Basic toolkit for 354

   / Basic toolkit for 354 #1  

quicksandfarmer

Veteran Member
Joined
Dec 2, 2006
Messages
2,264
Location
Coastal Rhode Island
Tractor
Jinma 354, purchased 2007
Hi --

Longtime lurker, firstime poster.

Soon I'm going to be taking delivery on a Jinma 354. I plan to do the maintenance myself, and I'd like to put together a toolkit because my farm is somewhat remote and it's a pain to run out for things. So far I'm thinking I'll need a set of metric combination wrenches, a set of metric sockets, a torque wrench, a grease gun, and a store of grease, motor oil, hydraulic fluid, oil filters and fuel filters. Oh, and a trickle charger for when I leave the tractor alone for a while.

Anything else I'm forgetting?

Also, any thoughts on the best way to mount a toolbox on this tractor?

Thanks.
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #2  
This isn't tractor specificc.. but rather.. just 'needed' tools for ownin' a tractor.

Your list is good so far.. but you may want a good 'smart' float charger vs a 'dumb' trickle charger... otherwise you may have a dry battery after a few months..


On that socket set.. considder getting it with a half inch drive, and a good breaker bar.. also locate a scrap piece of pipe 2-3 feet long that will slip over that breaker bar. That's a 'redneck' torque multiplier.

Some sort of 'heat' device is good. I.E. a gas axe, smoke wrench, blue axe.. etc. ( torches... seems like tractor ownership usuly requirs heated metal ). If nothing else.. get a walmart 15$ bernz-o-matic plumbers propane torch.. or if you feel like 30$.. get the mapp gas for a few extra degrees. This will make loosening stuck parts easier.. or if you need to unbend or bend any metal for light fabrication.. or field repairs..e tc. )

Way down on the list.. for when you have excess money burning a hole in your pocket.. get a welder.. cheapy garage sale 50$ AC tombstone arc welder is fine... any thing you can hot-glue metal with.. etc.. As with the gas axe... Usually once you own a tractor.. things brake easier... And nothing spells 'relief' like a big 225A ac arc welder when you are out on a rainy windy day with a piece of 1" thick rusty and painted metal that needs to be glued back together so that you can get your tractor to move again... been there.. done that... ruined the t-shirt laying under the batwing mower welding one of the wings back on after the big honkin hinge broke one day... ( don't feel like you got to rush out and buy a set of torches and a welder if you own a tractor.. think of them as nice options to have.. but not necisities.. like having a wife that cooks.. vs one that cooks good... you won't starve either way... but the good cook is.. um.. just nice to have.. ).


Let see.. a maul, or sledge hammer.. ( both... )say.. 3# or 5# Also.. a good ballpeen hammer, and a copper or brass hammer. Brass or copper hammers are good for persuading steel and cast iron parts that just need a little beating on to get going.. but when you don't want to leave marks.

A prybar... ( tire spoons and tire irons make good prybars )... One is good.. multiple are better.. Besides being great for prying on bent metal before beating on it with the sledge hammer, heating with the torch, and then welding up.. they make ok tire changing tools too...

Bailing wire... plus electrical wire and some basic connectors... A good set of gas pliers... preferably the ones that 'can' cut that bailing wire.

A nice 12" adjustable wrench.. for when you find those 12.25mm bolts that make ya scratch your head.

A good 18" pipe wrench for when the bolt is just too stuck to come out without really chewing it up good.

Vise grips

A small assortment of extra nuts and bolts.. washers..etc... a few self tapping sheep metal screws thrown in for good measure.

A couple different sizes of drifts.. perhaps a small set of hard ones.. maybee with a center punch.. and then a big brass one.. say.. 3/4" round.. brass drifs are good and non maring to steel and cast iron.

A good section of chain with hooks, or at least a snatch strap... Never know when your truck or tractor will get stuck with you stranded out inthe boonies..

A come-along is almost as good as a friend or neighbor when you are alone inthe woods with the tractor stuck inthe mud.. or high centered... Just find a anchor point and help yourself out...

A few pieces of lumber.. various sizes... they make great 'traction modifiers' for when you are stuck inthe mud.. and are great for cribbing when jacking.

Jack stands and a hi-lift farm jack... tsc has them for 30$.. it's a good investment that you will love once you change your first tractor tire out in the wilderness. ( jacks, lumber and comealongs have helped many people out of mud... )

A good cheap spade shovel.. for when you can't jack the tractor out o fthe mud to insert the traction modifiers...

Extra fuel can with fuel in it.. and some fuel stabilizer... Great for when your tractor gets down to 5minutes of fuel and you have 10 minutes of work left before driving home... or 30minutes to a fuel station...

