Opinions

grandpa Love · Dec 27, 2020

Bought a burnt cub. Got what I needed off
it. Wheel weights and seat. And the
brakes. Oh and a set of cultivators.
Fire was hot. Melted radiator, carb,
distributor....... Cast parts ok? Got
folks asking about parts. Final
drives.....rear rims.

sandcastle1 · Dec 27, 2020

the temper is out of it. it will not be strong again. scrap the rest

Bob Bancroft · Dec 27, 2020

I say yes. I got a pair of rear tractor rims off a burned up tractor. Never had a problem with them.

grandpa Love · Dec 27, 2020

So final drives are junk? Block? Head?

muleboss · Dec 27, 2020

Why would the head be junk. It gets very hot when tractor is running.

Traditional Farmer · Dec 27, 2020

Well I'd let the buyer take a look and decide for themselves,no guarantees as is for your part.

J Hamilton · Dec 27, 2020

I'd just make sure they knew it was in a fire and it's their responsibility to determine if they think it will work for them.

Jim in NC · Dec 27, 2020

What do the fenders look like? They could be an indicator as to how hot the final drives got. Did you get the cultivator attaching cuffs off the final drives? They can be pricey. I tend to think the final drives would be okay. Check to see if they have any oil in them. I tend to agree with TF. Let the buyer decide.

wingnuttx · Dec 27, 2020

Manifold ok?

Andy C · Dec 27, 2020

Maybe a chance to learn here.... Does cast iron get tempered? I think it could move with heat but does it get tempered during production?

David G · Dec 27, 2020

I have to be honest, just do not know.

Janicholson · Dec 27, 2020

If the buyer is aware of the history, and it is written on the bill of sale (both the sellers copy and the buyers copy), sell them with Zero warranty as to serviceability. Essentially it is like going to the scrap yard and getting a part before the magnet lifts it into the rail car to be made into almost correct parts. Jim

jimg.allentown · Dec 27, 2020

If critical tempered parts like gears and shafts got too hot, they could have lost their hardness/toughness/temper. Only a Rockwell hardness test can tell that story.

Items like block, cylinder head, and manifolds may have become brittle if sufficiently heated.

Unless parts are rare and made of unobtainium, it might be better not to take the chance with them.

Dave41A · Dec 27, 2020

Some cast can be heat-treated. "White cast" (2.5-3% carbon), can be brought to a red heat and held there for several hours. The carbon then congeals into round globs instead of being uniformly through the cast iron. When this happens the remaining material becomes more steel-like. This is so-called "malleable iron," and can actually be worked a little without cracking.

However, the blocks and other parts IH used were likely grey iron (~4% carbon). If the grey iron is alloyed with magnesium it can form "ductile iron" which is ductile in an as-cast condition (sometimes also called "nodular iron"). But without this alloy, there's really nothing that can be done to heat-treat grey iron.

Royse · Dec 27, 2020

In my experience, most parts will be Ok. Others will not be.
I agree with letting the buyer decide.
I thought the sheet metal would not hold paint reliably when I
fixed up that burnt up Jubilee I nicknamed Krispy, so I swapped it
and put the burnt up, repainted tin on my old loader tractor. That was
about 5 years ago. The burnt tin still looks great and has no issues.

504 · Dec 27, 2020

I have never had anything to do with fire salvage. But I have a friend who had a dozer fire several years ago. He told me he had to take the block somewhere and have it x rayed to prove it was junk to the insurance company.(and it was not cheap)

Andy C · Dec 27, 2020

Thanks Dave....I learned something tonite!

formerly ny bill · Dec 27, 2020

the Super C that Dad bought new, was upstairs in my barn when the barn burned. any aluminum parts were just blobs of metal. Gas tank was ballooned out.
I took the bottom piece (axles) off the tricycle spindle and put it on a Super C that I bought with one front wheel broken off. Worked OK. I took one rear rim that was bent some, straightened it (including cutting the bead and welding a patch to make it straight). that rim is still going 31 years later. HOWEVER, I didn't try to salvage structural pieces like the block and transmission. Considering the relatively plentiful supply of Cubs you are finding down there, I would take off rims, fenders, maybe hood and then send the carcass to the scrapyard. Perhaps if the oil is still in transmission, gears may be OK.

