Ford 501 Mower

Good afternoon everyone. I'm looking for a 501 expert for some help. I finally got mine hooked up to my 640 and started cutting around my pond and went about 30 feet and the pitman broke. During that time it seemed to work ok except the break back went backwards a couple of times and I had to push it back. I read the manual but the part on how to adjust it leaves a lot to be desired talking about pounds of pressure on the foot plates. It seems that my bar is to low at the end and when I raise the lift it doesn't raise the bar like it says it should. Can anybody give me some step by step instructions on how to adjust the springs lift arms and everything so it will work right please? Thanks for any help you can give me.
 
I'm no expert.

There are a few different ways they clamp on. Do you have little stabilizers as part of the mower to the 3pt arms? I've never used that system.

Do you have regular stabilizer bars, either out to brackets under the fenders, or in to brackets right under the rear end on the hitch bracket?

You do have stabilizer bars of some sort right, one of those three setups to keep the mower from swinging side to side? It won't work without some stabilizer.

After that, the bar that clamps to the left 3pt arm needs to slide back farther and clamp down, to create more lift on the end of the sickle bar. You might have it too far foreward.

For the breakback, is your ground rough, gopher mounds, etc? Perhaps the breakback was doing its job.....w

Paul
 
Danny, ran a 501 for several years. I suspect a few things going on. Regardless of the tractor, I always used the clamp on the left side to stabilize the bar. I found clamping with large u-bolts worked on late model tractors. With that stabilizer in use, there is an adjustment on lower left that will adjust bar tip. Most likely cause of break-back is combination of grass density, ground speed, knife (sharpness), and ledger plate condition. I always found that with good ledger plates, good hold downs, and reasonable knife sections, everything seem to work good. For me, breaking pitmans was always caused by too fast ground speed in heavy hay. I always had a spare in the truck. As they say, "the more you work it, the smarter it will get". Good luck. David/
 
you need to take the manual and go through every adjustment on it. it will take time but be worth it. i used to disengage the pto every time it would break back. but then learned i could just back up and reset it with no damage to pitman.
 

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