1948 8N, front mount, still 6v positive ground. I freely admit to being a bit of an idiot mechanically, so I"ll save you the trouble of pointing that out! 
I"ve been lurking for a couple of years, and have gotten a wealth of knowledge that has enabled me to do alot of troubleshooting, replace my front wheel bearings, etc. So I know I"m at the right place. Don"t want to just depend on the archives this time tho!
tractor wouldn"t turn over, and I was getting a small hum from either the solenoid or starter, couldn"t tell which. I thought the easiest thing to do first was put on a new solenoid, which I did. In retrospect I perhaps put it in backwards, (because you can"t tell with the cheap chinese one I had) because I got a hell of a short, to the point where it melted the negative battery terminal and the solenoid. I"m very lucky the battery didn"t blow. Since the short didn"t happen as soon as I connected the battery cable to the solenoid, it must have happened when I pushed the starter button, with presumably the ignition switch on, but I honestly don"t remember. I wouldn"t have thought anything I did would have caused such a bad short, but obviously it did.
So at this point I"m assuming I"ve fried pretty much everything. I"ve been meaning to put on a new wiring harness for a couple of years now, so I"ll do that, and am planning on replacing everything else as well, and then testing the old parts and if still good hanging on to them. I actually had spares of most everything on hand already, so this really won"t be that bad. While I expect to be somewhat flamed for throwing parts at the problem, I honestly was planning on replacing a lot of them already, and cleaning things up, so I don"t feel bad about it. The starter was sounding shaky before, so that"s why I expected to at least have to replace the bendix at some point. I had a new gas tank waiting to be installed, so I"ll be doing that as well now that the hood"s off.
Can only work on weekends that aren"t raining, so I"ve only replaced the starter switch, starter and solenoid to this point (good Dennis Carpenter solenoid and starter). Will take down new battery this weekend.
So my questions for you guys who actually know what you"re doing:
1. Am I correct that I fried everything downstream, or would the generator, coil, VR etc maybe still be okay? The generator is the only piece for which I didn"t already have an extra on hand, so if I managed to spare the charging circuit that would be nice.
2. Just so I get a little positive reinforcement as I"m doing this, am I correct in assuming that I should at least get the starter to turn over if i jump it with my 12v car battery, even if none of the other wires to it or the solenoid are connected? Negative to the starter post and positive to tractor ground? At least then I"ll know I got the starter in correctly. (Luckily someone before me opened up the opening so it was pretty easy to get in).
3. The whole thing seems like it should be pretty straight-forward, but is there anything that you think might be a particular problem I should look out for? I have the F0-4 and the other manuals.
Thanks for your help.
I"ve been lurking for a couple of years, and have gotten a wealth of knowledge that has enabled me to do alot of troubleshooting, replace my front wheel bearings, etc. So I know I"m at the right place. Don"t want to just depend on the archives this time tho!tractor wouldn"t turn over, and I was getting a small hum from either the solenoid or starter, couldn"t tell which. I thought the easiest thing to do first was put on a new solenoid, which I did. In retrospect I perhaps put it in backwards, (because you can"t tell with the cheap chinese one I had) because I got a hell of a short, to the point where it melted the negative battery terminal and the solenoid. I"m very lucky the battery didn"t blow. Since the short didn"t happen as soon as I connected the battery cable to the solenoid, it must have happened when I pushed the starter button, with presumably the ignition switch on, but I honestly don"t remember. I wouldn"t have thought anything I did would have caused such a bad short, but obviously it did.
So at this point I"m assuming I"ve fried pretty much everything. I"ve been meaning to put on a new wiring harness for a couple of years now, so I"ll do that, and am planning on replacing everything else as well, and then testing the old parts and if still good hanging on to them. I actually had spares of most everything on hand already, so this really won"t be that bad. While I expect to be somewhat flamed for throwing parts at the problem, I honestly was planning on replacing a lot of them already, and cleaning things up, so I don"t feel bad about it. The starter was sounding shaky before, so that"s why I expected to at least have to replace the bendix at some point. I had a new gas tank waiting to be installed, so I"ll be doing that as well now that the hood"s off.
Can only work on weekends that aren"t raining, so I"ve only replaced the starter switch, starter and solenoid to this point (good Dennis Carpenter solenoid and starter). Will take down new battery this weekend.
So my questions for you guys who actually know what you"re doing:
1. Am I correct that I fried everything downstream, or would the generator, coil, VR etc maybe still be okay? The generator is the only piece for which I didn"t already have an extra on hand, so if I managed to spare the charging circuit that would be nice.
2. Just so I get a little positive reinforcement as I"m doing this, am I correct in assuming that I should at least get the starter to turn over if i jump it with my 12v car battery, even if none of the other wires to it or the solenoid are connected? Negative to the starter post and positive to tractor ground? At least then I"ll know I got the starter in correctly. (Luckily someone before me opened up the opening so it was pretty easy to get in).
3. The whole thing seems like it should be pretty straight-forward, but is there anything that you think might be a particular problem I should look out for? I have the F0-4 and the other manuals.
Thanks for your help.
