New Member Introduction & 440IC

[soffiler]

Greetings all! I've been a member of this message board for a few weeks now, lurking and reading. There is some fantastic information here; thank you Lavoy for hosting!

I am a mechanical engineer with a decent workshop and some interest in old iron; in the past it's been rubber-tired ag machines like the Farmall Cub and Ford 8N. Now I find myself the proud owner of a '58 JD 440IC - the acquisition is a long story and I'll keep it short for now. The machine has a blade, a simple up-down-float single hydraulic circuit - I guess this is a "4-way" blade? I've got an Operator's Manual, I've printed the Parts Manual off the JD site, and I've got a Service Manual (SM-2023) on order. It seems to run well, starting and running on 5-year-old gasoline so we could get it on the trailer. Stored indoors, clutches were only lightly frozen and broke free easily.

A couple different people who I generally trust eyeballed the undercarriage (yeah, "eyeball" as in, no actual measuring tools were employed) and used words like "good and solid". This leads me to my first question: I could really use a good, comprehensive, single source hopefully with pictures and illustrations to explain the basics of how an undercarriage is evaluated and measured. Does this exist somewhere on this site or elsewhere on the 'Net?

My second question is even more broad... how about a resource for tips & tricks & techniques of bulldozer operation? Driving and maneuvering the machine is no problem at all, and I have a very good appreciation for safety aspects, but what I am after is more along the lines of how best to approach certain tasks, for example, smoothing and leveling a piece of ground to build a horse riding ring.

[Lavoy]

I have a Deere undercarriage appraisal manual, but it is way too involved to be just a simple tool. For what you are doing, post a couple pics here, and we can guess general condition with the exception of pins and bushing wear. For that, measure across 5 pins (4 links) on a tight track, 23" is new, 23.51" is 100% worn.
Lavoy

[soffiler]

I have a Deere undercarriage appraisal manual, but it is way too involved to be just a simple tool. For what you are doing, post a couple pics here, and we can guess general condition with the exception of pins and bushing wear. For that, measure across 5 pins (4 links) on a tight track, 23" is new, 23.51" is 100% worn.
Lavoy

Thank you very much, Lavoy! That makes sense. For what it's worth, I have a long history with bicycles and motorcycles so I have a good sense of what pin and bushing wear means to the sprockets.

[Lavoy]

The concept is exactly the same, other than crawler tracks are a series of half links.
Lavoy

[440 iron popper]

My second question is even more broad... how about a resource for tips & tricks & techniques of bulldozer operation? Driving and maneuvering the machine is no problem at all, and I have a very good appreciation for safety aspects, but what I am after is more along the lines of how best to approach certain tasks, for example, smoothing and leveling a piece of ground to build a horse riding ring.

Hi,
440IC have dry steering clutches, full mechanical drive train. Something I will suggest for operation is this: When you push a full blade of material, I would avoid to steer. With this old drive train style, you remove power to one side in order to turn. All the mechanical torque goes to the ''engaged'' side. That would put a lot of strain on old tired 50+ years old splines in the differentiel hub on one side. I would rather back up a bit realign and start pushing the pile again with both tracks engaged.

Have the brakes adjusted if you plan to work on steep hills. King of scary if they don't work.

When I first got on my 440 (first machine ever!) I was trying to get a nice leveled pass. I was always playing with the blade lever to compensate or something. I got an advice from a neighbor using a big 1954 Cat D6: Fill the blade and go forward.Don't touch it! It actually works good. If you're leveled at the beginning, the blade will fill the holes and remove the exess all along the way. Shure He's got more horse power than me!!

You'll enjoy a well tuned 440 for shure. It is a cool vintage machine to run.

[soffiler]

Lavoy, thanks for the comment on the half-links. I just took a look at the tracks in the parts manual and I see that now. Makes perfect sense.

440 iron popper... thanks to you, too, for the words of advice. I generally understand how the power is delivered via mechanical controls (clutches and brake bands) but I appreciate your comments regarding avoiding steering under load, and the leveling comments.

For the record, I've got a modern diesel 4x4 utility tractor w/ loader (Ford 1520, ~1990 model), and a rake and a blade for the 3-pt, and I've done a fair amount of pushing and pulling dirt around. I am not a complete newbie when it comes to that, but I *am* a complete newbie to a crawler/dozer. Again I appreciate the wisdom and welcome any further comments on dozer tricks, tips, & techniques.

I am looking forward to a week of vacation between Christmas and New Year's. I plan to spend some quality time in the shop, cleaning the carb, changing engine oil & filter, checking all the other lubes, coolant, greasing *everything* (that should kill an afternoon or two!), checking ignition timing (but previous owner put in all new ignition parts before he parked it) and valve adjustment, and once I get the service manual, plan to check the steering clutch and brake adjustments. Need to clean up all the heavy-gage connections between battery and starter, and polarize the generator since it's not charging. Might need to get into the generator to service commutator and brushes, and/or the regulator, but nothing I'm too worried about. And that's about it.

This machine was purchased from the father of a close friend of mine and I've known it since around 1980 or so. It has not been worked too hard, as the previous owner did general construction only part-time and only infrequently had any jobs for the dozer. He's getting older and tapering off on the construction jobs, and it has been sitting unused for, we figure, about 5-7 years. He kept it indoors and he had a mechanic service it whenever it needed anything. I think I got a good one.

I'll shoot a few pix of the undercarriage as mentioned by Lavoy and post them when I get a chance.

[Tigerhaze]

Besides being hard on the final drives, sharp turns (especially when pushing) and working parallel to sideslopes is hard on the undercarriage and can result in track derailment- you will quickly learn to not do those things with a worn undercarriage after the first couple instances of throwing a track in a mudhole or on a sideslope

[soffiler]

10-4... sharp turns bad, sideslopes bad... both of which, obviously, put side-loads into the tracks and rollers. Great advice, thanks!

Hey, while I'm here... I see discussion about "5 roller" tracks all over this board. I've got 5 rollers on mine. Not sure if there were any other choices on the 440 but it does seem the earlier models might have had fewer rollers. What's the deal here? More rollers = more resistance to those side-loads that we're talking about?

[Lavoy]

440 was offered only in 5 roller version. More rollers=longer track=more floatation and stability.
Lavoy

[Gil]

With your bulldozer you can push out ground going forward and try to level it. With a light machine like a JD440 you will find that you cannot always just power thru and cut a flat path. I have my best success on a project like the horse ring you mentioned, to loosen the earth and bulldoze it flat as best you can; but then backdrag the loose soil smoothing and leveling with your crawler in reverse.

When backdragging, if the back of your crawler goes into a low spot it will raise the blade in the front and you will have to compensate by dropping the blade slightly and then raising it slightly the moment you are out of the low spot. Going over a high spot do the opposite. With a little experience the JD440 will do a credible job. Gil

[soffiler]

Thanks for the advice, Gil!

[Ray III]

On a machine with a tight blade, set it and forget it is a good strategy. With the worn blade on my 420 though, I tend to apply downforce just before hitting a high spot and pull up a bit before low spots. Otherwise the thing goes where it will. A loose blade does a beautiful job of backblading though and is a bit more forgiving when plowing snow.