YM336D Restoration thread - Part two

Domush · Aug 24, 2011

My tractor is functional, minus 1st and 2nd gear. Now we get to making it spiffy and pretty.

The to-do list:

- Rebuilding the dashboard
- Adding useful gauges (removing the idiot lights)
- Replacing the missing switches.
- Glass blasting the engine and rusty areas of the frame
- Priming and painting the engine
- Priming and painting the frame and rims
- Piping the exhaust up the canopy for a more gag-free experience
- Diagnosing and (hopefully) stopping the white-grey smoke coming from the exhaust

And the before photos of the engine (my first item)

Yesterday I began blasting the engine in order to remove the flaking paint. I degreased everything, let it dry overnight and threw on a coat of primer on the entire tractor, or as much as I could do before my compressor seized from overheating

.

I'll attempt to finish the priming this afternoon. Hopefully tomorrow will be the first coat of engine paint, as I have very little sanding to do on the engine, seeing as it doesn't need to be perfectly mirror-worthy.

Domush · Aug 25, 2011

As always, here is a link to my rebuild photo collection, which has every photo I've taken, not just the ones I post here.

Small update today. I got my gauges in and also some 1/8" OD copper tubing for the oil pressure line. Being the impatient person I am, I couldn't help but begin the process of trying out my new gauges

, so I began my dashboard rebuild.

The OEM dashboard was destroyed, so it was time to make a new one.

For ease of fabrication and a nice, custom look I opted to use ash for the new dash cluster.

After some planing, sanding and bend sawing I had an exact replica of the OEM dash shape.

I decided to move the new gauges to the left side and the tach to the right.

After some liberal use of my hole saws and new jigsaw, I had perfectly sized holes for the new component locations.

Here you can see the contour of the new dash, which is identical to the original.

And after the first coat of stain and poly. I'll be adding 4 more coats of poly prior to installing it. I don't want to remake this every year.

I'm tempted to begin making a new, wooden steering wheel as well as some matching wooden shift knobs just for kicks. This will never be a show winning tractor, but at least I can make it mine.

UPDATE: I may have shot myself in the foot on this one, as the tach cable may not reach the new tach location. I'll have to check this shortly. I'd hate to have to remake the entire cluster because I misplaced one gauge

284 International · Aug 25, 2011

Wow, that's gorgeous. Nicely done work, and terrific write-up! Thanks for the other photos in your album, too.

clemsonfor · Aug 25, 2011

You gonna worry about 1 and 2? I assume its boths the high and low range right? 1's not a big deal but i use high 2 alot. Im thinking you may miss your #2 gear!

Domush · Aug 25, 2011

clemsonfor said:
You gonna worry about 1 and 2? I assume its both the high and low range right? 1's not a big deal but i use high 2 a lot. I'm thinking you may miss your #2 gear!

Yeah, #3 is certainly a bit fast, especially as I want a tiller for this beast. I'll likely wait until things are stable before digging into the broken gears, as that likely requires splitting the tractor. I'll pull the shifter housing in a week or so and see what I'm dealing with. #2 has only a few broken teeth, so it would be nice to be able to TIG the teeth with the gear in place, but I'm dubious whether I can pull that off.

As for the dashboard.. my suspicions were correct. The tach cable no longer reached, so I had to remake the dash.

I had to move the tach back to where it was. Luckily it wasn't too difficult to make the dash. I happened to gear up for woodworking a year ago, so I have all of the right tools to make this stuff. Was pretty nice to find a reason to use them all.

And the side view. It isn't that dark, it was simply getting dusky outside and I don't have lights in my workshop yet. It is the same shade as the original (made from the same board).

Let's hope this is the last one I have to make!

Johndeere3720 · Aug 25, 2011

Very nice! :thumbsup: When do your dash assembly's go on sale? :laughing::thumbsup:

Domush · Aug 26, 2011

Makes one wonder how well a tractor customization market would do

Tractor spinners anyone? :laughing:

If I knew I could make a living making wood replacements for whatever, I'd do it in a heartbeat. There are certainly worse ways to make a living.

This weekend I'll likely be making a wooden steering wheel (my first ever). No real reason; it was so nice using my woodworking tools, I want something else to build.

Domush · Aug 28, 2011

I made this weekend "paint the tractor already!" weekend. I managed to get my primer to thin out nicely enough to get a coat over the tractor and get down to the colorful business of painting it. I'm not finished yet, but at least it is beginning to resemble something which is not an eyesore.

I also got the new gauges ready for installation. I should be able to simply hook them up and go when the dash is installed. I'll have to trim a bit from the brackets to account for the thick wood dashboard. They assume there will only be a skinny metal mount, not a 5/8" thick one.

I finished up the dashboard today. The fourth coat turned out well.

It isn't a mirror finish, but it'll do.

