that Don remarked about it
as he pried it off. 


Then put it all together, this I did myself. About this time my daughter
woke up so now I was watching both kids run around.  Turn the crank and
got fuel but no fire.  Check the timing and I was off a notch on the
gears. This is why I brought the whole tractor with, I wouldn't have
though to check, but he heard me and crank and came to check. 

Next time I put in just enough bolts to hold everything. Crank again and
still nothing. Timing seemed right though. He grabbed an ignitor coil
and battery and soon the engine was running. As the engine fired I
happened to see a huge grin light on my son's face. I grabbed for my
camera, but I couldn't get the right angle. 

I missed this part, but Don told me he tried once the engine was running
he tried connecting the Magento again, but that didn't work. It ran only
on his coil. I ended up leaving the Magento with him to rebuild.
Probably won't get it back before February, but I have plenty of other
work to do in the mean time. 

It was now past lunch time so I left. As I was driving away I did a
little thinking. After lunch at a Chinese buffet I went next door to
northern tool and bought one of their 1200lbs wagons. 

Back home I grabbed a starter from my uv4 (utv), the starter didn't seem
to work even when I put it on a battery with jumper cables. Off to the
auto parts store to have the starter tested, it failed on their machine
too. New one will arrive on Tuesday. 

While there I asked the guy for a 12 ignition coil. It took some work to
convince him to just go in back and get him one without looking up
anything.

Back home, assembled the wagon, put a spare battery in it, connected the
trailer to the tractor and a few feet of wire to the ignitor, using just
the primary on the coil. That took an hour, but I soon had the tractor
running and my son driving it, pulling his sister in the wagon. I don't
know who is the happiest about that.
 
As I put my son to bed he asked me to show him his tractor again, so I
got out the video I took of him driving it. 

If you are still reading I have one question. The coil I got said that
you needs an external resistor which I didn't get. I couldn't convince
the guy at the store to grab one that would fit, so what do I ask for to
get one that they are likely to have in stock?

The coil got hot in just a few minutes so I know I need one before I run
it again. 


-- 
  Henry Miller
  hank at millerfarm.com



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