Z129D

Hi, I hope you all had a peaceful day yesterday. I had, and got many gifts, and one of them is a book about the UK built FE35, MF35 and MF 65, and it starts with a little about the American versions.
Among other things I see that Continental developed a Z129D for the TO30, but the book says none was fitted to a Ferguson tractor.
So, I am curious about this engine, was it something Continental put in production for other things, other tractor brands or other types of equipment. Does anyone know ?


Bill

I've never seen one in a tractor, or ever for that matter. Wonder if it was ever in an air compressor, or generator?

Is there any books or literature that covers the Continental engine production, and now I am thinking about engines that could be used in tractors or trucks, not the aircraft engines they made ?


Bill

I have a tune up spec book for the Continental engines that Massey-Harris used, both gas and diesel. I looked in the old NAPA and Michigan bearing catalogs, the ZD129 is listed nowhere. I have seen the Roosa-Master spec and parts list for the injection pump. I wonder if the engine was never put in production. Since tractor and industrial Continentals were all water cooled and the planes air cooled, were they built by the same company?

There was a TED20 that used an oil vaporizing engine(?) Is that what they were referring to?

http://www.yesterdaystractors.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=oliver&th=187208

From the archives, Search for ZD129.
We were talking about this just the last few weeks.
I found pistons and sleeve set for $1,200.00 US
and some literature.

Is there any mention of how many Standard Motors
petrol tractors that were shipped to the US?

Bill. Here are the pistons
http://onanparts.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=451

Jensales has written literature on ZD129.
I have in the past read about a ZD120 also.

Bob Sybranday mentions that they developed a Z129D
diesel engine was developed for the 30 but was never put into production in the book. I did have an old original parts book for the TO-20 and 30 that on the last few pages of the book listed the parts for this engine. Sadly, I gave the parts book to the guy who bought my 30 so I no longer have it. Maybe if someone is interested they can see if they have this book and tell us more about the engine, but like Bob wrote, this engine was never put into production, probably for 2 reasons. Gas was cheaper here in the US, and Harry Ferguson did not like diesel engines, but I do not know how much influence he had here in the US at that time.

two manuals on ebay right now

Hello 2tractors.

I guess it might be such information in the UK somewhere, if there is.
Then you have 2 ways of getting tractors in to the US, some was exported from the factory in England to the US directly through the dealer system. Then, a lot of UK tractors were exported from England to Canada, and some of them have from what I have heard ended up in the US over the years.


Bill

Hi,

No, the TED 20 has a Standard 85 mm engine. A little lower compression, and different head, different spark plugs, different carb., different lubricating oil, a heatshield over the carb and intake manifold to increase the temperature.

The Z129D, or ZD 129 as it seems it is called, is a normal diesel engine, not a spark ignition engine run on some kind of fuel oil.

Back to the TED 20, it is run on pure gas to start and stop, and on something they called TVO in England, it stands for Tractor Vaporizing Oil, and was a mix of something they called 28 second heating oil and gasoline. A mix of about half and half seems to have been common to use in more recent times. But, back in those days from what I understand you could buy TVO at the gas station.
The 28 second heating oil I think is a destillate between kerosene and diesel fuel.
In Norway (where I come from) we had something they called "Traktorbensin" or "Tractorgas" it would be translated to American English. It was a mix of gas and kerosene of some kind, and I think I have heard that it had about 70 octane, and I think I have heard that the TVO was about the same. But Norway did not have the 28 second heating oil, so I guess the mix rate between the gas and the oil/kerosene had to be altered some. It was not only Ferguson tractors that ran on this stuff in Norway, at least I know that some BM Volvo tractors used the same stuff, and people could buy it at the gas stations in Norway too, as in England. I have no idea if other countries had it in Europe, but I would assume Sweden might have had it too, because if I remember right BM Volvo made more of these "TVO" tractors than they were sending to Norway.
It has always been a puzzle to me why gas was so cheap here in the US, and so expensive in Europe, and that it waqs the opposite when it came to the diesel fuel. It is like I have a feeling that the crude oil used in Europe has been of a different kind than in the US and therefore gave different amounts and therefore different prices too.
Maybe some wise guys here know about that part of the story.


Bill

Thanks Bill.

They did make some Z series diesels. I don't think many of them Years ago when I worked for Dana a NAPA machine shop down along the Ohio River called as they were looking for a crankshaft for one. How old of a bearing catalog do you have? I think 1976 is about it for me. Happy New year! J.

I'll just speculate that the Diesel patents were pretty much tied up by European companies. There were some efforts in the US, such as Packard Motor Company which built radial airplane engines that were very good, but didn't sell. Another guy kept the effort going, but only got a pay-off when his diesel radial engine was chosen as a tank engine. Of course, the 2nd World War pretty much invalidated patents, especially German ones. So not long afterwards they began to be commonplace. Up until WWII and shortly afterwards, distillate-fueled tractors were pretty common, because it was a cheap left-over from distilling gasoline. Farmers went for low cost any which way they could. However, in about 1938, a single individual Frenchman came to the US and demonstrated how distillate could be converted into aviation fuel. This one man may have done as much as anyone for the US war effort. One result of the ramp-up in fuel production for WWII was an abundant capacity after the War ended, which kept the prices cheap. The State of Texas actually set the price before the overseas extractors formed a cartel during the Viet Nam war.
In the US, farm gas was not taxed, I'm not sure about Europe, but if they did, it was probably more costly than the fuel itself.

Well, here is what has happened since last time I sent a post on this topic.
I bought an original Continental Red Seal Four Cylinder Diesel engine operator and maintenance instruction book on e-bay.

It covers the ZD-129, but also the GD-157, GD 181, ED-201, HD 260, and JD 382.

The ZD-129 engine seems to have very similar engine mounts in the front, like all Ferguson TE and TO engines have, but it has a sheet metal oil pan, and it has fuel filters on the left lower side, so you can not have any starter there, guess it is on the other side. So, this is not the Ferguson tractor engine, or it probably is, just modified a little for industrial use. As I can see, moving the filters is not a big deal at all, and then it should be fine to mount the starter there.
Another interesting thing is that the diesel injection pump is a rotary pump that looks like a regular distributor, and the mounting looks just like where the Z-129 has the distributor.

Engine power is rated at 30 hp at 2600 hp, and 87 lb.ft. at 1200 rpm, and it has a 3 1/4" bore, and a 3 7/8" stroke. and 16.25:1 in comp ratio.

If you take 30 divided by 2600 and multiply by 2000 which was the standard engine speeds for the TE - To series engines you will get just a tad above 23 hp. But, I guess the horsepower curve flattens a little out at 2600 rpm, so it might have had more at 2000 than just 23 hp. The Standard 20C engine in the TEF 20 has 26 hp, and I guess that would not be so far off at 2000 rpm for the Continental either.


Bill