560 stopped leaking....

Good news! I took care of a few leaks. First, there was a new leak that developed on the fuel return line. It was just after the elbow to the tank. The strange thing is, it had a notch worn into it & a small hairline crack formed in the deepest part of the notch. Have no idea how that could happen as there's nothing there to rub against it. Called into NAPA to see if they had any fittings & some 1/4" brake line. Indeed they had it & would have it ready at the counter when I got there. Got back home & they were the wrong fittings. Couldn't go back into town because my sister had to leave for the afternoon & I had to be around for mom. Thought about it for a minute & had an idea. Don't have anything on hand to braze it with, but I have a few sticks of HVAC solder & some high temp white flux. Cleaned the line off, blew it out, dried out the inside as best I could with some pipe cleaners, put a little heat to the area with a torch to hopefully dry out the fuel, cleaned up the notch & crack with the Dremel & wire wheel & set to do some soldering. Being a little rusty at it, things didn't go picture perfect like I planned. Ended up with kind of a pimple of solder over the crack. It did cover & had sealed all the way around the edge of the "bump". Figured it was at least worth a shot & gave it a try. If all else fails, wait until Monday. Got the line on & added a couple gallons of fuel. Took a look at the leaky head bolt again while waiting to see if the line leaked. Seen there was just enough room to sneak the torque wrench in there with my shortest extension. Got it in there & on the bolt & gave it a tug. It turned not even a quarter turn & the ratchet clicked. Checked the line again, still dry. Put everything away & hopped on to give it a start. Twenty seconds on the glow plugs & we were off & running. Starts better now that when I brought it home & had thought it was a good starter then. Gave it a minute to run & checked the return line. Nice & dry. Looked over the head bolt & gasket, also dry. Hopped on & opted to hit the road for a short trip & then head on down the lane. First thing I noticed, it's a little doggy. I'm thinking that will get better when the valves are re-tightened?? Really hope so, as that tractor had more spunk to it before I sent the injector pump in to get rebuilt. Could pop the front end off the ground in 5th no problem. Not so much anymore. Got to the lane, went down to the woods. Stopped to check for leaks. Still dry. Drove my walking route that goes in front of the woods & down into the wet spot. Tooled around down there & found out it's still a bit soggy. Was able to paddle through the muck & headed back. Not being happy with the fact that it was a bit doggy on the road, I put her in 5th & headed for the hill. According to the topo map that grade is 9.5%. If it bogs down, there's always the TA. Made that hill at half throttle, DD. Checked over everything at the end of the lane now that it was at operating temperature & still no leaks. Headed home, let it cool down for a couple minutes & shut it down. Still no leaks. Going to go check it out again when I'm done yammering here. If all is well, I'm going to warm it up a touch & power wash it. Let it sit over night & see what tomorrow brings. Will post back later if there's more questions.

Many thanks to everyone for the help on my 560. It's been almost a year since it was parked & I've done much to it with the help I received here.

Mike

i told you so it would seal, lol. hope your going to do a retorque on the head then reset the valves. plus recheck the timing to 3 degree's as it might be off a bit if its doggy. what all did you do to this engine?

Indeed you did & I thank you! Somewhere in your replies to my posts, you said run it for an hour & re-torque the head & go over the valves. I have a half hour to go & I'll get that done. The timing I can go over tonight. The only things that were done to the engine is, needed the injector pump rebuilt, head & valve cover gasket got replaced, the gasket got changed out on the side cover & I wanted to check out the valves & pistons. Those were relatively clean & didn't have a whole lot of coking. The sleeves were near perfect. Push rods are good & straight. Not sure if the tractor had a charmed life or it was overhauled shortly before I bought it. It does only have a bit over 2400 hours on the tach & doesn't show signs of that being off. The pedals & TA lever are still pretty tight for example. The PTO being stuck on is the only thing that tells me that something could be off. However, the locking tab on the handle & the quadrant isn't worn much. So.....?

Mike