ford 3000 questions and purchasing advice

a fellow i know approached me asking if i would be interested in a ford 3000 he has that has been sitting a while...hes trustworthy and said it needs a water pump..rear brakes oil and filter change(old oil and been sitting) probably a carb kit and possibly fuel tank cleaned along with sediment bowel...tractor has good rear tires so so on front...no power steering ..decent paint and is gas... has 2 stick transmission...i went and looked at it tonight and this is the blue one by the way not the older with sos...wants $2000.00 as it sits...is this reasonable?...any pitfalls to these tractors...parts to repair expensive?...do they have live pto?..the clutch doesnt feel like a 2stage..any other comments...thanks for any input

There's unknowns with any non-running tractor, but for what you could get or make out of a 3000 in the shape you say I'd probably offer a little less. Lack of power steering, may also support less of an offer. The brakes are one of the easier jobs to tackle on one of these, barring any oil seal leaks. Inspect the fluids in it, suspect anything, drain a bit of same and inspect etc. Our 3600 in a diesel, a bit newer but much the same, has held up well. See if the hood has the foil like sticker, the information on it will ID what it is, well as long as its the hood it came with, thought these were stamped on one of the flat areas on the large casting behind the engine. Parts are reasonable and available. 2 stage I believe depending on the transmission, the 3600 mentioned above is the 2 stage type. I liked the 2 stage with the new idea flail type spreader we had on it most of the time, same with a rotary mower.

I was looking at a 3000 a year and half ago, well worn, non running, municipal tractor on a broom all its life, pto never used. Lot of work to repair, it had power steering that needed work too, worn tires, $500 tractor needing $3k worth of work. They do come in all forms of wear, that is for sure.

They are very good small tractors.
Good longevity, not hard to work on, good parts availability.
Twin stick usually meant lpto but they did come both ways.
Best to find the 3 lines of code just above and bebind the starter. See photo. Post them and we can tell you.
Price is in the zone if the tractor is decent in appearance, no smoke, rattles, etc. Lift works, runs ok. As Billy said, add $500 to fix everything. Wouldn't be a money maker to resell but a good solid machine to own and use. Clean one here - good tires, tin, runs good, not new paint is about $4000 +/-

Even if you had to overhaul the engine (you doing the work except machine shop work and parts) $2000 is cheap. Dual stick 3000 probably 8 speed, 4 LO, move the right hand lever back toward you, 4 HI. With that tranny expect Live PTO....live means that pushing the clutch all the way down stops the tractor ground movement and the PTO. Letting the clutch approximately half way up starts the PTO spinning (if engaged with the PTO lever) let the pedal on out (up) and you engage the ground movement while the PTO is running.

That concept is perfect for digging post holes in a fence row and brush hogging in corners and around obstacles where you want to keep the blade turning while you change the ground position of the tractor, unlike the transmission drive that comes with the 4 speed tranny.

I still have 2 of the Ford thousand series and over the years have had 3 more; 2 are/were 3000s.

Water pump avail from Napa. Inexpensive and easy to change out.

John

post the numbers as requested.

dual stick machines CAN be live pto, some were not.

if the engine is not stuck, and the oil is serviceable, I'd see if I could get it started just on a temp tank to evaluate the engine, steering, tranny, etc.

hard to pay 2000$ for a ran when parked. that don't run... them are 500$ tractors.

On the other hand, a good 3000 needing minor repairs for 2000$ is good.

just got to see which side of the coin you are on.

this is the blue one by the way not the older with sos.

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There was only ever one 3000 model. They were always a 3 cylinder engine and they were made from 1965 through 1974 (or 1975 depending on your source of information). They had several transmission options, including the s-o-s, but were also available with a 4 speed, 6 speed and 8 speed manual transmission. The 4 speed only had a non-live PTO option, while the 6 speed and 8 speed, which both had twin sticks, could be had with either live or non-live PTO.

They were always blue when sold through the regular dealership channels regardless of which transmission they had, including the s-o-s, but could have been any color if it was custom ordered or part of a fleet purchase.

Sean. If not Live, were they transmission? Sure seems to be a wasted design to put a tranny on an 8 speed utility like the 3000.

Texasmark1,

The non-live PTO's on the 6 and 8 speeds were trans driven, just like the one on the 4 speed. The non-live PTO's were available on the 6 & 8 speed transmissions on both the 3000 and 3 cylinder 2000 models, but were more common on the 2000 models, and on the 6 speed transmissions on the 3000 models, as the buyers who went with the non-live PTO were more likely to be shopping price and if they were springing for the extra price of the 8 speed they would probably spring for the live PTO as well, but there are a few out there.

Well sir, that's reason enough. If you can't find a market for your product what's the point in manufacturing it.

(quoted from post at 10:22:21 10/05/16) Well sir, that's reason enough. If you can't find a market for your product what's the point in manufacturing it.

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Since they only had to stock a few different parts in terms of gears and shafts for the transmission, and they had the single and dual clutches on hand anyway, it wasn't much extra cost to offer the live and non-live PTO on all configurations it was feasible on. And some folks don't want to spend a nickel more than they have to in order to get what they need, and a lot of folks back then had only known transmission driven PTO's their whole farming career so they saw live PTO as an unnecessary expense, where the 6 and 8 speed transmissions that allowed more control over the speed of the tractor, especially the slower speeds that were unavailable on the 4 speed, were considered a necessary feature worth paying a little more for.