Retired and Working Hard or Tractors and Flails.

[3 Horse Ranch]

New to the forum. I just want to say thanks to those who post regularly for the help they have given me, especially on the subject of flail mowers. I am a 66 year old recently retired truck driver. I hauled mostly flatbed freight on the west coast predominantly in Washington, Oregon and BC before moving into a dump truck and trailer for the last 13 years. My one brag in all of this is that I drove over a million and a half miles with no accidents and no moving violations. (One accident in my rookie year that was charged to the other driver)
I just recently moved to nice home on a few acres in NW Washington and bought a used tractor, a Ford 1715 which, came with a front end loader, a 60" box blade, a 60" Ford 917L flail mower, a 4' brush hog and a few other things. Thirty minutes into owning the tractor the shifter stopped shifting, meaning that it had stuck in first gear. I still had three ranges so it was sort of like the old 9N I had 20 years ago, but I figured that a reverse gear might come in handy at some point (th 9N had one), especially if I wanted to hook up to any of the implements. Not being familiar with the tractor at all, I decided to haul it to the local Ford dealer for a repair. I had figured that it would involve splitting the tractor, which it did, but I hadn't counted on a domino series of added "needed" repairs. Four weeks later, bank account severely depleted, I now have my tractor back and it should be good for the long haul now.
While I was waiting for the tractor and the seemingly endless delays for parts I decided to tackle the flail mower. First thing I discovered was that the previous owner had tried to mow boulder creek or something similar because there wasn't one knife (blade or whatever the proper term) that was straight. Knives for a Ford 917L are a little hard to come by. I tried the various sources I saw mentioned here and only Messicks had any. They had less than half of what I needed at the modest price of over $7 each. I'm not a wiz at math, but 96 times $7 plus shipping is about $700 and I wasn't willing to pay that. After searching the internet for a few days I was able to find some Alamo fine cut blades at Flail Master at $.71 each that seemed to be dimensionally similar. So I carefully cleaned the 48 mounting bolts and nuts and waited for the knives to arrive. When they arrived I grabbed my box of freshly cleaned bolt and nuts and try to install the first pair. The bolt is too big or the hole is too small, either way they aren't going to work together. I checked the online specs and it says the bolt hole is 3/8s, but my caliper says the hole is.357. They must have used a .38 caliber punch to get that size. Searched online and found some 5/16 bolts and locking nuts for about $25 delivered, and now the knives swing freely as designed. Still not a wiz at math, but $130 for knives, bolts and nuts seems way better than $700 even if they aren't a perfect replacement.
While I waited for the knives, I noticed that the previous owner had been a little neglectful in maintaining the gauge roller bearings. The bearings were gone, the races were gone, the roller had spent a number of hours riding on the end plates with the result that the hole in the end plates was egg shaped and a groove had worn in the roller shaft. Messicks had genuine Ford replacement bearings for only $107 each. I found replacement bearings without the blue paint elsewhere online for about $17 for the pair including shipping.
Knives installed, bearings replaced, I then opened the cover over the pulleys. Both of the bearings on the main rotor, the gearbox, the drive shaft, idler pulley were all in good serviceable condition so I greased the fittings and changed the oil in the gearbox and will replace them when they fail.
Last item, replace the drive belts. Found replacement belts at TS and proceeded to remove the old one and found that the idler bracket was immoveable. One full can of PB blaster and two weeks later and the bracket moved a little. Slowly working it back and forth while prying behind it got it to move out about a quarter inch. Using a wrench on the end of the bracket and a two prong puller along with some heat I slowly start working it off. I moved another quarter of an inch and seized completely. I decided to add an extension to the wrench for a little more leverage and pulled up and all of a sudden something popped and it came loose. Hallelujah! Or so I thought for about one second, unfortunately it was the weld holding the shaft into the mounted bracket that snapped and now I have pully bracket and shaft in my hands united forever. I thought well what God had joined together... Decided to seek a divorce for this thing and took it (them) to my former employers shop and asked the shop foreman, Brian, if he could press the shaft out. A few minutes, a little acetylene, and a press Brian designed and built for working on Mack dump trucks and I now have shaft and pulley bracket. A little time with wire brushes and emery cloth and both parts move easily and slide in and out without binding.
My last steps are a little paint, finding someone who can weld the shaft back into the mounting bracket, plus a few welds on some cracked stress points and I am good to go.
Before I retired I was worried that I wouldn't have anything to do and would be bored. The perfect solution is an old tractor and and old flail mower that were used by a family with a teenage son and who lived near saltwater. Add to the mix frequent flyovers by Navy jets to vibrate the salty water down deep into parts. (They live near Whidbey NAS) There will always be something that needs to be worked on so I will always have something to do. New would be so boring, but probably cheaper.
Thanks for reading my little intro. I hope do be a part of some of the discussions in the future, especially when the winter months drive me indoors.

