Olcatmech2
New User
I worked as an aircraft electrician in the military for 20+ years and yet sometimes little things will jump up and bite me. This past week I started bush hogging an unused pasture with my 1955 Allis Chalmers CA. This old machine fires up quickly and was ready to work.
About halfway through it just shut down and remembering from last year when a similar thing happened. That turned out to be rust particles inside the tank and clogging the fuel system. I had cleaned and repaired the tank last year using a tank sealer and new sediment bowl and cleaning the carb. No other problems last year and had mowed without problems this past Spring. But alas here it is again!
Ok drained the tank and repeated all of my previous findings and really didn't see a fuel caused problem.
Unbolted the hood and got it out of the way to check out the ignition points. Well they weren't exactly hitting on center and there was a gray area. So filed them clean and reset. ( I did order new ignition parts as Tractor Supply is just a joke). But something kept telling me that I had not found my problem yet.
When it was running again I took off to finish mowing only to have it bucking then backfire on me. The backfire convinced me that there's an electrical issue.
Using my ohmmeter from battery negative (tractor is 6 volts positive ground) to the ignition coil and switching the ignition coil on and off multiple times I found intermittently different resistance values. No continuity or low values at all.
Same issue with the light/ charge control switch.
My point is that these electrical mechanical switches cause a lot of problems as they age or in use a long time so a good careful resistance test could probably save a breakdown later.
And how simple to just read from the battery post to the coil and turn the switch on and off multiple times to see if the continuity is consistent! But still it sneaks up on me everytime!
About halfway through it just shut down and remembering from last year when a similar thing happened. That turned out to be rust particles inside the tank and clogging the fuel system. I had cleaned and repaired the tank last year using a tank sealer and new sediment bowl and cleaning the carb. No other problems last year and had mowed without problems this past Spring. But alas here it is again!
Ok drained the tank and repeated all of my previous findings and really didn't see a fuel caused problem.
Unbolted the hood and got it out of the way to check out the ignition points. Well they weren't exactly hitting on center and there was a gray area. So filed them clean and reset. ( I did order new ignition parts as Tractor Supply is just a joke). But something kept telling me that I had not found my problem yet.
When it was running again I took off to finish mowing only to have it bucking then backfire on me. The backfire convinced me that there's an electrical issue.
Using my ohmmeter from battery negative (tractor is 6 volts positive ground) to the ignition coil and switching the ignition coil on and off multiple times I found intermittently different resistance values. No continuity or low values at all.
Same issue with the light/ charge control switch.
My point is that these electrical mechanical switches cause a lot of problems as they age or in use a long time so a good careful resistance test could probably save a breakdown later.
And how simple to just read from the battery post to the coil and turn the switch on and off multiple times to see if the continuity is consistent! But still it sneaks up on me everytime!
