[AT] 1948 John Deere A

Sat Oct 26 23:31:38 PDT 2019

Farmer,

Thanks for the added information. I totally understand the health situation. Went through something similar but not nearly as serious.  Between debilitating back problems,  a 1031 Exchange coordinator who liked our money better than we did and losing a son, there were several years where nothing got done. I have accomplished more this past summer than probably 5 or more previous summers. Got the house and barn completely up to snuff and painted this summer so we are on top of that again. Another year I would have had major repairs on my hands. For some reason the barn needed much more work than the house and the barn is at least 5 years younger than the house. Rain did a lot of damage to the 6 stall ½ barn doors requiring complete replacement  and the main 12 foot sliding doors all the trim needed to be replaced.  They were originally built to look good but were not built well. I went out of my way to build them right this time. I was able to do the work with the help of my wife. A reals sense of accomplishment after several years of  looking at the problems and doing nothing about it. Got to get a new deck built on the house and then I will be able to say I’m almost caught up again. Then some remolding has to be done inside the house.  

Hopefully then I can get back top playing with my tractors again.  Had an absolute disaster hit in the barn this summer.  I had about 10 really nice hoods stacked on end in thick sawdust in one of the horse stalls. A nice dry place I thought.  Well I discovered that there was a salt block left in that stall and it spread to the ends of 3 to 4 of the hoods and literally just ate them up.  These were pristine hoods. I was and am beside myself for letting this happen. But the damage is done and it is not repairable.  Buying hoods out here in the West typically have to come from the Midwest and shipping costs just kill us. That is why I was kind of hoarding hoods. Of course the ones that were damaged are for tractors I’m working on. Oh well *hit happens. 

Your comment about the A that you got free reminds me of a statement someone said to me relative to antique tractors.  “Sometimes free is too expensive”  I haven’t ever got one free but I have had a few money pits arrive. My biggest mistake on buying antique tractors was a 1952 JD 50. It was “All Fuel” that had been converted to gas, When I went to look at it didn’t have a water pump but I got it started and shifted through all 6 gears and shut it back down. I wanted a 50 to go with my 60 and I thought the price was right. Got it home and put a water pump on it and was exercising it like I do all my tractors going down our hill and coming back up in high gear which uses up all the HP on most of my tractors except the 1958 720D. Well, each time I went up and down the hill the transmission got a little more noisy. I had replaced all the fluids in the tractor and when I drained the transmission it had quite a bit of water but having water in our tractors is not unusual here. Eventually the transmission noise got so bad that I finally pulled the cover. I discovered that every bearing had been exposed to water, had rusted badly and now that I had new oil in there the bearing were all coming clean and as the rust disappeared the noise increased.  The reason it had been quiet to begin with is the rust was keeping things tight. Got fooled into thinking I had a good tractor and transmission. Then I found out several gears had teeth missing or were chipped. That tractor became very low on the priority list.  I had been completely fooled. Fortunately I haven’t had that happen on my other tractors. 

But did find out some good news this week on my JD 720D.  I had come to the conclusion that the Pony Motor was using so much oil it just had to be overhauled.  A $2,000 plus job.  But a couple weeks ago I read something on one of the Internet boards that got me to thinking about the oil consumption.  When one wants to change oil on the Pony engine you open a screw valve and that Pony engine oil dumps into the main diesel engine oil chamber and both then need to be changed. The diesel engine oil chamber is so big that a little oil coming in from the Pony engine is hardly noticeable. Turns out I think I have discovered the oil drain screw valve threads were damage to the point that the valve wasn’t closing properly. Oil was leaking from the Pony to the main engine but since I use the tractor so seldom I didn’t notice the main engine oil level was increasing but I was needing to add oil to the Pony every time I fired it up. Really had me confused since it only smoked for a few seconds on startup and they did that when they were new. So if my discovery is correct I may have avoided a huge bill for overhauling the Pony Engine.  Its my first 720D so I’m learning as I go. Should know in a few days if I have fixed the leak, The threads are 3/8” NPT and of course I couldn’t find my 3/8” pipe thread die so had to be creative about cleaning up the threads. I think I have it to the point it closes properly. Have filled the pony to the full mark and letting it set. I hope like hell that it stays there.  Saving a $2,000 repair bill would be very acceptable. 

