Setback on daughter's tractor

Friend has a grey-market Yanmar tractor. He's moving to town on August 8, and has no place for it- he tried to sell it, but no interest. Daughter has been using my compact utility Deere (also a Yanmar) for about a year, and I would like to get it home, so I was ripe for the pickin' when he made an offer I couldn't refuse.

Cute little tractor- he repainted it, slapped some diamond plate on the floor boards, new seat, just spiffed it up very nicely. I roaded it to my place, about 8 miles, and it ran strong- never even had to shift down for the hill.

But went to put the bush hog on it to test it out, and it turns out he didn't get past the cosmetics. 3 point will go up, but not down. PTO runs- but control handle is frozen and will not shift out of gear. Its a 3 speed PTO, and appears to be in the highest gear, which is about 1500 RPM, so that's not good, either.

I suspect its just gunked up, as that was the case when it quit running after he bought it- I helped him change very dirty fuel filters. But I've got to tear it down to clean it up, so am ORDERING A MANUAL tomorrow (ain't ya'll proud of me?). Operators and parts manuals came with it- operators is basically a series of safety tips, with very little real content, and parts manual is entirely in Japanese, so not a lot of help. Service manual I'm getting is in English, so that's a plus.

Girl needs a tractor for her horse place, and I think this one will be great for her- but didn't really want another project before delivering it. Well, such is life- seems like only yesterday, she was 16 and I replaced most of the front end parts in her Subaru after she ditched it. And put new front sheet metal on her brother's Ford Tempo. And rebuilt her other brother's Honda automatic transmission. Been fixing the kid's stuff for 30 years, so why stop now?

I thought that's what Dads are for! When my kids were in school and working part time jobs, I maintained as many as six vehicles. That meant either a safety inspection or a new set of tags almost every month. But I know, deep down inside, you wouldn't change it for the world. I know I wouldn't. BTW, good luck on the tractor.

You're right on that, Shadetree- We called it "the fleet" back in the day. I encouraged Subarus, because they're pretty tough, are easy to work on, and I already had the manuals! Had up to three of them at one time. Two of the kids still have them (newer ones, of course).

No, I don't begrudge working on the kids' stuff- that's what Dads are for.

Well, SWELL!

You (apparently) are about as DUMB as I am! (But we sure do have FUN along the way through life!)

Horses?

Yep! I found the problem!

Why girls get so attached to horses, I'll never understand. I have 2 sisters. both of which have cost me a LOT of time and effort. One ha horses, the other sees what a mess it has become and won't touch them now.


Having girls to take care of is simple. Having girls' horses is a completely different problem!


I am glad you take it all in stride.


I have to mow 13 acres of pasture and over seed 2 of them soon. Sometimes I think it would just be easier to open the gate and let the horses run away, but I don't.

One of these days, I will get smarter and convince them the horses are a burden. Until then, I keep looking online for recipes for barbeque horse meat!

Mike, I experienced similar problems with my "favorite daughter" thought Id never get her "off the payroll" lol but like you said thats just what dads do. Fortunately, her current "main squeeze" is an old farm boy who knows how to fix things so old dad is a bit out of the lopp finally lol

One story where she considered old dad a hero, Shes in Texas over a thousand miles away and calls dad "I locked my keys in my car" so I say I'm a thousand miles away what am I supposed to do?? Then I tell her look under the rear bumper where I had hidden a spare key MADE HER VERY HAPPY but I tell her to put it back or the next time DONT CALL ME

"........Oh the stories we could tell........"

Ol John T and all

I came from a family of 13 kids. At one time my dad had 9 cars in the driveway every night. Needless to say, something was always broke.

Might be a rate of drop valve on the 3 pt. housing that is in need of adjustment ?
Get the pto linkage soaking in your favorite brew of penetrant and hope for the best.

What model is it? We have a F-18 D. It is also a gray market tractor. Ours doesn't have down pressure in the three point unless there is an implement on it, then it just falls to the ground! Yours might just be a little stiff, and the arms won't go down on their own, did you try standing on them? Bryce

Mike (WA):

Under the front of the seat, directly behind the gearshift is a valve with a "T" handle, this is the hydraulic lock for the 3 point hitch. In the fully closed position it will allow the hitch to go up but not down. Also, to the right of the seat and down on top of the axle is another valve with a "T" handle, this controls the rate-of-drop for the 3 point hitch.

The three PTO speeds are: 240, 540, 850 RPM .

I also have a gray-market Yanmar, mine is a YM1300D-A, MFWD, with ROPS, Front Loader, & Box Scraper with scarifiers. Nice little tractor & does everything that I want it to do. Mine is the Landscape tractor and it gets into small, tight places that you could never get to with a normal sized tractor.

