Posted by jdemaris on December 13, 2010 at 15:12:16 from (67.142.130.19):
Anybody got some good "stoopid" stories they want to admit to?
I assume we all spend a fair amount of energy trying to look intelligent. How about the converse?
I got thinking today, while using my 1960 Deere 1010 crawler - #1 how good it runs, and #2 what a dumb mistake I made on it early on.
I bought it about ten years ago, after the it burnt up in a fire. The guy that had it really liked it and wanted it fixed. But, the local Deere dealer gave him a $10,000 estimate, and that was that.
So, I ended up replacing all hoses, plastic parts, rewiring it, rebuilding the engine, etc. The distributor had melted, i.e. nothing left of it. I called the local tractor scrap yard (MadFaddens) and asked for a 1010 distributor. He had one. So, picked it up for $50. It was a Delco, with no cap and rotor on it. I put in new points, condensor, lubed the advance, and put on a new cap and rotor.
OK. Like I said, I rebuilt the engine. Started and ran good, but kind of underpowered. But, the 1010 four cylinder is basically the same size as a two-cylinder 420, so I wasn't too upset. This four is 115 c.i. and a two-banger 420 is 113 c.i. Funny thing though - I had to time it by ear. If I timed it with the flywheel timing marks, it ran lousy.
OK, used it a lot for over 5 years. It always ran hot in the summer and was always underpowered. But, it ran smooth and started fine. Then one day after moving dirt for 8 hours non-stop, it crapped out. It was an ignition problem. Huge carbon-tracks inside the distributor cap. So, I went down to NAPA and got another new cap. Next day, it ran for a few hours and burnt up another cap. Also, half burnt up the rotor also. Now, I was getting perplexed.
To shorten the story a bit, I spent hours fooling around with this thing, trying to detect this weird problem.
Guess what? That distributor I bought 5 years earlier from Macfaddens was a 6 cylinder distributor from a gas-version Deere 4020. NOT from a four-cylinder 1010. They both use the same Delco basic distributor - except the 4020 version has a six-lobe breaker-point cam. I still can't believe I didn't notice this early on. But, guess it wasn't something I had any reason to look for. They both take the same points and rotor also.
So, for five years, I ran a 6 cylinder distributor on a four cylinder engine, with a four cylinder cap and rotor. Seems that's why I could not time it to factory specs. And, it's also why the caps were burning up. There were probably lightning bolts going on inside, and when "fire" took place, the rotor was not pointing anywhere near a plug-wire pole.
So, I went out to my personal junkyard and took a distributor off a Case VAC tractor (junked machine). It also has the same basic distribtor as the Deere 1010 and 4020. I took the four-lobed cam out of it, and stuck it in the 4020 distributor - and my 1010 ran like a totally different machine. Still does.
I rank this as one of the stupiest things I've ever done turning wrenches - when I should of known better. I'm not going to count all my youthful screwups taking apart 40s-50s cars that never ran again.
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