Dexta gas engine

Arrow driver,

Have you taken the head and oil pan off so you know if it has been previously overhauled?
I think this is a version of the Triumph Vanguard Standard engine. the bore may be the same or slightly greater the the Triumph Tr4 engine. It has the same stroke 92 mm, but the Triumph engine has a compression ratio of 9:1 while the Dexta engine has a ratio of 6:1.

If no one else can provide a parts source they can probably be ordered using Clevite and Hastings catalogs.

If the pistons are any good you might be able to reuse them and order rings per piston groove dimensions while the bearings should have numbers on them that can be used as a guide.
 
On further checking I think it has the same engine as the ferguson FE-35 gas engine. It does have the same bore and stroke. YT has the bearings, pistons, rings and sleeves for this engine, but you have to be sure it is the same engine or based closely on it.

Surely someone more familiar with this will chime in soon.

DL
 
It is not the same engine as the FE35 but similar. It is a Standard Industrial engine and some of the parts, like the starter are
different. It has a completely different flywheel and ring gear, the ring gear now being impossible to get new. I had to get one
from Canada and one from Australia for my tractor. The starter is mounted on the other side to the FE35 and the Dexta has a fuel
lift pump.

Head gasket, pistons rings and sump gaskets are as FE35/TE20 but valves are different. They are different sizes of stem and valve
guide, one is FE35 the other is Triumph TR3 ( I think). I do have the parts book but the Fordson numbers used are no longer
relevant. It does have an FE35 carburettor.

I get my engine parts from the Ferguson dealer but tend to take them along and match them.

I am collecting as much data as I can on these tractors world wide. There were only 4000 built and Ford did not build them but
only supplied the parts. If you post the engine number from near the coil, FPL....E, the serial number from the flange behind the
fuel pump (959E......, or 09A......) and any date codes from the gearbox, rear axle trumpet housings, rear axle, and hydraulic
lift, I can tell you the day the parts were built and assembled into the tractor. Date codes look like A27D or 3A1. Numbers that
start 959E and are cast in to the component are mould numbers and are the same on every Dexta, petrol or diesel.

If you send me an e-mail (bhe at btconnect.com) I will send you all the details I have collected so far from around the world. Most of the tractors seem to be in Australia and not in the cold countries they were destined for.
 
Majorman,
Thank you for providing more exacting information than I. I am limited to my Dexta diesels. It is good to know that most of the short block parts are the same. At least the valves can be replaced if necessary, but I guess you have to go by size.

How many teeth does the starter ring gear have? I guess it is different from the one on a Dexta and a different size.

DL
 
The diameter of the flywheel is way bigger than the diesel and the MF ring gear looks like a car one beside it. Can't remember
the tooth count at the moment but I think it was around 141. I went to ring gear suppliers all over England and Europe with no
luck. My friends in Canada and Australia help me with good second hand ones as mine had no teeth in the usual places for a four
cylinder. I even tried to repair it with weld then turned it so the starter hit in another place but with no luck. A new ring
gear sorted it and I now have a spare for future use.

The engine was used on Massey-Harris balers and other industrial applications. It is a lovely smooth runner and very quiet. At
ploughing matches you would here people say "Oh it is another Dexta" until you dropped the revs down and she crept along with
hardly a purr.

I worked for a Ford tractor dealer and was involved with Ford Motor Company in later years and nobody had heard of a petrol
Dexta. I saw my first in the early 1990's and was "smitten", I had to have one. Mine came back to England in a poor state, from
New Zealand. She was dumped in the container as a "make weight". Now there are four within a couple of miles of me.
 

Thanks to everyone here for the prompt and helpful replies.

The engine number is FPL674E and the s/n is 957E7572 with some kind of squiggle at the end of the number that looks like a tilted upside down V

Yesterday evening I got reading up on this engine and came to the conclusion that it might be much the same as the Triumph TR3 and TR4 engines, at least to the extent of the internal parts like sleeve/piston assys and bearing shells, and external ones like distributor cap, points etc, Nice to know that this tractor isn't a total orphan.
 
I would imagine that this being an industrial engine parts of the block are reinforced and sturdier than the block used in a Triumph. That way there would be no need for additional support when they used it in machinery like a tractor.

Good luck on your rebuild.

DL
 
My engine is FPL661E, but the chassis number is much higher, 5 digits, 959E756XX M. I believe the "M" stands for "Modified". Although minor, the modifications consisted of moving the battery tray to back end of left hand running board, with longer cable., and, installing an extra fuel tank where the battery would be. They also pinched off the diesel return line to the fuel tank. The dash was also modified to have an ignition switch and choke. Actually, mine doesn't have the extra gas tank, nor the remote battery. It may have been farmer-modified, or it was early in production and they hadn't considered how much gas would be burned.
You should probably double check to see if your serial number starts with 959. This correlates with 1959 era design work. The tractor didn't get into regular production until 1961. If it really starts with 957, I don't know what to think. Maybe it was a test model.
 
There is a site called the Fordson Tractor Pages forum. PHPBB. They have a number of pages on petrol Dexta and one owner gives the frame number as 957E 73663 for his gas Dexta.
Yet the tractor dates from 1961. So there is a pattern here that is inconsistent with the normal production dates associated with the 957E numbers of the diesel Dextas.

I just found this site, but YT is my normal forum
 

I tried to edit my posting to correct the serial number as I since noted that there is a "zero" at the end of it, thus the s/n is 957E75720. I did double check the 957 and it's very clear. There is no evidence that a battery was ever installed in the space between the fuel tank and the engine firewall though there is a line connected to the front side of the fuel tank that doesn't go to anything. This looks like it would have been a diesel return line as it connects quite high in the tank. I also checked the casting dates and they fit in early in 61 which seems to fit both the engine # and s/n#.

I assume that there is no factory records on these?
 

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