1930 Farmall Regular

Since the Regular has no water pump and I'am sure in the old days they just drained the water when a Freeze was coming. I don't know when Antifreeze was invented it was around when I grew up 67 years ago. Anyway my question is what to do? I don't use the tractor in bad weather and it stays inside all the time, but it still can freeze inside. Antifreeze or drain water???

We live in Minnesota and leave anti-freeze in year around 50/50 mix. We don't worry then about whether we got it all drained or not. Cheap compared to a busted block.

Antifreeze is best becasue you never have to worry about forgetting to drain it. It happened to a neighbor of mine and he had 2 tractors crack.

One of the better things about antifreeze is that it helps to slow rust. Water isn't good for the metal, but draining the water lets air into the (wet) passages.

My grandfather had stories about the alcohol used in early cars and tractors. (And it wasn't the drinking kind of alcohol either.) You might start your car only to have it overheat because it had been drained by some wino. Many times he had seen a bum passed out under a front end.

When I restored my 1929 Regular I cleaned about 5 pounds of rust out of the block and the radiator. The previous owner had used water in the summer and then stored it after draining it in the fall. When I got it all back together, I used antifreeze 50/50. I have checked a couple of times and there is almost no rust that has accumulated since. I would say fill-er-up with antifreeze.

Alcohol WAS the way it was done when I was a little kid, in the 30s. It worked just fine, but it evaporated before water did, so you had to check the mix to make sure there was enough to keep from freezing. The modern stuff ("Prestone" is the famous name; ethylene-glycol is the generic name) must have come out in the 30s. My father used it at some point in all his tractors and car and truck, but I don't remember exactly when. Incidentally, ethylene-glycol became the coolant-of-choice in "liquid-cooled" airplane engines, like the Rolls-Royce Merlin and Allison V-12s of World War II. I don't know whether it was used straight or as a mixture. One great advantage of the glycol antifreeze is that it is not prone to evaporation.
I can't see any reason not to use it in an old engine. It does tend to find ways to seep out, so the hoses have to have good sealing. About the only problem I can think of with the old IHC thermosiphon cooling systems is that the big cap on top of the radiator was not absolutely water-tight. There was always a little slop-out around the wing bolt, and the gasket could leak too if it was in poor shape or the wing bolt wasn't tight. Just meant you should look once in a while, especially IF YOU DON'T see any water slopping out!