TireSmoke.org

Ever have a project that just spawns other projects? In my garage for the last 12 years or so have been a couple of John Deere 210 garden tractors. For attachments I started with one good deck, one swiss cheese deck and a snowthrower. The second one was cheap and I felt a new engine would cost more than the tractor.



Now the second deck is also swiss cheese. I couldn't very well get out of the JD business just because of a rusted out deck, so I set out to find one that would fit. New ones don't exist and used decks are quite expensive. In short order I found a 180 John Deere on Craigslist sans engine. The deck was rock solid, so for $150 I bought the thing and brought it home.




With a little TLC I had the deck looking good, in working order and under the 210. There was some fab work but not bad.




With my newly discovered use for Craigslist, I got the idea to repower the 180. The stock 210 only makes 10 horsepower. Even if the numbers are off a little 18 HP sounded really good to me, so I found an 18.5 HP Briggs for $100. Also two tractors would make for faster mowing since I have two young operators in the house.



I proceeded to start fitting the Briggs to the 180 JD tractor. Somewhere along the line I reckoned there might be a problem with the trans on the 180 (why else would someone have pulled the engine out of it?). A quick test revealed only two forward gears - 5th and 6th. Further inspection found the telltale sign.




At this point I decided that with no tranny I'd just find a new home for the 18 HP Briggs I just bought. Another search on Craigslist found this lawn tractor:



For $100 I took it home - guy said prior owner said it just "died". It had an 18.5 HP Briggs and 42" deck. It is a Montgomery Ward Elite 2000 Signature Series (made by MTD), made in 1991. It had the hood and the air cleaner off. The seller said it had been sitting out in the rain like that, but I did not really care since I was replacing the engine. It needed some parts: ignition switch, deck neutral safety switch, steering arm, belts. Thing about it is that it actually started up on ether. After some effort to clear the water out of the intake and crankcase it is almost ready to run - mowed with it for about half an hour this past weekend. Also had to put the hood on and set it up for a 5" wide tractor battery. It still needs a carb clean or rebuild and maybe a deck belt but otherwise looks to be ready to mow.



In the meantime I found a Peerless trans to put in the 180. It was $70 - again from Craigslist. I still have some fab work here but it's a start.



See what I mean? I have had a lot of fun fixing these things up, and can't help but think of my Grandfather who used to do this stuff all the time, but I have created this bizarre tractor odyssey for myself.

Now I am going to sell the 1972 210 next to free up space.

That brings back memories of summer's at Haueter's Lawn and Sport. I don't miss those long summer hours at all.

As a side note you could almost start your own lawn mower racing league at your house. Bet your kids would love it.

I did a little customizing on our tractor




The funny thing is all I do is work on it now

Mine runs like a Deere.

Love the mods!

My mods are a little less visible.

In 2003 I cracked open the head on the '72 210. The '79 was down so I moved the head over there. When I rebuilt the '79 engine in 2004, I found a "D" head that was the best flowing stock Kohler head. The compression was lower but the increased flow was more than enough to offset. I also did some radius work on the intake port.

Just so you know, if you do some quick work with a sanding block and 80 grit sand paper, you can mill the head on the work bench. In the early 90's a guy I worked with did it to a 12 hp Briggs on a pressure washer. When we were done, you could almost lift the pressure washer off of the ground with the recoil rope because the compression had been bumped up so much!!!

In my effort to be brief I neglected to mention how I learned about the Montgomery Ward. Of course it had the serial and model # on it, but where to look it up?

I found a website: www.sepw.com (small engine parts warehouse) where you could look up the tractor, get the part numbers and either order from them or go to ebay or wherever with the part number and search for it.

I ended up buying about 1/2 the parts from sepw and the rest off ebay.

+1 on sepw.com. Mostmint told me about it over the phone the other night and within minutes, I had a part number (and ebay listing!) for the failed spindle on my tractor.

-Dave

Sold the 72 210 tonight. Only fetched $260 but the thing had no deck, leaking input shaft to the trans, no battery, not to mention it was over 36 years old. It may have the original tires.

Now there's this 25 hp hydro Craftsman with a 50" deck on craigslist...

I'm tired of looking at the 180 sit there half apart. So I told my son we would work on it - I'm having him do most of the wrench turning. Started on it last Sunday. So far the trans is installed and the braking mechanism hooked up. The trans was not an exact match so we had to modify one of the supports and the rims need to be cut as they are a little wide for the shaft. The shifting mechanism is not an exact match either and so we used the old lever and the rest from the tractor.

There are a ton of little things that need to be fabricated but hopefully it won't cost much money. Does this qualify as a cheap bastage project?

The starter was sluggish and I had it apart. The bushings seem worn so I'll probably need another. I put some WD-40 on there and we'll see if it is good enough to get through shakedown runs. I fabricated some retainers to hold the brushes in place and it went together fairly easily. The starter was then installed.

Next up was the business of mounting the engine. The previous temp mount was set up with on bolt to hold down and one to keep it from spinning. The firewall needed to be modified in a couple places in order to fit the engine in the right place. Sawzall to the rescue. There were holes drilled in the frame but they were not the right diameter so I opened those up also.

Doesn't look like much but it's moving forward. In fact it looks like less since we took the hood off since it won't fit over the engine in it's current shape.

I guess I'll add my own little piece to this thread.. After getting home from down under to a broken tractor, and struggling to get my lawn cut with my dad's extra tractor, I said "Enough!" and went and bought my first (and last!) new mower. I got it from my friend Nick at R&B Mower in Chesterland. Nick grew up on the same street with Fatica and I.



20hp Briggs V-Twin, 48" cut, twin hydraulic motors (1 for each wheel) and it seems to be really sturdy. Those of you who've been to my house know I have a fair amount of grass to cut and this thing is just better/faster/stronger than my old mower, which I hated from the day I moved in here. The new one is sooo much nicer to cut with, way easier to maneuver and turn around. About the only downside is that I don't think it will fit in the bed of my pickup. I measured everything and it's within an inch, but I haven't actually tried loading it.

It wasn't cheap, but I think it'll be worth it in the long run.

-Dave

Mostmint Jr and I have struck a deal. I told him he could have the tractor if he could get it running. He is now working on it. Last year Fred32v got a drive pulley and now that is installed and looks viable. Choke is also set up and he is working on the throttle cable next. Plan is to get it set up for a test run then some things can be made more permanent.

Tell him to attach the throttle cable to a foot pedal. Makes mowing more fun.

I bought a zero turn this spring:

http://www.lowes.com/pd_336008-270-17WF ... facetInfo=

I got rid of my commercial walk behind .... so I don't have to walk anymore. I'm cutting less than 1/2 acre so it doesn't take me too long to mow anymore.

-BP