 

[Wagtail]

G'day Mate and welcome to TBN from Downunder.

Very nice introduction.

Enjoy the site.

 

[fried1765]

New to the forum. I just want to say thanks to those who post regularly for the help they have given me, especially on the subject of flail mowers. I am a 66 year old recently retired truck driver. I hauled mostly flatbed freight on the west coast predominantly in Washington, Oregon and BC before moving into a dump truck and trailer for the last 13 years. My one brag in all of this is that I drove over a million and a half miles with no accidents and no moving violations. (One accident in my rookie year that was charged to the other driver)
I just recently moved to nice home on a few acres in NW Washington and bought a used tractor, a Ford 1715 which, came with a front end loader, a 60" box blade, a 60" Ford 917L flail mower, a 4' brush hog and a few other things. Thirty minutes into owning the tractor the shifter stopped shifting, meaning that it had stuck in first gear. I still had three ranges so it was sort of like the old 9N I had 20 years ago, but I figured that a reverse gear might come in handy at some point (th 9N had one), especially if I wanted to hook up to any of the implements. Not being familiar with the tractor at all, I decided to haul it to the local Ford dealer for a repair. I had figured that it would involve splitting the tractor, which it did, but I hadn't counted on a domino series of added "needed" repairs. Four weeks later, bank account severely depleted, I now have my tractor back and it should be good for the long haul now.
While I was waiting for the tractor and the seemingly endless delays for parts I decided to tackle the flail mower. First thing I discovered was that the previous owner had tried to mow boulder creek or something similar because there wasn't one knife (blade or whatever the proper term) that was straight. Knives for a Ford 917L are a little hard to come by. I tried the various sources I saw mentioned here and only Messicks had any. They had less than half of what I needed at the modest price of over $7 each. I'm not a wiz at math, but 96 times $7 plus shipping is about $700 and I wasn't willing to pay that. After searching the internet for a few days I was able to find some Alamo fine cut blades at Flail Master at $.71 each that seemed to be dimensionally similar. So I carefully cleaned the 48 mounting bolts and nuts and waited for the knives to arrive. When they arrived I grabbed my box of freshly cleaned bolt and nuts and try to install the first pair. The bolt is too big or the hole is too small, either way they aren't going to work together. I checked the online specs and it says the bolt hole is 3/8s, but my caliper says the hole is.357. They must have used a .38 caliber punch to get that size. Searched online and found some 5/16 bolts and locking nuts for about $25 delivered, and now the knives swing freely as designed. Still not a wiz at math, but $130 for knives, bolts and nuts seems way better than $700 even if they aren't a perfect replacement.
While I waited for the knives, I noticed that the previous owner had been a little neglectful in maintaining the gauge roller bearings. The bearings were gone, the races were gone, the roller had spent a number of hours riding on the end plates with the result that the hole in the end plates was egg shaped and a groove had worn in the roller shaft. Messicks had genuine Ford replacement bearings for only $107 each. I found replacement bearings without the blue paint elsewhere online for about $17 for the pair including shipping.
Knives installed, bearings replaced, I then opened the cover over the pulleys. Both of the bearings on the main rotor, the gearbox, the drive shaft, idler pulley were all in good serviceable condition so I greased the fittings and changed the oil in the gearbox and will replace them when they fail.
Last item, replace the drive belts. Found replacement belts at TS and proceeded to remove the old one and found that the idler bracket was immoveable. One full can of PB blaster and two weeks later and the bracket moved a little. Slowly working it back and forth while prying behind it got it to move out about a quarter inch. Using a wrench on the end of the bracket and a two prong puller along with some heat I slowly start working it off. I moved another quarter of an inch and seized completely. I decided to add an extension to the wrench for a little more leverage and pulled up and all of a sudden something popped and it came loose. Hallelujah! Or so I thought for about one second, unfortunately it was the weld holding the shaft into the mounted bracket that snapped and now I have pully bracket and shaft in my hands united forever. I thought well what God had joined together... Decided to seek a divorce for this thing and took it (them) to my former employers shop and asked the shop foreman, Brian, if he could press the shaft out. A few minutes, a little acetylene, and a press Brian designed and built for working on Mack dump trucks and I now have shaft and pulley bracket. A little time with wire brushes and emery cloth and both parts move easily and slide in and out without binding.
My last steps are a little paint, finding someone who can weld the shaft back into the mounting bracket, plus a few welds on some cracked stress points and I am good to go.
Before I retired I was worried that I wouldn't have anything to do and would be bored. The perfect solution is an old tractor and and old flail mower that were used by a family with a teenage son and who lived near saltwater. Add to the mix frequent flyovers by Navy jets to vibrate the salty water down deep into parts. (They live near Whidbey NAS) There will always be something that needs to be worked on so I will always have something to do. New would be so boring, but probably cheaper.
Thanks for reading my little intro. I hope do be a part of some of the discussions in the future, especially when the winter months drive me indoors.

