It happens. My dad fractured his wrist when a John Deere L backfired on him. They'll backfire when you least expect it and there is absolutely nothing to protect you from it when that crank is engaged. We had a Farmall F-30 that felt like starting a battleship. I was pulling it through one day and it coughed, pulled the crank out of my hand, spun one rev reverse and hit the palms of my hands with the crank before I knew what happened.

It would have launched me into the next county if I'd been pushing on it.

That's why you run Deeres and crank with the flywheel.



Seriously, JDs seem to start best when you gently roll them to right before TDC on the compression stroke, then snap it through so the magneto kicks. Maybe that's just a two cylinder thing.

No kidding about those flywheels being a lot safer. Now, when the crank seal gets dry, leaks, and the inside of that flywheel is coated in oil and you can't get a grip on it.....

A neighbor had a JD B displayed at the county livestock show years ago. Kids were crawling all over it, and I guess at some time someone had pulled on the flywheel and had it RIGHT on TDC. While he was telling someone about the tractor a kid walked up admiring the flywheel and gave it a gentle pull - it started right up. Thank God it wasn't in gear. Everyone raced to pull the plug wires on all the tractors after that.

I always killed Dad's tractors by shutting off the gas. But you can't be too careful with kids messing with stuff.

quote:

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2. It seems to fire more often with the hand crank. I got 3-4 fires in a row on the hand crank but I'm still flooding.

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Welcome to six-volt land. It is a miserable place! It would not surprise me if the battery is unable to throw a hard spark if you've been cranking much.

I pulled a plug just to make sure and the spark was pretty strong.

You said timing is off.

Off as in its not 'in time' w the distributor? Misfiring cylinders?

Or off as in too advanced or ******ed? Since you've yet to experience a backfire I believe it would be too far ******ed if anything. When it's advanced it'll buck like a mule on the crank and the cylinder will hit and pop HARD.

I'm not sure in way it would be off but it just doesn't want to do anything. When it does pop it's very weak and doesn't seem to help crank the engine at all. it seems like the fuel air mixture isn't right at the time it fires.

Also it didn't do anything for me when I tried to spray in starting fluid which leads me to believe the carb is ok and I have an ignition problem.

You can turn on the gas, let the carb fill, then cut the gas off. Engine should run a minute or two on gas in carb, and you won't flood.

If the timing were too advanced, you might get a backfire through the carb, or the engine spins backward. If its too r e t a r d e d then maybe a pop through exhaust and a lack of oomph

Pop through the exhaust and lack of umph is what I'm getting.

I've always treated those symptoms as ******ed timing. I can't believe that offends TA sensibilities. Someone please tell me what the PC terminology is for LATE firing.

It would not be beyond the realm of possibility you are firing on the exhaust stroke. Pull plug 1 and put your thumb over the hole to see if the plug is firing @ on the compression stroke.

I missed some posts there. I concur with y'alls thinking.

If you're firing on the exhaust stroke, just pull your distributor cap, pull the rotor off, rotate it 180 degrees, and push it back on. That should get you close, and you can loosen the bolts on the housing to rotate it to fine tune the firing/timing.

Tried that and it got worse. Never got it to fire. I'm going to play with the timing first thing in the morning to see what happens. I have the setting all the way to one side so hopefully it's off enough to cause these problems.

Maybe it's been mentioned before,and I've seen some variations, but timing is pretty easy.

Ignition off

Gas off

Spark plug #1 out, or all 4 if you want to make it really easy to turn

Put finger on #1 spark plug hole

Turn engine by hand, slowly, until you feel the pressure rise of the compression stroke

Look at the bottom pulley or wherever the timing marks are. You should be somewhere around 90-120 degrees rotation before top dead center. Turn the engine on around to TDC. You can also find TDC by stopping where the pressure rise stops, sticking a wire or screwdriver in the sparkplug hole and jiggling the crank back and forth, or looking in with a flashlight.

Pop the distributor cap, the rotor should be at or just past the wire for #1. If it isn't, loosen and rotate the mag to get it there, or move the wires to match.

Put cap back on, check firing order and make sure it is nailed down correctly.

I did all this and it's an improvement but it's still not firing much. At least now when it fires it seems to help the engine and it sounds right but I still can't get it to fire consistently. I'm getting about 1 ignition for every 3-5 seconds of cranking it. When I pull the plugs they all have a visible spark in daylight. Is it possible somehow I'm not getting a good ground when I instal the plugs so they aren't sparking consistently in the cylinder? Is there a way to check that?

The tractor also behaves the same way with the gas turned off and shooting starting fluid in the intake so I don't think it's a fuel issue.

Do you have a 12v coil laying around? If you do sub it for your 6 v coil and try a 12v battery. Just don't stand in the starer for 10min and you'll be fine. Remeber this about pulling plugs and checking the fire - you're relieving compression too - so the battery will throw a harder spark with the plugs out. 6v systems aren't much better than hand cranking if things aren't perfectly tuned. Don't take that personal - I've been right where you are.

Just a suggestion.

If your timing is right and you have good spark it SHOULD hit on starting fluid.

If you think talking through it will help email a phone number to my username @ yahoo and I'll be happy to help you formulate new expletives.