Finally rid of that awful green! I primed the entire tractor and recoated it with black. I am so happy to rid myself of having to look at an ugly beast. Who knew a paint job could make one feel so much better

No more flaking and mismatched paint. Removing the hood was quite easy. Not sure why I fought my removing it for so long.

The new tractor color. I also planned for the new gauges by cutting some additional holes. I'm excited to see it in place.

Tomorrow I'll be painting the fenders, canopy and recoating the hood in order to make it more scratch proof. Hopefully there will be enough daylight (and energy) left to remove the wheels one by one and paint the rims.

grainger12002 · Aug 29, 2011

Domush
Nice job as usual,with the repairs and the updates,its great to see this tractor come back to life-really like the wood dash,its a nice touch !!

rmully · Aug 31, 2011

Great "resurrection" ..... you will have looking so nice you won't want to use it

Johndeere3720 · Aug 31, 2011

Excellent job! Cant wait to see it back in Yanmar red. :thumbsup:

Domush · Aug 31, 2011

rmully said:
Great "resurrection" ..... you will have looking so nice you won't want to use it

I'm a bit worried about that :laughing:

I'll have to live with taking a photo of it before I use it for the first time and referring back to it when I wish to recall why I spent so much freaking time working on it.

yanmars · Sep 1, 2011

I repainted my 336d with Yanmar paint about 20 years ago. The paint held up well except the red faded alot, perhaps since it is out in the sun a great deal.
Your project is looking great and the dash will be a classic.

Domush · Sep 1, 2011

It has been a few days, but I haven't stopped working. There simply hasn't been much obvious progress. Mainly a whole lot of coats of paint. It seems single coats just scratch right off at the lightest touch, so I'm going for 2-3 coats.

Also, this is taking way more paint than anticipated, so multiple trips into town have been needed to re-buy supplies. Town isn't exactly close to me here in stixville

I painted the roof white in the hopes to keep the interior bright on those days where I cruise along into the dusk. I may add some LED light strips to the interior in the future, if needed. The white should make nice ambient light without killing night vision too badly.

I removed the front from the hood in preparation for the new headlights and mount. At first I was going to be lazy and only paint the outside, but seeing as I have it removed..

It was precarious, but both rear tires are off at once for painting. Otherwise I'd have to reload the paint gun with multiple colors, which would be annoying.

The hood had some major dentage going on, and I was going to leave it be, but there were some rust holes I wanted to fill, so out came the sander and body filler.

A better angle of the dents, after some rough pounding out. The filler should be enough beyond this point.

I forgot how quickly body filler hardens! At 90F I had about 1:15 to work with it. Sheesh! This is the section with the rust holes.

Before, during and after shots.

I have a love/hate relationship with body filler. Today I love it.

Tomorrow I'll hopefully be finishing up the painting of the body parts and starting on the headlight assembly and wiring.

winston1 · Sep 2, 2011

From the beginning of this project to now has been most interesting. The starting point was really quite bad. You are going to end up with a nice tractor. I do believe you are a man of patience! :thumbsup:

Domush · Sep 2, 2011

Thanks for the compliments, fellas. I really appreciate them. I wouldn't have even made it out of the gate without all of your help. I'm sure I'll really need you guys when it comes time to split the tractor in order to remove the bad 1st and 2nd gears. Splitting a tractor just sounds daunting.

If it ever gets below 100F outside today, I'll actually get some work done.

Johndeere3720 · Sep 2, 2011

Wow, great job on the body work! Wanna do my Yanmar next?

Domush · Sep 7, 2011

Quick update.

I finished the painting the other day. Now I'm working on the new headlight mount and wiring up the new horn and lights (both switches and wiring were missing).

Making the new headlight assembly required some exacting cuts, as not only is it a tight fit with little overlap, but the grill is curved.

I'm also adding some wood siding on the hood itself. Sort of an homage to the old Woody wagons, as it serves no actual function. I'd love to figure a way to burn 'YANMAR' into the wood siding using a nice bold italicized font.

After a couple of coats of poly.

Tomorrow I have to do some web work, but hopefully I'll have a few to add the last few coats of poly and make up a bracket to affix the new headlights to the new mount. If all goes well, Friday I'll be wiring it all up and mounting the new horn.

yanmars · Sep 7, 2011

That spalted wood looks great.

farmfun · Sep 8, 2011

Domush said:
Quick update.

I finished the painting the other day. Now I'm working on the new headlight mount and wiring up the new horn and lights (both switches and wiring were missing).

Making the new headlight assembly required some exacting cuts, as not only is it a tight fit with little overlap, but the grill is curved.

I'm also adding some wood siding on the hood itself. Sort of an homage to the old Woody wagons, as it serves no actual function. I'd love to figure a way to burn 'YANMAR' into the wood siding using a nice bold italicized font.

After a couple of coats of poly.

Tomorrow I have to do some web work, but hopefully I'll have a few to add the last few coats of poly and make up a bracket to affix the new headlights to the new mount. If all goes well, Friday I'll be wiring it all up and mounting the new horn.