Test lamp.. or dependable vom... if ya don't know how to use the vom.. stick with the test lamp.

A good set of jumper cables...

Tire pump.. cheapy auto 12v one is fine...

Bag o' shop rags..

A couple botles of water and a can of pop open top tune or sardines.. vieena sausages.. etc... kept in a zip lock baggie with a plastic fork... great for when your truck and tractor get stuck int he mud.. out on the farm in the middle of nowhere, and it's too late to call someone to help you out till morning... beats sleeping in the barn or truck hungry waiting for the sun to come up... Just change it out every 6 months...

A kerosene lantern.. or parafin lamp.. and a quart of fuel.. and a box of matches.. also in a ziplock baggie...the lamps store better than batteries and flashlights for long term non use... these work great in conjunction with the sardines and water.. when you are staying in the barn waiting for the tow truck to arrive...

First aid kit.. for tractor and shop

fire extinguisher. ditto above..

That's the list of stuff for your shop. Now.. to actually carry on your tractor.. a bit of wire balled up.. some extra lynch, cotter, and hairpins.. a pair of pliers..and that big adjustable wrench... ( also known as an emergency hammer )

Mount first aid kit near seat, if possible... Fire extinguishers mount great to rops using the oem plastic cheapy brackets and big radiator clamps... Tip.. put a piece of masking tape over the spout.. keeps bugs out....like dirt daubers...

A bunji cord or two strapped down under your running boards.. outa sight.. but close when you need them.

Front bumpers are great places to carry chains.

Soundguy
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #3  
Soundguy, there ain't no way I'm quoting that but you must have a really big tool box and your right on all of that and maybe some more things
Jim:D
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #4  
Oh.. for a tool box.. try a fender mount. I've sene some people use army surplus ammo cans for tool boxes.. they have good closure and gaskets.. can mount to floor board, fender.. behind seat.. etc... back of bumper... attach to a small bracket that is then band-clamped to rops.. etc..

Soundguy
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #5  
Not sure if you have any room left ;) but recommend metric grease fittings and fuses to fit your tractor. Also check your metric socket set, you may need a couple sockets that don't always come in a set. Sometimes they come in the spare tool kit w/tractor.
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #6  
That bailing wire makes a great emergency replacement 40a fuse.. and the adj wrench is good for the 12 and 3/16mm bolts..

Soundguy
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #7  
I'm sure your on top of replacing oils and cleaning the fuel tank. Also look at the fuel shut off valve taken apart and you will see some very small holes for fuel to go thru. I replace mine with standard one quarter inch needle valve and solved a bunch of problems. My machine starts and has excellant power. I really feel those factory fuel strainer combination shut off valve are a real sorce of problems. You'll be glad of aquiring a chinese tractor after using it for a while. They are good basic machines that will "git-er done" bjr
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #8  
Soundguy, Not sure on a 354, but on the 200 series there are allot of bolts that you won't get to with a cresent wrench. ie the sockets are needed. As far as the fuses, I'd bet he has the newer auto type fuses. A handful of values for spares are cheap. Not woth risking the fire/meltdown using the bailing wire, IMO.

Because of the posters remote location, he does need allot more items than what most of us carry. Assuming he has a shed or other spot to store some of this stuff.

My onboard toolbox has only:

- three sizes of cresent wrenchs
- 4-5 of the metric sockets needed w/ratchet and extensions
- screw drivers
- fuses
- grease fittings
- hammer
- grease gun
- cheapo dvm
- pins and clips
- pto shear bolts
- pair of water pump type pliers
- wire (lengths of the alum wire that came with tractor crate)
- probably some other odds n ends that elude my memory ;)

Tools fits in my small plastic tool box mounted on fender. It has one removable tray. What gets used the most? cresent wrenches for adj 3pt linkages, pins & clips, and grease gun. As I think about it, the grease gun sets on the hoe. I don't carry it around in the field. I grease before using.
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #9  
Soundguy said:
That bailing wire makes a great emergency replacement 40a fuse..
Old VW's were always blowing fuses. They were similar to a glass fuse but with pointy ends, and hard to find. The normal emergency field repair was to wrap the old fuse with tinfoil, from a stick of gum or the liner of a cigarette pack.
 
   / Basic toolkit for 354 #10  
Johns .. I think you are missing the point, if not spirit or intent of the post. This was not meant to be an advertisment for mack or snap on.. this was a real world breakdown of what's practicle and what's possible.