Indiana Ken · Dec 27, 2020

(quoted from post at 17:56:20 12/27/20) Bought a burnt cub. Got what I needed off
it. Wheel weights and seat. And the
brakes. Oh and a set of cultivators.
Fire was hot. Melted radiator, carb,
distributor....... Cast parts ok? Got
folks asking about parts. Final
drives.....rear rims.
<img src="https://www.yesterdaystractors.com/cvphotos/cvphoto68969.jpg">

You should be able to get a feel for the temperature by looking at heat sensitive parts: Rubber gaskets/o-rings/seals, carbon/oily deposits in the combustion chamber, condition of oil in the various sumps, aluminum serial number tags, pretty easy to tell if a spring has lost it's temper, oily soot on the outside is better than metal burned clean, sheet metal-is it warped?

As others have posted let the buyer decide - it is their decision, but I would think you can show him/her the condition of the parts.

TractorTucker · Dec 27, 2020

I would think that the cast parts would be okay. I have no experience with fire damaged equipment though.

retired farmer · Dec 27, 2020

Had one that burned up, I wouldn't want any of the parts. Looks like it got pretty hot.

rew1953 · Dec 28, 2020

The rule of thumb is if the fire was hot enough to vaporize the oil out of the motor, tranny and rear end, they are damaged beyond use. My FIL learned this when he bought 2 David Browns burnt in a fire. Front of one and rear on another. Everything was good until he got to the tranny. Both were burnt out and the gears would come apart when trying to rebuild the tranny. Spent a lot more than expect to make 1 good tractor due to tranny rebuild with new parts. The cast housing was OK, but the internals worthless.

Hobo,NC · Dec 28, 2020

We always replaced the valve springs, and all seals on a burnt engine, all the tin on the engine got replaced. Engine covers and such was replaced from the other engine. I did not replace the timing cover on burnt engine it bit me the gasket leaked even tho it did not damage the aluminum cover.

All the other tin on the tractor was junk it weighed haft of what it should weigh. Anywhere there was a seal fire damaged the seal water got in the part the inner's were trashed from the water damage. I don't know how long it set when I brought it maybe if I had took it apart as soon as I got it home I could have saved the steering gear. The transmission was OK I would not be skeered of the cultivators.

Water was the killer : (

PJH · Dec 28, 2020

This subject has been beat to death. I'm gonna feed cattle today with a JD 630 that once looked like that Cub. It was a lot of work. I was young then, working two jobs and feeding hogs on the side. It took a couple of years part time working on it and many miles of travel to junkyards in SE Missouri. Would I do it again? No - I'm old now, and I'm not broke. Looking at that picture brings back both good and bad memories. The bad memories of cleaning things up. The good memories of hearing it fire off and run good on the first spin of the starter.

Pete in Holland MI · Dec 28, 2020

Most any steel that relies on heat treatment (gears, springs, bearings, draw bars, etc) will have lost their temper and are not the same anymore. Anything that has a seal on/in it needs total replacement. Any wiring & insulation is shot. Any piece of die cast aluminum or zinc (pot metal) most likely has distorted or it's properties changed.

Total restoration will be time consuming and costly, and still yield a questionable tractor in the long run. Pick out the static parts that might be salvagable, and scrap the rest.

I've read several place that if the tires burnt off, it really reinforces the above information.

Good luck !

Tracy Brown · Dec 28, 2020

A tractor that catches fire outside is a totally different animal that a tractor inside a burning building. It gets hotter and is kept hot longer in the building. I would be very selective on what I used off it. Wheel weights, sure. Seat, maybe. Brakes, no.

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