(Stuck) Farmall MD

This message is a reply to an archived post by eddie v on April 07, 2016 at 08:24:05.
The original subject was "Stuck Farmall MD".

I bought a farmall MD from a local scrap yard 2 days ago, was suppose to be a runner but i think the engine is stuck, no can on the muffler and we had a lot of rain this winter, i have quite a few farmalls but i dont know much about the diesel models, is there any way to view the cyl walls without taking the head off? i tried a Harbor freight bore scope in the spark plug hole with no luck the end will not flex enough, or could a injector assy be removed? would be nice to see in the cyls if possible before a tear down, thanks Jess

Open the starting valves and put about 1/4 cup of ATF in each hole. Put the plugs back in loosely, and wait a week. Next, remove the plugs, and use a 12v jumper on the starter. If the fan moves some (and stays there)keep bumping it. If it stops, or does not move, you are into a tear down no matter what. Jim

Being a MD it has spark plugs so I would do a wick test and make sure the cylinders are not full of water. If they are you need to blow the water out or do some such thing to get the water out. Then I would fill the cylinders with ATF and let ti sit a while. Then set a good 12 volt battery in it and with the controls in the gas start position use short fast taps on the starter to see if it has freed up.

If you have a smart phone, there are flexible bore scopes that you can buy quite inexpensively that will plug into your phone, with a flashlight, that will allow you to look down inside the cylinders through the plug holes.. Check out Amazon.com

If you can somehow get any water out of the cylinders I had best luck filling cylinders with a witches brew of Diesel Fuel and Brake Fluid and Auto Tranny Fluid all mixed together. After that soaks a few days fill again if any leaked out then try pulling or bumping with a starter motor or cranking or whatever to get it free but just go a small tad at a time.

John T

The Plug holes lead to a chamber that does not open into the diesel combustion chamber. There is a Briggs and Stratton size valve that opens to allow it to run on gasoline. They are rather unique, Good idea though! Jim

Good to know! I'm not very familiar with the construction of the MD's... Well, I guess we'll keep that in mind for regular gas motors!

What is the serial number of this tractor? Also you could pull the injectors and view the cylinders that way
Have any photos of the tractor?

you could pull the injectors would be the only way. but i am sure that is a total waste of time. i am working. on a w6ta at the present time and it had water down the exhuast . took head off and honed cyl's free of rust blew out cyl's and wiped everything down so it was all clean. poured in ATF oil in all 3 stuck cyl's. let it sit one week. total waste of time! i even had a fire burning in them for an hr, not a budge.i ended up removeing starter , but first hammer #3 cyl. down so it broke the top of sleeve off so i could get at the rod bolts to undo them. then once i got the rod caps off i turned the engine over with a cat bar so that it pushed the sleeves out the top. removed the 3 stuck ones that way. so i dont get this thing that ATF is the miracle god engine free up cure. it does nothing more than any other liquid poured in the cyl's. i even sprayed brake kleen under the bottom of pistons so i could see when the atf leaked past. never happened. everthing stayed dry. not a sign of any oil seepage past piston. plus why in the world would you want to run an engine with rusty pitted sleeves even if it did free up??? makes no sense to me. plus the valves are all rusted also and need to be resurfaced. even if it came loose it would run but there is no engine there. i been through these seised engines many times and it dont pay to waste time on miracles. pull it apart and do it correctly. thats my say on the matter. sure maybe if you caught the rain within a month or a few weeks , but rain sitting in cyl's for years its teardown time.
and if you want to get a lube in the cyl's on those diesels you must open the gas valves and then blow the oil in with a syphoning gun. you cant just pour it in. and looking at spark plugs tell you nothing as they supposedly where shut. or just dump it down the exhaust pipe.
plus it was at the junk yard so that is not a good sign .

thanks for the info, more than likely its take the head off time, it got roughed up at the scrap yard and in a way i saved it from total Destruction. the seat, steering wheel & vertical tube, light switch box and fuel tank all got ether bent up or dented, i did take some pics at the yard where it was at and will post them in the near future, today my son & I replaced all the parts that were bent except the fuel tank will do that later on, this tractor use to belong to a farmer about 20 miles from me they sold out and this tractor ended up where i got it, it is set up with the size 9.5 42 farmall vegetable crop type wheels that are in very good shape.i dont think its a hopeless case and I have all the parts currently i have around 23 farmalls and a lot of parts i have been collecting for years, half of them being cotton pickers, that is mainly what i collect, but never fooled around with the diesel models even though 2 pickers are diesel, never started them or even tried to. this tractor started its life as a cotton picker which i didnt know till i cleaned the plate off #FDBK283372X20C model MDCH but had been fitted somewhere in its life with the standard axle housings and i think they cut the axle shafts short. so if the motors junk it will still be nice yard art, it is in bad need of a good steam cleaning before we start working on it, right now everything you touch diesel & dust jumps on you, sorry for the long winded post, will update next week, thanks to all that replied, Jess

down loaded the photos i took how do you add them ? whats the URL

Choose your favorite hosing site and upload them to there and then post the pictures here using the code.

For example I used photobucket and the following code will
will result in the picture that I have shown after it :

[code:1:100b216090][URL=http://s422.photobucket.com/user/91f2504x4/media/90F250.jpg.html][IMG]http://i422.photobucket.com/albums/pp309/91f2504x4/90F250.jpg[/IMG][/URL][/code:1:100b216090]

And by the way , Photobucket gives you that code , you just copy it from there and then post it in your message.

heres the photos at the scrap yard and at my place afterward

mine are in kodak easy share, i transferred the pics then clicked upload and it kept asking for a file name, i tried about everything and couldnt load them
i will have to get my son to help me with this later on

I tried for a whole year to loosen up a stuck diesel engine. After trying all the fore mentioned methods and about to give up I filled the cylinders with Coca Cola. One week later it it came loose. Just saying.

APF

Don't waste your time screwing around just yank the head. If full of water and it has ruined sleeves then your talking some serious coin to rebuild the engine depending on what it needs. I priced a complete top and bottom end overhaul kit for a md/smd and it was right around 5k in parts not to mention machining costs. The sleeve/piston assemblues are getting harder to find and cam bearings are basically non existent. Good luck with it, you will find as I have they are cool tractors but can be a big money put also. Jim.

well i havent posted anything because i have been busy, but my son figured out its only the # 1 cyl that got water in it