GC 1750 - tipping and other items

[jrm21]

Used my 1705 quite a bit over the past few days for several jobs around the property. Really enjoying this machine and what it can do. Not sure I will ever get tired of finding new uses for it.


Did quite bit with my rotary cutter. My property is far from level... lot's of ups and downs. It got me to wondering - just how easy is it to tip one of these tractors? I have the FEL low to the ground and the cutter is pretty heavy. That should make for a low center of gravity. There were still plenty of times that it didn't feel "right." I'm talking relatively small grades at very slow speed - areas that I wouldn't flinch while riding an ATV. On the tractor I just had that "holy cow" moment.

Am I being overly cautious?


On another note, I had a small issue. Went to put the tractor away for the day and noticed something hanging underneath. It was a curved metal bar. Seems this bar has something to do with the mid-mount attachments (I have no mid-mount items). It is supposed to be connected via a pin in the front and back. Apparently, the rear pin fell out at some point and the bar was dragging. Got hung up somewhere and bent really bad. Brought it to my dealer and he was able to straighten it (not sure how). Also gave me a new pin.

Looking at the matching bar on the other side, the cotter pin holding the pin in place is bent to avoid falling out. Not sure how this could have happened. Also not sure how it could have bent like that without my noticing. Strange. Is this a freak occurrence, or something to watch out for? If the latter, how to avoid the situation?


Finally, a question about the adjustment turnbuckles on the 3-pt lift arms. They each have a nut that you can tighten against the turnbuckle. Guessing that they are there to keep the turnbuckle from slipping out of place. I find that in a short time of use those nuts move quite a bit, serving no useful purpose (Although the turnbuckles seem to stay in place, at least when an attachment is connected). Any way to keep those nuts in place?

 

[cglaser104]

To answer the first portion....yea, they tip easy. The ROPS wouldn't be there if it was a risk both when operating on inclines and working with a raised load. Its better to be cautious and feel the back door pucker in fear of rolling than to operate with reckless abandon and find out how good the ROPS is.

As for your bent up underneath bar, it's important to regularly inspect your machine for defects, loose bolts, missing hardware, etc. Through vibration and wear and tear things can come apart. That tractor is so strong it could bend up a piece of steel without so much as a grunt if your not careful.

Speaking of vibration, your turnbuckle and the nut will come loose during operation unless you really crank the nut against the turnbuckle nice and snug. Once the nut gets loose the turnbuckle will too. I have had it happen when running my tiller but was able to catch it before I broke something when inspecting the unit after use.

 

[oosik]

When I had my Ford 1700 the jam nuts on the turnbuckles came loose regularly. I went to the auto parts store to get blue locktite. The guy there suggested liquid rubber cement. He said it would hold just about as well and could be loosened with wrenches much easier than locktite.

I got a jar of the goop and it worked well.

 

[jrm21]

To answer the first portion....yea, they tip easy. The ROPS wouldn't be there if it was a risk both when operating on inclines and working with a raised load. Its better to be cautious and feel the back door pucker in fear of rolling than to operate with reckless abandon and find out how good the ROPS is.

pucker... that's exactly the term I was looking for. I was definitely taking it careful. Just surprised at how little it took to make me uneasy. Wasn't sure if the seatbelt and ROPS was just for show and required by the lawyers. Thanks for clearing that up.

As for your bent up underneath bar, it's important to regularly inspect your machine for defects, loose bolts, missing hardware, etc. Through vibration and wear and tear things can come apart. That tractor is so strong it could bend up a piece of steel without so much as a grunt if your not careful.

Yeah. Definitely surprised how it bent that piece of steel without blinking an eye. Everything looked good when I started her up. The cotter pin must have popped out during use. Just not sure how. The pin is bent back on itself. Would take more than vibration. Guess it is possible some wood/brush caught it just the right way.

Speaking of vibration, your turnbuckle and the nut will come loose during operation unless you really crank the nut against the turnbuckle nice and snug. Once the nut gets loose the turnbuckle will too. I have had it happen when running my tiller but was able to catch it before I broke something when inspecting the unit after use.

Makes sense. I will probably use a wrench in the future to snug is up good and tight. A few weeks ago the turnbuckle did come loose, but I noticed it before any harm was done.

 

[jrm21]

Good idea on the rubber cement. I'll give that a try.

 

[AxleHub]

Jrm21,

You may want to consider a couple of items depending on your implements:

1. I assume your dealer would have mentioned it or you would have seen it in the manual. There is a knob right behind your feet just above the floor. Its used to set the cutting height for a mid moubt mowet. If you don't have one . . Then you want to set that know on lock. Doing that locks the mount bars for the mmm at their top most position. When you adjust your 3ph downward . . Those bars movevdown too unless you havevthat knob in lock position. My guess thatbis what happened with that bar that was bent . . You had the 3ph moved lower and those mmm bars weren't locked in the top position so they were hanging liw.

2. You can get skid plates for your underside . . they are available for your machine and protect from sticks and rocks if need be.

3. You can add wheel spacers in various sizes from 1 inch to 3 or so inches to each rear wheel . . Which will give you more stability to sidehills and slope isdues.

4. I noted you mentioned you were cutting with the 3ph but had your fel on the front end. You could take the fel off to lighten and "tighten" your handling. If needed you could then add some weights to the front instead of the whole fel unit hanging out front. Or a second option is to leave the fel ares on but rake just the bucket off . . this is especially easy if you have the quick attach option from mytractortools.com.

