John Deere 4410 Draft Arm Break and Weld

EdwardB · Nov 4, 2019

Good afternoon,

One of the rear draft arms on my 4410 broke right across the attachment point for the lifting arm. It was a clean break. The tractor is 16 years old. I priced out a replacement and it was around $250 bucks. Ouch! I decided to take it to my local welding shop instead. They welded it up for $100 bucks and it looked great. Unfortunately, after about 10 minutes of discing, it failed in the exact same spot.

I took it back and discussed it with the shop and they were going to try it again with some higher tensile strength rods and reinforce it with some steel on the bottom. There isn't room for reinforcement on the sides or top. I am not expecting to be charged...

I'm not a welder, but it seems like this original weld didn't get adequate penetration. Thoughts from the welders in the group?

Do you think this can be fixed with stronger rods and reinforcement?

Ed

pmsmechanic · Nov 5, 2019

I've repaired both the arms on my 4410. They broke in the same spot.

What I did was grind the metal away on both sides to to a "V" shape. This was to let the welding penetrate right through the steel. Yes I did have to rework the hole after I was done but I was more interested in a good weld than saving the shape of the hole. I did not add any reinforcement like the welding shop talked about but I did think about it. I said I would reinforce the next time they broke and that hasn't happened yet.

I used a Lincoln 7018AC rod as I don't have a DC welder. I ground out the broken spot and laid the pieces out straight on my welding table and welded them together. I have also thought about making new arms that are straight without the offset in them as I believe the offset weakens the whole arm.