Since you've already done or are doing all the things a logical analysis says to do, here's a couple of long shots --

1. Hole in the intake or in gaskets causing vacuum leak and diluting your fuel/air mixture.

2. Obstruction in exhaust messing up the intake stroke.


I feel for you brother. I've spent time on projects where the effort far outweighed the reward, mainly because I couldn't let it kick my tail. But, sometimes they did.

Good luck.

PROGRESS!!!!!

The gears that drive the rotor/distributor must have been off because I couldn't get enough adjustment to line up the #1 cylinder to fire near TDC. It seemed off about 30-40 deg. I took it apart and couldn't find any timing marks so I put it back together to where it looked right and what do you know she cranked right up and ran for about 15 seconds but it was still very rough. Unfortunately my battery died from cranking all morning so it's on the charger now.

I did also wind up having the engine run backwards for a few strokes which I think means it's too rehtarded right? Pretty weird seeing exhaust billow out of the intake.

Thanks for all the help on this and I finally feel like I'm on the home stretch. I have thought so many times that "this fix is going to get it going" but I really think I'm almost there this time. I have never been more happy to have a garage full of exhaust.

If your mag goes into a multi tooth gear the mark will be a tiny V pointing into a groove or @ a tooth. There should be a similar mark on your mag that lined up a it. Look close and maybe polish around the sweet spot you found. I promise it will be there.

I thought you had the 2 lug coupling where it's just one way or the other.

too far advanced

I can't tell you how many times I worked on something long past reason, because I didn't want to be defeated

On second thought - it may not be a V on the engine. One side has a Small V pointing to a gear tooth. The other will have two small dots that bracket the groove that tooth goes in.

CP....isn't it nice that someone comes along from time to time like the OP and allows you to share knowledge that has just been taking up space in your brain for years and years?

The mag is just two lugs but the gear that drives the rotor is 15-25 teeth. I couldn't find any timing marks on the small one. The R L marks are easy but I can't find one on the pinion. I'm just playing with it till it seems close enough to adjust by moving the mag body.

I'm not sure if I'm in the same page as you with the coupling. Hopefully my pic clears it up.

Two lugs like this?

Absolutely. I'm enjoying this thread and I'm going to have a beer when coolerguy gets this thing purring.

I'm going to have more than just one!

Mine has two lugs like the picture you posted on what I'm calling the magneto side. There are only two ways for it to go. The outlet side of that is where the rotor is and its driven by the two gears I posted. I'm playing around with the position of those two gears to get the timing where I need it. I'll be back at it tomorrow afternoon. Thanks again for all the help guys.

SHE LIVES!!!!



Now for the fun part. I don't think the throttle is doing anything because I'll move it around and it doesn't change the rpms. Valve train is crazy loud but I guess that's expected. After it ran about a minute it smoothed out and sounded much better. About to clean all the tools off it and go for a spin.

Update: I got it out in the street and there is virtually no power. Would die if I tried to start in 2nd and barely moved in 1st. I drove a circle and it decided it didn't want to run anymore. Battery couldn't crank it and I got it running a few times with the hand crank but not for long. It will run rough like it did in the video and then randomly speed up and sound smoother. It's also got a ton of exhaust.

It's in the street right now charging which sucks because my driveway has quite a slant. If I can't get it running with some power I'll be parking it in the street for a bit.

Congrats. You've already made it farther than the dude going to Africa in the modded jeep!

You are running rich, too much fuel - that is the cause of the black smoke. I'll bet if you pull a plug now it would be sooted up pretty good. My first thoughts are to:

• make sure the choke butterfly is in the position you think it is (I'm sure it is, but it's the obvious)
• reduce fuel flow with the main fuel jet needle by leaning it out some, usually that is screwing the needle in some
• verify that the throttle linkage is in fact moving the throttle butterfly

The valve train was dry and took a bit to move oil up there and quiet it down. If it's been inoperative a while I'm sure it just needed to get primed again - if it persists check that there is no sludge blocking the oil pump. Remember to keep an eye on the oil pressure gauge, if it's too low we need to diagnose that before we have to open up the bottom end.

Have I mentioned how much 6 volt systems suck? When you get this tuned you will much prefer the hand crank.

ETA - on the throttle linkage. There is a governor involved there somewhere - so when you get it running again reach over with your hand and push the throttle butterfly to see if it changes the engine RPMs. If it does and responds like it should then we need to check and make sure the governor linkage is set and there aren't any stuck linkages somewhere. Also, it can be wonky because of old or dirty oil and wake itself up just like the drive train. Stating the obvious the governor limited the throttle response with a set of spinning counterweights that helped the engine maintain RPMs under load and then kept it from 'running away' when the implement was lifted.

I only made it about 50 feet on the maiden run and then about 20 feet each time after that. If I have the Africa guy beat then he must suck.

I wound up using chains and a come-along to get it back in my garage. I'll start messing with the fuel mixture and finalizing the timing this week. The throttle produces no change so I'll get into that too. Hopefully I don't need to pull the radiator to mess with it.

You shouldn't have to. It's just that unlike a car your throttle isn't directly connected to your throttle butterfly. Your throttle input is a 'suggested throttle setting' to the governor which ultimately holds the engine at the desired rpm. If something is off, like your carb, the governor just seems to compound the problem. When you lean it a little and get it back running reach in to override the gov & see how it responds.

Oh, and momma is gonna be pissed when that tractor exhaust blackens the inside of your garage door.