Stuck ZB engine-Help

I'm helping a friend with a newly aquired 1953 Moline ZB. It has sat inside a pole barn or 15 plus years. Engine is stuck otherwise a nice tractor.
I've pulled the sparkplugs, filled the cylinders with diesel and transmission fluid. Been setting a few weeks. Would parts washing fluid/mineral spirits work better? Checked the valves, five were stuck. Got three unstuck, other two are pushed in and connecting rod adjustment screws are turned out on those.
Today tried to pull the tractor as a way to see if it would free up. We would tow it with my D17 letting out the clutch in 2nd gear on the ZB, it would usually just slide the tires, then both tires did start turning forward -but the tractor still pulled hard and the fan wasn't spinning. Do you think the clutch is just slipping or did we damage something? This does have what seems to be a hand clutch also, but it doesn't seem to do anything.
Any help would be greatly appreciated
Anything we could do to make this project easier? Hope we didn't damage anything
 
It will be better to use 5th gear and to just GENTLY rock a wheel back and forth to free the engine. The hand clutch is what provides a quasi live PTO. It disengaged the left wheel so that forward motion stopped while the PTO remained turning. It does sound as if either the main clutch or the hand clutch may be slipping.
 
The zb didnt have a hand clutch did it? I think he meant the hand clutch on the d 17 ? Yes from the little i know GENTLY rock the zb back and forth . Do NOT force anything. I've heard of a commercial solution for freeing engines and also of guys using sea foam stuff.. I always wondered about using a small torch and holding it in the sparkplug hole to heat things inside there so it would expand and contract when cooling and maybe loosening things up. Guess I will have to be the fool to try that some day . lol I might try squirting a little gas in the hole and lighting it.Good luck and be safe. Not many of these old gals around.I wish i had bought my neighbors now with the mounted picker on it. Only two of that combination i know of. He had the dual hydraulic lines on his but i cant remember if his had power steering or not.Did they come with it from the factory or was that an add on maybe? Good luck and let us know your progress.
 
One should never try to pull one to free it up that can cause many broken parts. Now a 12 volt battery and the starter using short fast taps on the starter on the other hand will not cause problems. As for freeing ti up straight ATF NOTHING else. Fill the cylinder and let it sit and also if you can fill the exhaust with ATF. It took a long time for it to lock up so it can take weeks to free one up. Thing that can help if you have a way to do it is hook up the cooling system to a water heater and let the water flow so as to warm up the engine which can cause things to expand which can free things up. Had an RTU that took 6 months to free up and I had to pull the heads off then pout gas in and light the gas up a few times then it freed right up
 
I have tried while soaking them to put the hand crank in the engine and either hang some wheel weights on it or put a jack under it going up to put a little pressure on things.
 
I have never had any luck getting an engine unstuck with out having to take it apart. I had a stuck ZB, took the engine apart, pulled the blocks with pistons off the case and set them on the work bench. The only way I have had luck in working with that type of block was to put the head back on and use a grease tip in the spark plug hole. Pump grease into it. I have gotten several loose this way. However, the valves must seal for this to work. It is never a good idea to try to get a stuck engine loose by pulling it and letting the clutch out, something is going to give and it won't be the piston from the cylinder wall. This takes a lot of patience.
 
I have never tried this but I was told it works, And I'm going to try it.
Take a torch cutting torch and place a small flame through the spark plug hole with
trans fluid in the cylinder and heat the top of the piston. Was told that this will work every time
" let me know if you use this remedy "
 
I bought a 445 that had been sitting many years but had a flapper on the exhaust pipe. I pulled all the plugs and put several tablespoons of Kroil in each of the cylinders and let it set a couple of weeks. I took a large screwdriver or small pry bar and went to the timing hole on hte side of the flywheel housing, you could see the teeth of the starter ring gear, I managed to turn it a couple of inches - one tooth at a time. The oil appears to be over full and I want to drain the crankcase before I go much further and pump water thru the oil pump.
Bryce
 
ya, pull the engine apart and do it properly. sure it will run IF it frees up. but never like an engine that has had no water or condensation in it. which means rust in cyl's and pitted cyl's what do you think the rings are doing rubbing against rust. the amount of time you spend waiting on soaking i can have the engine apart and back together and running and you will still be waiting on magic to happen.
 
that will do nothing.you dont want to heat the piston anyhow. you want to expand the cyl. with heat . i have tryed these time wasted ideas for my own curiosity and found out they do not work. a piece of round hardwood the size of the bore and a sledge hammer is most effective once the head is off. one thing that would benefit though is to hook up a ciculating htr. up to the block and circulate the water around hot. as you want to heat from the outside of sleeve. i had a mccormick w6 i left for about a year soaking with atf and mystery oil with full cyl's. not a chance. pulled the head and honed out the rust. used my block of wood and hammer and air to keep cleaning the cyl's. after half a day i got it loose.
 
The only bad part on the R-Z series motors though is you can use a block of wood on top of the piston.
 
Old is on the RIGHT track. At MM Hopkins plant we used only Type A ATF on machines pulled out of the "bone yard" to free them up!
 

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