Finally, Light at end of tunnel for my 450(long read)

[Mike B]

It has been a long road to bringing my 450 straight loader back to a functioning piece of equipment.
Went and looked at it after seeing an ad for it on craigslist. Owner said it had been sitting for 5 years and had been working fine when one day it just quit moving. No forward or reverse. Previous to him had been owned by a winery and looked to have been maintained. A friend and I took fuel and a battery and some tools and got it running. The radiator was dry so put some water in it and it leaked out the water pump seal. Got it to move front and back, left steering brake was stuck and called it good. He was amazed that it moved as he had tried numerous times the summer it quit moving to get it to move and nothing. I said I would think about it and let him know. Called back about 3 weeks later and asked what his bottom dollar price was. He asked if I was going to fix it or part it out. I said I planned on fixing it as long as it made sense. He didn't want it scrapped because he hates to see old equipment thrown away. Said he would let it go cheap as he didn't need it anymore and wanted to clean his place up. Got it for $850 with the 93A hoe that was laying on the ground next to it.
I made about 6 trips at a 130 miles each way to change the water pump and hydraulic hoses, pull the hoe upright and get it mounted to the tractor so that it would run long enough to get it loaded on a lowbed for the haul home. It was up in the woods and took 4 wheel drive to get there if it was wet. Found a lowbed driver who said if I could drive to it he could get it out of there and he did.
That's a story in it's self.
Got it home and used the hoe digging some stuff the next day and it quit moving just like what happened with previous owner.
Trans was low but didn't see any oil anywhere. Turns out hole in bottom of bell housing was plugged and oil filled up housing and made main engine clutch slip. Probably dried out in the 5 years that it sat and thats why it moved when I looked at it.
Pulled engine and front bearing in transmission on input shaft was bad which took out seal and let oil leak into bellhousing. Pulled trans apart and fixed that and while it was out had radiator checked and it has 3 holes in it. Got that fixed. Put in new clutch and pressure plate.
Put engine back in and ran it hard for about 20 minutes and noticed coolant temp slowly rising up into red zone and shut it off and checked coolant, it was down. Topped it of and ran it again same thing. When I pulled cap I noticed there was no pressure and coolant was going somewhere. Checked oil and had coolant in it. Pulled pan and pressurized system and saw coolant leaks out of bottom of sleeves around O rings. Didn't do that before because holes in radiator let pressure bleed off.
Pulled head and pushed out sleeves, had standard bearings in it so crank had never been out. Sleeves looked like you had taken a cutting torch to them they were so pitted from cavitation. Previous owner must of been using tap water to fill it up since it kept leaking out from holes in radiator and water pump. Rod journals were worn, but not to bad. Balancer shafts bearings were shot. Pulled motor and tore it down. There was a lot of erosion in block where sleeve o rings seal. Had a good friend who is a machinist at a diesel engine shop come and take some measurements and look at things. He said if I wanted to make it last I should rebuild it. He took it with him and hot tanked block and went thru everything.
Machined block and put new sleeves in bottom of block where the liners seal. Crank had 4 cracks in # 4 rod journal so I had to buy a new one. Balancer shafts where junk so got 2 of those. Complete rebuild kit and engine is new.
I rebuilt the power steering boosters while engine was being done and changed almost every hydraulic hose on the tractor.
I am writing this because yesterday I worked it for about 45 minutes doing a job for my neighbor and everything worked like it should, all the fluids stayed where they should and I had a huge smile and sense of accomplishment when I got off of it.
Things I have learned along the way. The older tractors are pretty simple to work on and fix because they had to be. I feel good that I was able to save this one from being cut up and scraped out.
Did it make sense to do this money wise? Probably not. I have a huge stack of invoices that I probably won't add up. There are endless other things that were fixed along the way. It is going to be used to clear 40 acres of woods that my wifes family homesteaded in 1906 and has not been touched since 1978. Undercarrige is 70% worn so I will probably have to do that some day. Still have the hoe to go thru but I don't mind. I will own it till the day I die, probably. I have a friend that is in the land clearing business that has a Cat 963D that wishes the new stuff was as simple to work on as the old stuff. But with the emission rules for businesses they can't be run anymore in California. Thankfully mine is just a hobby tractor used for ag.
I have done all the labor myself with some help from my wife and friends along the way and I am grateful for that. My machinist friend did all the engine work in his spare time and I saved a bunch of money on that.
I am also very grateful that this forum and contributors exist to help people like me along the way.

Thanks to all
Mike

[77 Ford]

Job well done!

I agree it's not always about cost sometimes it's a matter of pride and doing a good job because you can.

[Labparamour]

Great story! It is a good feeling to be able to tear something down and see it brought back into service. Great people and information on this site!

[truck209]

I too went through the same with a 350c dozer. Bought it for camp here in southern Vt. cheap dozer for 6000.00. Thought it would last around camp dozing hillside to make more lawn and changing driveway. First the track adjuster cracked open replaced that. Then I bought another one for other side along with chains and sprockets. Cut pads off and bought new bolts and nuts to reinstall pads. We put chains on and sprockets and adjuster and put old pads back on. Had also bought spring covers. While doing this found idlers bad bought new idlers later we put them on. The next year we were still at camp and the motor goes. Had motor rebuilt for 4100.00 Then bought new pads and nut and bolts and installed them. My last post to this site was is there any thing else that is costly to replace down the road. Well there was the next thing that went was the hydraulic balancer got that replaced used dozer for awhile then the injection pump and a cracked hydraulic line. rebuilt that and got the dozer back a month ago. I am up to 21,100.00 in this machine not counting our labor. I think if the motor had gone first I would have stopped there. The end line is that we did a huge lot of work at camp and ended up with a completely rebuilt dozer. Now I can see I am not the only one to go through this. Good luck on your machine in the future. Bob