Just bought a 1800 w/ 3600 hrs. on it. Need some help.

Another thing is the hydraulic controls. The past owner had trouble with the cylinder hieght control while disking. The lever didn't keep the transport wheels were he set them. The disk would work back up out of the ground and he said the had a hard time with that.

Third thing is that he said he couldn't keep batteries in it. Cooked them right up. He said to prevent it from happening he would shut the key off while working the tractor. Could it be the voltage regulater? He also runs a single 12 volt rather than the 2 six volts that it was designed for. Any problems in doing that?

It runs like a new machine. Just needs to be gone over some. It is more tractor than I really need, but the smaller ones I've looked at I can't afford. After reading from past posts in most of the boards I have put our other two smaller tractors up for sale and bought this 1800. The sheet metal has some surface rust, but the tractor is complete. I will be asking you Oliver people some more about it in the future. Sure will need some help, and I hope you don't mind holding hands with an Oliver 'newbie'. I'm slow with figuring out stuff sometimes.

The smaller tires just limit the traction. If it's more HP than you need than they shouldn't bother, you can correct them at leisure. If you find yourself spinning a lot you can weight them if they are not already full. I highly recommend Rim Guard tire ballast, doesn't eat out the valve stems. If you still have traction problems you'll need to go up to the big tires and load them.

Cooked battery is almost always a voltage regulator or generator. Unless you want to restore it go get a 1-wire alternator (less than $100 at JC Whitney), hook it directly to the battery, and make a very simple light circuit - wire to battery, fuse, rocker switch, lights. If it's a gasser the same simple circuit will power the coil. I did this on my sister's 1355 and liked it so well I'm doing it on my AC-B and my MF202. Only thing to watch for is that the alternator needs to see some RPM to turn on - just make sure you go to high throttle for a couple minutes after the engine is warmed. Ours seems to charge OK at low RPM as long as it gets turn on by high RPM first.

Curious question - what did you pay?

Now we are looking for a semi-mount 4 bottom plow. Neighbor has a 10 foot disk we can barrow until we get to a point we can buy. The tires are poor. I'd say about 30 percent or so. Hoping that it will go another 3-4 year with them.

We paid 2500 for it. It has the Perkins diesel.
I'm hunting for manuals for it now. I figure it will take a while to get to know this machine. It is a big step up for us.

The air filter was broken up pretty bad last week just before we bought it. A friend of the owners was bushhoging and caught a limb. Will that be hard to find? Any ideas on where to begin looking for a replacement air filter assembly?

I have talked to a couple of Oliver collecter/dealers and they tell me the 1800A series has hydraulic problems. Parts are very hard to find and expensive when you do find them. Wish I could offer more detailed info but just relaying what I was told.

• Link for manuals

This site has helped me quite a bit. I quit worrying about sounding like a fool a long time ago, so I don't have a fear in asking the stupid questions. Everyone starts on the bottom is what the man told me. That is where I am on understanding these 1850 tractors.

I'll do just what you said on the fluid and filter changes. I'm going to fill up the tank before letting it sit some. May just get the electrical going as soon as I can put it under a shed.

Thanks once more Myron, nice to read you have done your own repairs. What seems to be the most common flaw with this model? The steering is very loose on ours. Is that common with these Olivers?
I have read some posts about that, too. We won't be on the road with ours, but I would like to fix the problem sometime in the future.