 

[jrm21]

JThere is a knob right behind your feet just above the floor. Its used to set the cutting height for a mid mount mower.

The knob was definitely in the lock position. The problem was caused by the rear pin somehow coming out. That caused the arm to hang down and drag on the ground. If the pin was still engaged when this happened, there would have been much more damage.

2. You can get skid plates for your underside . . they are available for your machine and protect from sticks and rocks if need be.

Good idea. I will look into that. Prior to the bent arm I wouldn't have thought skid plates were necessary for my situation. Now, I am not so sure.

3. You can add wheel spacers in various sizes from 1 inch to 3 or so inches to each rear wheel . . Which will give you more stability to sidehills and slope issues.

Been thinking about that. Where is a good source to purchase? Is is a difficult DIY job? (Not sure how to jack up the tractor to remove a wheel). Does it affect the warranty at all?

4. I noted you mentioned you were cutting with the 3ph but had your fel on the front end. You could take the fel off to lighten and "tighten" your handling. If needed you could then add some weights to the front instead of the whole fel unit hanging out front. Or a second option is to leave the fel ares on but rake just the bucket off . . this is especially easy if you have the quick attach option from mytractortools.com.

I've been thinking about a quick attach for the 3pt. Being able to get the cutter on/off more easily would be a good thing.

Haven't considered a front quick attach, but it sounds interesting. Would removing the bucket add to stability? I would have though having that extra weight low to the ground makes tipping less likely.

That said, I do like having the bucket on while cutting. Lots of rocks in my area. Not big enough to bother the tractor, but not something you don't want to run over with cutter blades. The FEL makes it simple to move these out of the way (along with fallen trees and other obstructions). I'll look into this more. What do you mean by "tighten" the handling?

 

[AxleHub]

The knob was definitely in the lock position. The problem was caused by the rear pin somehow coming out. That caused the arm to hang down and drag on the ground. If the pin was still engaged when this happened, there would have been much more damage.



Good idea. I will look into that. Prior to the bent arm I wouldn't have thought skid plates were necessary for my situation. Now, I am not so sure.



Been thinking about that. Where is a good source to purchase? Is is a difficult DIY job? (Not sure how to jack up the tractor to remove a wheel). Does it affect the warranty at all?




I've been thinking about a quick attach for the 3pt. Being able to get the cutter on/off more easily would be a good thing.

Haven't considered a front quick attach, but it sounds interesting. Would removing the bucket add to stability? I would have though having that extra weight low to the ground makes tipping less likely.

That said, I do like having the bucket on while cutting. Lots of rocks in my area. Not big enough to bother the tractor, but not something you don't want to run over with cutter blades. The FEL makes it simple to move these out of the way (along with fallen trees and other obstructions). I'll look into this more. What do you mean by "tighten" the handling?

Both the skid plate and spacets would be available from bro tek and the quick attach for the bucket and the quick attach for the 3ph can be found at mytractortools.com for the gc1705.

As to the fel on the front end while 3ph mowing on very rolling land. Yes the fel adds weigjt on the front end. But in rocking and rolling land you desire weight that is not leveraged or creating teeter totter effects. In other words you want weight close if weight is needed.

I'm not sure using a 3ph cutter really requires weight on the front . . but I can tell you that having a fel and bucket on the tractor when I'm cutting with the mmm is not a pleasant thing on slopes and any sidehill or washboard situations. Just quick detaching the bucket makes things better as 155 pounds of bucket is not hanging out front in my case.

Now to address the convenience of having the fel while cutting. I can see where it might be handy . . but I wouldn't understand why more than the 1st cutting would need it. You move the rocks or logs and they are gone . . right ?

I like my fel but it creates some issues too. By the way . . I assume you have your rear tires filled with fluid of one sort or another ? That also helps.

The mf gc1700 series is good stuff . . I'm really glad I got the gc1715 for many of my uses, and I've been quite surprused how iften I use my forks for many things beyond palletized purpises . I predict You'll get a lot of use from that gc1705

 

[wrangler6831]

For what is worth these Amazon.com: (2) 5mm (2") 5x4.5 to 5x4.5 Hubcentric Wheel Spacers for Ford Mustang Edge Ranger Explorer: Automotive fit the GC2600 series and extend the axle almost 4 inches. The work with the 60" mower deck without interference.

Rich

 

[AxleHub]

The knob was definitely in the lock position. The problem was caused by the rear pin somehow coming out. That caused the arm to hang down and drag on the ground. If the pin was still engaged when this happened, there would have been much more damage.



Good idea. I will look into that. Prior to the bent arm I wouldn't have thought skid plates were necessary for my situation. Now, I am not so sure.



Been thinking about that. Where is a good source to purchase? Is is a difficult DIY job? (Not sure how to jack up the tractor to remove a wheel). Does it affect the warranty at all?

One ladt comment relating to when I wrote:


1. I assume your dealer would have mentioned it or you would have seen it in the manual. There is a knob right behind your feet just above the floor. Its used to set the cutting height for a mid moubt mowet. If you don't have one . . Then you want to set that know on lock. Doing that locks the mount bars for the mmm at their top most position. When you adjust your 3ph downward . . Those bars movevdown too unless you havevthat knob in lock position. My guess thatbis what happened with that bar that was bent . . You had the 3ph moved lower and those mmm bars weren't locked in the top position so they were hanging liw.


Its important to remember that to fully lick your m pto apparatus . . Not only do you have to turn the know to lock . . But it must have thev3ph inits absolute top location wjen it is done.