In a perfect world.. if your 5a 'wahtever' fuse blows.. you don't put in a 10a funse if it is not correct.. because that is just 'not the way to do it'. in a practicle real world.. most of us jab a piece of wire in so we can get home.. as long as we are sure of why the fault occured ( low bat E thus higher I.. etc. ) or a pinched wire that was corrected.. etc.

Emergency field repairs are just that... emergency. They may not be ideal.. they may not employ all of the oem safety features. They are designed as a stop gap method for either preventing further damage.. or to get you home.

Anyone here ever jimmied up wire and odd bolts into a u-jont that sheared it's botls off.. then slippe dthe clutch and drove home real slow on a back road?

Ever put a screw into a leak in a tire knowing it will substantially reduce the leak so you canget to a service station? Same with a ding/chip in an oil pan? a sheet metal screw and a piece or rubber will stop a small leak.

I know a guy that jump started his car using a single coat hanger out in a mostly deserted parking lot late one night. He left his lights on flattening out his bat while shopping.. The only person he could flag down dind't have cables, they did however find a wire coat hanger inthe parking lot, Both cars were pushed together till the bumpers touched, and then the wire coat hanger was stretches from positive to positive... both guys sat there and gabbed for 15 minutes while donor car ran and charged dead car. When they fired of fthe deat car.. the rest of the shelac burned off the coat hanger... but the car started.

Speaking of coat hangers.. back in the 'day' I've made a null modem cable using 3 coat hangers... and it worked fine for xfering date between 2 old iron boxes.

I helped a lade get home one night and all it required was a penny.

Her car wouldn't start... opened her hood... when she tried starting i observed an arc at the battery terminal.. clamp was loose on the battery post... Bolt and nut were really coroded... My multi tool plires wouldn't budge it... clamp was only a tad loose. I fumbled in my pocket for a penny.. grabbed a rock fromthe parking lot.. I beat on the penny with the rock while it layed on the asphalt.. the woman looked at me like i was crazy. After a couple whacks.. the penny had a slight bend to it. I started the penny into the space around the post, between the clamp and the post... used the rock to drive it in.. was a quite nice tight fit. Car started on first try. I told her to get her hubby/BF to put a new terminal end. Time for repair? 3 minutes.. cost? 1 penny... Money saved? 50 $ towing.. or leaving the car unatended all night... Concept of the 'right way' changes when you or someone else are in need.

In a perfect world.. neither of the cars would have been started due to a lack of the proper tools or parts...

I didn't specifically have 100% of the tractor nuts and bolts in mind when i mentioned the crescent wrench.. I.E.. i wouldn't try to rebuild an engine with a pocket knife, and a crescent wrench... however there will most certaintly be implement or at least a few fasteners that are wrenchable

besides.. I have personally changed spark plugs on a JD-B with an adjustable wrench... I didn't have the large SP socket.. and i needed to get that heavy #$^& moved out of the barn.. and the plugs were bad.... took longer than with the correct tools.. but worked.

I keep a wire with 2 gator clips on it hanging in the barn... friends always ask me what it is for.. I always tell them that it is the spare ignition key to my gas tractors... Real easy to hook coil to battery vs walking out of pasture up to house to retrive key, just to start and move the tractor.

My point is.. the spirit of owning a tractor is that you may have to do a field repair one day.. and it probably won't be in ideal circumstances.. and in those cases.. you make do with what you got.

This probably holds true more for older tractors.. than newer tractors.. however.. it's no secret that these chinese tractors are considered more 'hands on' than a comparable big 3 model... That 'hands on' issue makes them somewhat closer to the way old iron is...

Soundguy

QUOTE=JohnS]Soundguy, Not sure on a 354, but on the 200 series there are allot of bolts that you won't get to with a cresent wrench. ie the sockets are needed. As far as the fuses, I'd bet he has the newer auto type fuses. A handful of values for spares are cheap. Not woth risking the fire/meltdown using the bailing wire, IMO.

Because of the posters remote location, he does need allot more items than what most of us carry. Assuming he has a shed or other spot to store some of this stuff.

My onboard toolbox has only:

- three sizes of cresent wrenchs
- 4-5 of the metric sockets needed w/ratchet and extensions
- screw drivers
- fuses
- grease fittings
- hammer
- grease gun
- cheapo dvm
- pins and clips
- pto shear bolts
- pair of water pump type pliers
- wire (lengths of the alum wire that came with tractor crate)
- probably some other odds n ends that elude my memory ;)

Tools fits in my small plastic tool box mounted on fender. It has one removable tray. What gets used the most? cresent wrenches for adj 3pt linkages, pins & clips, and grease gun. As I think about it, the grease gun sets on the hoe. I don't carry it around in the field. I grease before using.[/QUOTE]
 
 
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