Farmall H Not Starting

Phil in the hill · Jan 5, 2009

Good morning, I have had my 48' H in my unheated garage for the 2 past months. I had just bought it and not used it much due to overheating. In PA the temps. ranged from 10 to 60 degrees. I had not tried to start it in that time, so it has been sitting awhile. This past weekend I put on my radiator that I had reapired which was off for about 4 weeks. Before I put it on I pushed the tractor outside and flushed it with water. Also in the same day I took off the valve cover, cleaned the valves (which had pretty heavy grim), put on a new gasket, recovered, and changed the oil. I tried to start the tractor and it will not turn over. It gives a weak try but will not go. The tractor is still a 6v with 30 weight oil. Any suggestions to get it started? Thank-you

GordoSD · Jan 5, 2009

Remove the battery. charge it on 6v, 10 amps for 4 to 6 hours. Then take it to a shop and have it tested. Replace if necassary.
Remove ground cable and sand point of contact and cable end shiney. Claean battery end bright and shiney.
Look closely at your starter cable. How large is it? It MUST be a tractor cable , 0 or 00 in diameter. Replace as necessary.
Post back after you go through these steps.
Also check the archives. This comes up about every 10 days on this board.

Gordo

Gordo

Janicholson · Jan 5, 2009

Pull out the sparkplugs. I wuill suggest that water got into the engine and pulling the plugs will let it out. One other possibility is the starter could be jammed in the flywheel. Loosen the starter bolts and wiggle it. If the re is a clicking noise, that was it. The "repair" will last until it does it again. The cure is a new starter drive from CaseIH, or other sources. It is different than the original, and better.
A third possibility is weak battery and small cables. Cables should be O gauge wire, with soldered on terminals. This makes a big difference in cranking.
Try the plug removal first, then the starter.
Good luck, and tell us what fixed it, JimN

Janicholson · Jan 5, 2009

Crank the engine with the plugs out to clear the water! And always shut off the fuel when parked! JimN

Wayne in MN · Jan 5, 2009

Try 10-30 or other lighter viscosity oil in cold weather

rrogers · Jan 5, 2009

Try tuning the motor over with a hand crank to make shure your motor isn"t stuck, if it is you might be able to pop it loose with out having to tear down the motor

Bob Kerr · Jan 6, 2009

Just a long shot here but how did you clean the valves? If you shot a bunch of engine degreaser on them around the stems it may be possible that enough got in a cyl to lock up a piston. I guess you will see when you pull the plugs out like the others mentioned. As far as batt cables go, do like was mentioned with heavy cables and be sure ALL connections are very clean! 6v is very picky about clean connections. I do mine every year whether they need it or not during my "spring tune and clean and check"

Dave in CT · Jan 11, 2009

There are some troubleshooting procedures in the archives and with Bob M's wiring diagrams (links to them can also be found in the archives as well). I've had it happen to me twice that replacing the battery cables will correct a no-start situation. In both cases all the connections were clean and tight - it was the resistance built up combined with (in one instance) the cables being too light. This does seem to come up here in the forum from time to time so, if you're planning to replace them anyway, you could just do that now to see if it helps.

Farmall H Not Starting

Phil in the hill

New User

GordoSD

Well-known Member

Janicholson

Well-known Member

Janicholson

Well-known Member

Wayne in MN

Well-known Member

rrogers

Member

Bob Kerr

Member

Dave in CT

Member

Similar threads