Wd choppy idle and misses at all rpms

Awac

New User
OK gentleman,

I have a 1950 AC WD that I bought from my great uncle. It has sat for 7-10 years and u am trying to bring it back to life to plow snow this winter. It has a few slow leaks and needs new gaskets, but the major tear down will be next summer. Right now I am just trying to get it ready to plow snow.

So far I have replaced/fixed
-fuel lines
-coil
-spark plugs and wires
-cleaned fuel tank and sealed it
-oil pressure and heat Guage
-starter
-freed up the hydraulic lever as it was rusted from sitting.

It seems to idle choppy and not run very good. I am looking on some insight as to what it could be. Could it be in the carb? Does it sound like the points are shot and those need to be replaced? Any help is appreciated

(Note: the exhaust manifold has a pretty good leak in it. Could that be the cause of this?)

Thank you,
Austin
 
One that has sat that long needs an ATF treatment. Put about a 1/4 cup of ATF in all the cylinders and also pour about a 1/2 cup down the exhaust. Let ti sit a day or two. Then pull the plugs back out and spin it over to clear the ATF out of the cylinders. Then try to fire it up. Good chance it has rings that are stuck to the pistons and or a valve that is not closing as it should.

Also check that is has a good blue/white spark at the center wire of the distributor cap and at all 4 plugs.

Then pull the carb drain plug and make sure you have a good steady flow of gas for 3 minutes and in less that that time that it will fill a pint jar

Also what brand of plugs did you use. Now days Champs and auto lite plugs are junk. I use the NGK 3112 plugs in my WD45 and my W Speed Patrol
 
(quoted from post at 10:44:06 10/15/16) One that has sat that long needs an ATF treatment. Put about a 1/4 cup of ATF in all the cylinders and also pour about a 1/2 cup down the exhaust. Let ti sit a day or two. Then pull the plugs back out and spin it over to clear the ATF out of the cylinders. Then try to fire it up. Good chance it has rings that are stuck to the pistons and or a valve that is not closing as it should.

Also check that is has a good blue/white spark at the center wire of the distributor cap and at all 4 plugs.

Then pull the carb drain plug and make sure you have a good steady flow of gas for 3 minutes and in less that that time that it will fill a pint jar

Also what brand of plugs did you use. Now days Champs and auto lite plugs are junk. I use the NGK 3112 plugs in my WD45 and my W Speed Patrol

Ok, i will try that. I got autolite 295 plugs for it. It ran the same with the old plugs to the new plugs today
 
Did you get true wire plug wires?? Or did you get the plug wires made fr a car or truck that are carbon wires which do not work well on a tractor and break down pretty fast due to what a tractor is.

Also why replace the coil and other parts instead of trouble shooting since new parts can cause you to add problem not fix them till you do know what and where the problem is
 
(quoted from post at 14:28:46 10/15/16) Did you get true wire plug wires?? Or did you get the plug wires made fr a car or truck that are carbon wires which do not work well on a tractor and break down pretty fast due to what a tractor is.

Also why replace the coil and other parts instead of trouble shooting since new parts can cause you to add problem not fix them till you do know what and where the problem is

Tractor plug wires. I replaced the coil because the top neck was cracked off. The wires had broken ends. I'm going to check the fuel situation tomorrow to make sure that isn't the problem.
 
Earlier this year my WD45 started running badly and I founds it has some dirt/rust in the carb inlet above the float seat and that cause a fuel problem. I cleaned that out and it has run fine since. Bad thing was I was using it to bale hay with so it was a pain in the back sides to switch to a different tractor to finish the hay
 
(quoted from post at 14:59:28 10/15/16) Earlier this year my WD45 started running badly and I founds it has some dirt/rust in the carb inlet above the float seat and that cause a fuel problem. I cleaned that out and it has run fine since. Bad thing was I was using it to bale hay with so it was a pain in the back sides to switch to a different tractor to finish the hay

Thank you for the help. I will check the fuel system tomorrow and see if that's my problem.
 
It could be one or more of all of those but I wouldn't rule out valves. You could have sticky or burned valves. A valve/compression leaking will give a slight hiss out the exhaust. It will cause your problem but so will the others. Just one more thing to check.
 
Pull the valve cover off one of the valves may have stuck a little allowing the push rod to jump out of the rocker,once had a WF that ran pretty bad found out the rocker assembly was coming loose.
 
Adjust the timing?? Why timing does not just jump out of place because it has sat for years
 
Funny I have never done so and have been working on cars and trucks and motorcycles and tractor for 50 years now. Timing does not change much if any over time and if it is good today it will be good a year form now unless something major has happened. Installing new points will not change the timing enough to matter much if any at all
 
I cleaned the carb and adjusted it and that seemed to have helped a lot. I drove it around and it seems better under load. I will be installing new points and condenser this week to see if that helps. Thanks for the help guys
 
I'd leave the old condenser in it. Now days new condensers seem to be bad about 50% of the time. Point gap is 0.025 and be sure to buy good points not the points you find at say TSC
 
you must very lucky ,old,because changing points has sometimes,not always, necessitated an adjustment on the distributor to get the best run. so I guess we'll not convince each other as I have worked on them just as long as you. I assume you don't use a timing light or dwell metor then.
 
Learned from a guy who is long gone that a timing light while it can work is likely to be worng due to timing chains wear and then you can not time one as it should be. I do it by ear but that is not really how it is done it is done by running one and adjusting for max power and easy start. This guy also showed me how to weld gas tanks and many thing that many would not even try but I have done most more then once
 
"....a timing light while it can work is likely to be wrong due to timing chain wear and then you can not time one as it should be. "

Sorry, that makes no sense at all. You are timing the spark in relation to the crankshaft. If anything, the timing light will help to re-synchronize the spark to the piston movement if you DO have timing chair wear.

I agree that a timing light should be used after changing points, since there might be variations in the geometry of the rubbing block, or pivot point. Probably not so much if the new points are the same brand as the old ones.
 
When I said chain I mane as in like the old 350 Chev which once the chain has gotten old will starch and in turn cause timing to be off since the distributor timing is off the cam shaft.

That does not hold true to many if any tractor due to having gear to gear set up but one can get very good at timing something it you have doe it for decades which I have
 
You have both taken things out of context since I said engines with timing chains which means things like the 350 Chev engines etc
 
I would follow Old's advice. If that doesn't work you are probably due for some serious repairs. I acquired a 37 WC awhile back and it would start right up, but ran really rough, real choppy, popping, etc. Put a load on it and it would smooth out and sound pretty good, but didn't have much power. Soaked the cylinders with ATF but that didn't change anything. A compression check revealed serious problems. Two of the cylinders had about 60 lbs. and the other two had only 30. One cylinder had deep grooves where a wrist pin had come loose and ground in to the cylinder wall. One cylinder had swallowed a valve and the piston had the scars to prove it. I think it is absolutely amazing that these old engines could keep on working after so much use and abuse. Are they tough or what?????
 
Thank you. I learned years ago to try the simple stuff then work to the harder stuff of in other words KISS keep it simple stupid
 
You have got a lot of good advice, from the guys on this forum , but pay attention to what Traditional Farmer told you. Please remove the rocker arm cover, and check the top saddle on your rocker arm stands, for cracked cast tops. This has been something I have found, several times, on older Allis engines, that missed, and wouldn't respond to other means of repair. Yes you will need a new rocker cover gasket, if you do this.
 

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