John Deere MT

[molinebob]

Just how many years was the MT made and was there a lot of them made, are they good tractors to restore? Do they have any weak points? Thanks for any help!!

 

[J. Chantry]

JD made 25,845 of them from 49 to 53. I recently restored a 49 M. Was fairly easy and straight forward. Much easier than working on my A, primarily because parts are smaller and lighter. I had a lot of fun doing it. As far as weak points, some people have had problems with them running hot, but, I didn't have any temp issues even in hot georgia.

 

[GeorgiaHayFarmer]

I have a 49 John Deere MT and I enjoy using it to move equipment around the yard. It is small, lightweight and has plenty of power to do many tasks. I cannot think of any one thing that I don't like about the tractor. If I could do anything else to it I'd put an aftermarket 3 point hitch on it. Except for the time it was struck by lightning it runs great. I use a boom pole behind it to carry parts with. It has a tight turn radius which is a big plus. It also has an adustable steering column which is nice when you have to go a long way. It pulled a 24 disk smoothing harrow in dry soil with it last summer and worked it hard. It's just a real good tractor to have in the yard and very convenient to use when you need to jump on something quick and get the job done.

Scott

 

[leon]

Biggest problems with the MT are getting on and off and, as already mentioned, lack of a factory 3-point hitch. A later version of a Dubuque tractor gets you around both these problems, but then it's not as interesting, I think, because it's not as old a tractor.

 

[Anonymous-0]

Don't know if it is a common problem, but our '50 MT's drive shaft splines wore really bad. Had to put a new shaft in. Also, our MT seems to really foul plugs badly if not run hot enough.

 

[Dave H]

Bob

It wuld help if you described whAt "good" to restore means?

 

[Vermont John]

I have a 1953 M. I put a RedLandHill aftermarket 3 pt. on it. It runs a JD LX5 rotary cutter just fine and, with a RedLandHill handi-hitch on it, it moves equipment around real nice. If you run equipment off the PTO, remember the over running clutch as the PTO is not independent.

The 3 pt. makes it a lot easier to get on, as you can set it to the right height to make a nice step. Here is a link to a web site, which shows how Rummy (who runs another great JD board) made a 3 pt. for the M if you want to do it yourself: http://johnnypopper.com/gifs/M/M3pt.shtml

 

[Anonymous-0]

The mt's are more rare than the m's . They are a interesting tractors with a couple of FIRSTS , like dual touch-o-matic . The M series uses very little fuel because of the smaller 4 X 4 motor . They are fun little tractors but are kinda slow on the road in high gear .

 

[Anonymous-0]

Glad you mentioned the pto ! We used to have a pull behind bushhog we would run on the mt . It would make it interesting as u get ready to stop or turn a sharp corner u would depress clutch in and would get alot of pushing on the tractor {probably because tractor is so light} and seemed to take forever for blades to stop spinning ,did not make for a safe or fast job .