I have consistently had a battery drain on the Farmall 230 for as long as I can remember. It something that I just lived with. When I refreshed the tractor several years ago, I replaced the entire wiring harness with one from a known vendor. The tractor is still 6-volt positive ground and I don t plan to change this one to 12-volt although I know it would be less troublesome.
Recently I replaced the old generator with one I had on the shelf (the one I had on it was from an old 6-volt truck, it was replaced with a a generator from a Farmall tractor). I had the replacement checked and rebrushed, then it run on the machine by a trusted local shop with the voltage regulator that I had on the the tractor (he was given both of them). The battery was new in early October. A few days back it would not start and I found the battery to be low. So following the advice here, I started tracing the wires to check for voltage drain. I used a digital multimeter.
First without disconnecting any wires and using a charged battery, each terminal was checked to ground and was consistently 6.4 volts (neg battery anode - starter - ammeter - VR Batt - VR Load - ignition switch - fuse - light switch terminal #1). [u:568f58549b]So, I m concluding that there are no broken wires? [/u:568f58549b]
I went on to remove the wire at each terminal and check voltage between the wire and the terminal it was taken from. Between the battery anode and the starter cable I measured 5.1 volts so my thought is the circuit is drawing 1.3 volts someplace. This was consistent (+/-0.05 volts) all the way through the circuit up to and including at the Batt terminal of the VR. With the load wire disconnected from the VR, I read 0.0 volts between the wire and the L terminal. This changed to 6.4 volts when I turned on the light switch.
When I installed the VR I wire brushed the mounting holes and used star washers to be sure I had good grounding between the VR and the tractor. I have also been checking the charging output. I don t always get the 7-7.5 volts I would expect. At one point it was not producing any output at 2/3-3/4 throttle, but jumped to 7.3 when I idled it down. Then after charging it from this last non start, the output was running at 8 volts. [u:568f58549b]My guess here is that I have an internal VR problem. [/u:568f58549b]
Next I continued to trace by this method after the ignition switch to the coil. With the switch ON, and the wire off the negative coil terminal I read 5.8 volts. [u:568f58549b]Is this an indication of a switch issue? [/u:568f58549b]With the distributor wire off the coil, and the ignition switch on, I had a reading of 5.65 volts across the coil terminals. [u:568f58549b]Does this indicate a coil problem?[/u:568f58549b]
Thanks in advance for your insight and assistance. If there are other checks I should make, please let me know.
Recently I replaced the old generator with one I had on the shelf (the one I had on it was from an old 6-volt truck, it was replaced with a a generator from a Farmall tractor). I had the replacement checked and rebrushed, then it run on the machine by a trusted local shop with the voltage regulator that I had on the the tractor (he was given both of them). The battery was new in early October. A few days back it would not start and I found the battery to be low. So following the advice here, I started tracing the wires to check for voltage drain. I used a digital multimeter.
First without disconnecting any wires and using a charged battery, each terminal was checked to ground and was consistently 6.4 volts (neg battery anode - starter - ammeter - VR Batt - VR Load - ignition switch - fuse - light switch terminal #1). [u:568f58549b]So, I m concluding that there are no broken wires? [/u:568f58549b]
I went on to remove the wire at each terminal and check voltage between the wire and the terminal it was taken from. Between the battery anode and the starter cable I measured 5.1 volts so my thought is the circuit is drawing 1.3 volts someplace. This was consistent (+/-0.05 volts) all the way through the circuit up to and including at the Batt terminal of the VR. With the load wire disconnected from the VR, I read 0.0 volts between the wire and the L terminal. This changed to 6.4 volts when I turned on the light switch.
When I installed the VR I wire brushed the mounting holes and used star washers to be sure I had good grounding between the VR and the tractor. I have also been checking the charging output. I don t always get the 7-7.5 volts I would expect. At one point it was not producing any output at 2/3-3/4 throttle, but jumped to 7.3 when I idled it down. Then after charging it from this last non start, the output was running at 8 volts. [u:568f58549b]My guess here is that I have an internal VR problem. [/u:568f58549b]
Next I continued to trace by this method after the ignition switch to the coil. With the switch ON, and the wire off the negative coil terminal I read 5.8 volts. [u:568f58549b]Is this an indication of a switch issue? [/u:568f58549b]With the distributor wire off the coil, and the ignition switch on, I had a reading of 5.65 volts across the coil terminals. [u:568f58549b]Does this indicate a coil problem?[/u:568f58549b]
Thanks in advance for your insight and assistance. If there are other checks I should make, please let me know.