JDcrawlers Messageboard

You do not want someone else to do this job for you if you can do it yourself. The steering clutches and brakes are the part of a crawler that you will be tinkering with the most over your years of ownership of the crawler. You need to know what is going on in there, how it works together, and the c...

If you have good tracks (and I assume you mean all undercarriage parts) KEEP IT. The rest of the stuff you mention is all standard repair work with parts readily available. The direction reverser might be the exception but if you can adjust it to work in the forward position, just leave it there unt...

These carburetors will pour gas out the intake if the engine does not start and you keep cranking it. So your problem may not be the carburetor. Did you do anything to the distributor, points, coil wires, plugs, etc. when you were working on the carburetor? When you say there is no fuel going to the...

What is wrong Roger; don't you like scraping your battery posts against a gasoline tank when you install or remove it? I have had good service out of 6V batteries I bought at NAPA, but there may be other alternatives. Doubt that you will find General Motors style terminals on a 6V battery. Gil P.S. ...

57jd420, why not post your suggestions here on jdcrawlers? We could all stand to be a little bit more knowledgeable. I do think it is funny how we all tell folks to pull their final drives whenever they have a steering problem, but hate to mention when they have to pull the engine. Engine is a lot e...

Actually, Montvale in this case appears to be just outside of Roanoke, Virginia; which seems to make my point about how confusing craigslist titles can be. Interesting, both towns are about equidistant from my location, so I could drive 250 miles to pick up the crawler; but I would have to decide wh...

What is it with craigslist????????
What logic prevents them from listing the State in the name of their city boards? I have no idea where Harrisonburg is. When I look in the list of nearby cities they have listings from Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia.

You might try oiling up the pin on the right hand side and replacing it. Then while it holds its share of the weight, try to remove the left hand side. Gil

The Parts Manual is available free on-line from John Deere at: http://jdpc.deere.com/jdpc/servlet/com.deere.u90490.partscatalog.view.servlets.HomePageServlet_Alt Search for "420". Lavoy or eBay are sources for the Service Manual. The Operators Manual is less important as the same material is covered...

When you cleaned inside the distributor, did you remove the plate the points are on? [I assume it is like a JD440.] Moisture will be under the plate. I would suggest you use an electrical contact spray as opposed to WD-40. You did not mention if the points were not firing when it fails to start afte...

As gregio said, it could be the solenoid. The little pyramid shaped box on top of the starter has the main battery cable attached to it and the pull rod from the starter knob. You can take the pyramid cap off by removing the two small bolts with a stubby flat blade screw driver (or just remove the s...

If you are planning to swap the diesel engine for a gas engine, you want to take note of the different other components that will be impacted by the change. Things you may have thought about like the starter, air cleaner, exhaust, etc; but also less obvious things like the hood, radiator, hydraulics...

I personally have never used an 8 volt battery but I know that many old timers used them to get a little extra kick with no problem. You would have to see that your generator / regulator was set to charge up to the higher voltage. I seem to remember that auto racers use the 8 volt batteries so they ...

Unfortunately you will probably need to take off the finals for a fifth time. It sounds like you need to adjust your clutch pressure plate. You are overdriving the bearing carrier and the three balls are coming out of the cups they rest in. That is what causes the clicking sound. Lavoy sells a tool ...

It is not only annoying - your neighbors a mile away will think it is annoying. Plus the exhaust pipe sticks up about head height and the sound will do as much damage to your ears as a ghetto boom box. Gil