Massey-Ferguson 165

delmoody

New User
Massey Ferguson 165 gas with a Zeinth carb::: Problem I can t get figured out. It died while mowing hay, got it to run but no more than 1/2 throttle. No biggie figured fuel line was dirty. Ran like that for awhile then completely died. Replaced points, plugs, cap and Rotor. Still no success. Disassembled to open valve cover, distributor was out of time. Put it back together no real luck. Retimed again got it to run. But not right. Acted to not be getting fuel. The fuel shut off Selinoind in the carb was not working at all when bench tested with 12 volts. Unable to find one I cut the tip off and put it back together now the tractor was running farrely well. Put gas tank and tin work back on, now nothing again. My dad tinkered with it and now it pyshically runs. The other night I started it up, running extremely rich, with a miss I started doing chores and it cleared up and ran perfect. I got excited then it backfired through the exhaust and died. I got it to start back up, but rich and a miss again. ANY IDEAS?? I ve been working on tractors forever but this one has blown my mind
 
Welcome delmoody!

Sounds like more than one problem...

The ignition timing, how far off was it?

For it to be major out of time, either the distributor turned (loose clamp, or something inside locked the shaft to the housing).

Or the roll pin sheared where the gear drives the shaft. If it sheared, something had to have locked it up, something loose inside and jamming it.

Exhaust backfire is commonly associated with ignition problems. Today's points, condenser, all ignition parts are imported, lesser quality than in the past. Could be bad out of the box or misboxed.

The rich running, is it dripping gas parked with the fuel on?

Or black smoke?

Or both?

Could be the float is partially sunk, trash/rust coming down the fuel line, loose or bad needle valve, restriction in the air cleaner, dirt dobbers, nests.

Might revisit the fuel solenoid, see if it is intermittently blocking the main jet, the main jet might be loose.

Check the fuel supply through the carb. Pull the drain plug, engine off, fuel valve open, catch the flow in a clean glass. It should flow a continuous stream, not a drip or slow to a stop. Look at what was caught. If dirty, water clouded, the tank needs to be cleaned out.

Check the voltage to the coil. Could be an intermittent bad connection, weak ignition switch.

Let us know...
 
Thank you very much for the ideas. I am going out tonight to mes with it again. I will leave my volt meter on the coil to verify constant voltage (I haven?t done that yet). And double check my timing. I talked with an older gentleman yesterday who has worked on that tractor in the past ( when my aunt owned it) he thought something was screwed up in the distributor drive a few years ago. I also plan to turn it over by hand to see if the distributor has any excessive backlash in any certain positions. When I had it running on Monday night, it literally ran all different phases by itself on the same cycle. I?ve never seen one run like that. I don?t even care how bad the actual problem is, I will just be happy to find it
 
A volt meter on the ignition side of the coil as it runs or as it is turning over read battery voltage then almost zero as the points open and close. Also not running or turning over if the points are close voltage reading will be almost zero.

One thing a person should always do is trouble shoot then parts NEVER the other way around.
#1 check that you have a good blue/white spark at the center wire of the distributor cap and at the plug wires that jump a 1/4 inch gap or more
#2 pull the carb drain plug and make sure you have a good steady flow of gas that will fill a pint jar in less then 3 minutes and yes catch the gas so as to look for water/dirt etc.
#3 when was the last time you serviced the air cleaner

Also distributors d not just go out of time with out something else happening like the gear drive at the bottom of the distributor going bad it the pin shearing
 

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