Here is some bad news for you!
With a Ford repair manual, and the help of a mechanically inclined friend, you might have saved big $, and split the 1715 yourself.
A friend and I (he had split 2 or 3 tractors before) split my Ford 1920 (1989), and replaced the clutch.
The Chinese aftermarket clutch failed after 5 hours. (NEVER again aftermarket anything.... for driveline, or engine internal parts)
So.........we split the tractor again ...... to replace the clutch again.
Took us amateurs less than 9 hours,... start to finish,..... second time.

 

[TBN Support]

:welcome:

I hope you are getting a chance to enjoy that land and not just tractor repair

 

[Member]

I think the 917 is a good flail mower, when I was looking for used I would have taken that or the John Deere 25A I ended up with. I do like the multiple drive belts on the 917, my 25A slips sometimes. I had to rebuild much of my 25A too, now I keep it greased, I don’t run it over big rocks and I wonder how it ever ended up in the condition I found it in. I’m sure the 917 will serve you well for a very long time. Enjoy your retirement, I’m envious.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

I think the 917 is a good flail mower, when I was looking for used I would have taken that or the John Deere 25A I ended up with. I do like the multiple drive belts on the 917, my 25A slips sometimes. I had to rebuild much of my 25A too, now I keep it greased, I don’t run it over big rocks and I wonder how it ever ended up in the condition I found it in. I’m sure the 917 will serve you well for a very long time. Enjoy your retirement, I’m envious.

Thanks. I was totally unfamiliar with the concept of a flail mower until I ended up with one as part of the package. This is the light duty version, but should work well for much of the property around here. Just hoping the slightly different shaped knives work. When I rotated the shaft by hand, it seemed as though everything was covered. In any event, I could find no source for the exact replacement knives. A long time ago I had an old 9N with a 5' brush cutter that did a good job provided I kept it reasonably sharp.
I have found I am thoroughly enjoying being retired. I let my medical card expire a week ago, so there is no going back now.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

:welcome:

I hope you are getting a chance to enjoy that land and not just tractor repair

Once I get the mower working and at least the proposed fence line mowed, I will get to work fencing it for my brothers horses. Right now the property is 6' below the "amber waves" of tall grass. I think I am going to enjoy that kind of work.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

Here is some bad news for you!
With a Ford repair manual, and the help of a mechanically inclined friend, you might have saved big $, and split the 1715 yourself.
A friend and I (he had split 2 or 3 tractors before) split my Ford 1920 (1989), and replaced the clutch.
The Chinese aftermarket clutch failed after 5 hours. (NEVER again aftermarket anything.... for driveline, or engine internal parts)
So.........we split the tractor again ...... to replace the clutch again.
Took us amateurs less than 9 hours,... start to finish,..... second time.

I had to replace a transmission seal on that 9N I owned years ago, but that was a much simpler tractor. I worked on it after work and it took me only a few hours to do the job. This one turned out to be a bolt had backed out and allowed the shifter to slide out between the two shifter rods. I am sure I could have saved some money on it, but being new to the area I didn't yet have a mechanically inclined friend. Brian who pressed the shaft out of the idler arm was 36 miles away, but I had some other business in that area to take care of too. At least that was free.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

G'day Mate and welcome to TBN from Downunder.

Very nice introduction.

Enjoy the site.

Thanks. I don't think one could be further away than Tasmania. Good to make friends all over the world.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

Got the Ford 917L flail all put back together, I had a neighbor weld the shaft back into place. Next time I think I might haul it to somebody who is a welder. It took about 4 hours with an angle grinder to get rid of the excess metal.
I found it to be a bit tricky to hook up to, the offset seemed to cause me to miss the mark and back towards the center of the machine. After I finally got it all hooked up, it worked quite well. I cut about an acre of thick grass that had been previously brush hogged and it did quite well. I mowed at the maximum cutting height for the machine, about 5 inches. I then adjusted it down and cut another acre of thinner grass, going slow through the thicker portions and speeding up where the grass was a little more sparse. It did have a tendency to collect the previous cuttings on the offset side and dump them all at once, usually on a turn.
I did find out the flail mowers and steel cable left half buried by the previous owner aren't very good companions. I managed to quickly wind about 20 feet of it up in the mower before the mower said enough and stopped. Headed back towards the house dragging the remaining 80 feet of half inch cable behind me, After a quick run to the local hardware store to buy some cutting wheels for the above mentioned angle grinder and thirty minutes of cutting and pulling, I was up and running again. Only three knives were slightly damaged but otherwise things seemed pretty good. The cheaper make do knives from flail master worked very well. Only other problem I had was the clearance between idler pulley and the cover. It rubbed the cover enough to polish two little groves into the inside and burn two small spots in the paint on the outside.
I think that if I can keep ahead of the grass next year it will do a very nice job.