Doc

I just love the term "grey" market on these compacts. "Grey market" started as tractors not made for export to the US. A lot of folks got used grey market Kubotas that were imported used and resold. Then people started calling the cheap Chinese imports as grey market. Now everyone is calling anything not JD, CaseIH, Kubota and toher major brands. Last time I looked Yanmar was alive and well and has dealers here in the US.

Rick

Oldtanker- At least among the Yanmars, "grey market" still has the old definition. There's an outfit, Hoye, that specializes in parts for them. Went on line to look for a manual, and they have it split into "Japan" and "US" models.

I remember when the grey markets started making it to our shores- dire predictions of no parts, inferior tractors, etc. Turns out the main difference is that the companies could build virtually the same tractor for their domestic markets for less money, because THEY DIDN'T HAVE TO CONFORM TO ALL THE *^$#% US REGULATIONS. As soon as some outfits started importing parts (which was legal), end of problem.

Walt, this is a 1610D, 4WD and a loader. It has a round knob under the seat which I think is the open/close valve. It turns hard, and doesn't feel "right". I think its not opening all the way, because the little servo shaft at the back moves a little as you lower the 3 point lever, but quits moving too soon- so I think its still partially blocked out, or the shaft is hung up.

According to one of the rare pieces of actual information in the operators manual, the three PTO speeds at 2200 engine RPM are 530, 8 something, and about 1100. I think I'm in high- that would really make that bush hog sing, at least for the brief period before it blew up!

I never do anything any more complicated than an oil change anymore, without a manual. That practice came to me suddenly, and quite by chance- when I removed an innocent looking bolt on an old tractor, and instead of just falling into my hand when I got it unscrewed, the bolt, and the spring and checkball behind it, shot across my shop. Took about an hour to find all three pieces (my shop won't win any prizes for neatness), and I vowed, "Never Again!".

Horses! I have heard it said about boats that they are a hole in the water that you dump money into.

Well horses are just holes in the atmosphere that eat money and poop, well, poop!

You shovel money in one end and shovel poop out the other.

My ex wife spent tens of thousands on a bunch of blankety blank horses. I am glad she is gone, and glad the horses went with her!

Good luck, Gene

Bryce, I tried standing on it- even jumped up and down, using my 225# as effectively as possible. It stayed right up there- I guess the good news is, its got a pretty strong hydraulic pump! LOL

Favorite daughter mechanical story- she called me at the office, in a panic- "I just put some motor oil in the power steering pump- is it going to wreck it?" No, I told her, a little oil won't hurt anything- power steering fluid is just oil anyhow, but a little thinner, with additives- we'll have a tutorial when we're both home.

So she pops the hood, and showed me where she put the motor oil- and it was the oil fill! Somehow the caps had gotten switched, so it said PS. So I switched the caps back, end of problem. Analytically, its a little like the old saying "I thought I made a mistake once, but I was wrong."

You'd have to know my wife to fully appreciate the situation. A more horse-crazy female never lived, and unless you believe in miracles, daughter was destined to follow in her footsteps. Wife trail rides Paso Finos constantly- will ride with anybody, anytime, and will furnish the horses to boot. She has many other good qualities, or I would have ditched her years ago (LOL, in case she sees this).

Laughingly told her the other night, what her tombstone was going to be if I outlive her: Picture of her riding in a parade on her favorite mount (a pinto gelding), and underneath, the inscription, "I think I've got time for a short ride. . ." She seemed to think that would be just fine.

She sure does enjoy life, and I guess that's worth something.

Mike: Yanmar is a good tractor/engine. You sound like you enjoy mechanic work. Japanese cannot be all that hard!!! I love these foreign manuals some are poorly translated to English. Guess women and horses are no worse than us guys with tractors and trucks!!!! Wife said one more tractor and its divorce!!! I am going to enjoy my next Moline!!!! Good luck

Mike check that this "Grey market" Yanmar has live/independent PTO. I looked into them 10-12 years ago and a lot of them did not have that. They where just like the old tractors without live/independent PTO. Some models did have an over running clutch built in.

With a rotary cutter you don't want her to get in trouble with it.

There was several companies that where shipping them back here by the container loads. You could buy a 1/2 load or whole load. It was so much per container not so much per tractor. They where mix brands too. Buddy bought a full container load. They where all Yanmars an most had Independent PTO. So he prettied them up and put English decals and warning on them. He sold them and made good money. He ordered another container. All the tractors in it where off brands you would never have heard of outside of Japan. They where 2wd and no live PTO. About half did not even have three points on them. They had some type of integral hitch that is common in Japan on small implements. He took a beating on them. Needless to say he did not order a third container. I still ride him about then yet today.