From: AT <at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com> On Behalf Of Indiana Robinson
Sent: Saturday, October 26, 2019 5:35 AM
To: at at lists.antique-tractor.com
Subject: [AT] 1948 John Deere A

Dean said:

Farmer, 

Regarding the JD A.  I don’t know if it is a special version or not but if it is known as a Plain Jane A. and not a tractor that has some special attachment be careful how much money you put into it if you would like to break even on it someday.  Plain Jane JD A’s and B’s resale value has dropped significantly over the last few years. It is quite easy to put tires on an A that have over half the value of the tractor.  Unfortunately the guys like you and me who were around when these tractors were new are starting to be reduced in numbers quite rapidly. And as a result the resale value has dropped along with those unfortunate events. Low production numbers and unusual configurations seem to be holding up quite well. But……. Every time I get my new Two Cylinder Magazine of Green Magazine I am struck by how many auctions there are of significant collections. Quite often estate sales.  I think the so called “rare” versions will continue to hold their value.   My only hope is that the prices will stabilize soon where the younger crown will buy them just because they are reasonably priced and kind of neat to own as something different from the typical city toy. 

.

My Deere A is about as generic as they come. It's just what I wanted. It was the basic model that about everybody bought. It does have Roll-a-matic. One of the greatest things about it was that it was free.  :-)

A guy I didn't even know stopped by my store one day almost 30 years ago and told me about buying a farm a mile or two away and a Farmall M and a John Deere A coming with it. They had been sitting in the woods for maybe 15 years. All of the tires were just pieces. He had dragged them to the tool shed and started on the Farmall M. He did a full restore on the M including full engine work, tires, paint and decals. He said that it was a fight from start to finish and that he spent months drilling out broken bolts. He did a really nice job on it. Next he started on the Deere by pulling the hood and removed the steering shaft. He said that every single bolt broke off... He said that people had told him about my interest in old tractors and said that If I would come and get it I could have it. I said yes, sight unseen. I hooked the trailer behind the wrecker and almost beat him back to his house.  :-)

What I found was a complete intact JD A looking rough from weather but nothing looked broken or damaged. That wrecker was really great for loading and unloading stuff. I winched it on the trailer and brought it back. I carried extra snatch-block pulleys on the wrecker and used one to pull the tractor off of the trailer using the trailer winch to hold it back as the wrecker winch pulled it off.

The oil actually looked decent and the engine was free. I stuck a battery in it and it cranked nicely then with a point cleaning I had a spark. I twisted a mouse eaten spark plug wire back together, poured some gas in the tank, hit it with some ether and it fired a time or two. A little more ether and the silly thing fired up and ran... Of course it was only hitting on two cylinders.  :-)  :-)  :-)

I had an E-3 Co-op sitting there that had been back flipped in a woods by a guy who never got back on the tractor again. I had bought it cheap mostly because it had a decent looking pair of rear tires on it. Over the next few days I took the junk tires off of the A and pulled the tires off of the E-3. I was amazed to find that the rims on that A were perfect including the original paint. I cleaned them down and painted them with a coat of yellow Rustoleum anyway. BTW, a guy stopped one day and offered me about 150% of what I had paid for the E-3 for parts and I jumped on it.

I used that JD-A (lightly) for a number of years, mostly pulling wagons and trailers. I also loved it for belting it to my buzz saw for firewood. I never did much to it but I did clean it down and paint it (quickie job) just to preserve it until I could do it right. I never did ever break a bolt working on it.

Then things went a bit south... I parked it when it blew a rear tire probably because the E-3 owner had hit stumps with it in that woods. Then I had a run of health problems and it just had to sit for long time again. I had gotten down to the point that I could only walk about 100 feet and that was using two canes. Got that straightened out then my ticker went dicky and had to have a re-plumb. Between Diana and I we had a whole string of health problems. Things are looking pretty good right now, just a lot of catching up to do. I hope to get back on that Deere again. It won't be a big money restore. Some used tires, some carb work and a light "go-thru" on the engine. 

My used tire collection has a bad gap. 13.6-38 would be appropriate but 13.6's and 15.5's get snatched up at auctions by the pulling guys. I have 2 decent pairs of 18.4-38's but they are way too big even just for running around. I have some 10-38's but dang they look too skinny for that A. I'm probably well into next spring or later getting to it so I can keep watching for proper tires.

I completely agree on the price situation...

.

-- 

-- 

Francis Robinson
aka "farmer"
Central Indiana USA
robinson46176 at gmail.com <mailto:robinson46176 at gmail.com> 

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