4x4 parts needed or drive without front powered G244/G194

hcforde · Jan 15, 2018

I have a Bolen G244 and a G194. They are the same except for the displacement on the engine. The front left side of the G244 is damaged internally and therefore no 4wheel drive. A used parts supplier want to sell me the parts to fix it for way too much money. Does anyone have a parts tractor in Bolens or corresponding Iseki model.

2nd question can this be run without the front wheel assist on one wheel or should I disable the other wheel also With that being done is the integrity of the front wheels such that a wheel will NOT fall off in the middle of the field.

Ilikeurtractor · Jan 15, 2018

On the 2nd question you could pull the drive shaft from the failed side or gut what you need to out of there to eliminate the drive and do some welding on the differential (essentially lock it up) to force torque to the good side. If you just remove the disabled side drive components the good side will never have any torque applied to it due to how a standard differential works which basically limits the torque to both wheels to the lesser value of the two required to make it turn. You will need to see how the components are put together but there should be a way to leave enough of the parts in the axle to keep the wheels on. I had mine apart on my G244 a few years ago but I don't recall all the details. The seals were leaking so all I really did was fix that problem. Seems like snap rings were doing the majority of keeping things together and as long as you maintain those it should be ok.

greeno · Jan 19, 2018

I would strongly advise against making a 3 wheel drive tractor. Would it not be easier/safer to disconnect the forward drive shaft?

hcforde · Jan 21, 2018

They want $650 for the parts to fix it. Sort of stuck by these old tractor parts bandits......If I could only find an old G244/G194 somewhere.

Ilikeurtractor · Jan 25, 2018

Even if you do find an "old" G244/G194 somewhere I doubt you'll get it for less than $650 unless you're very lucky. I've been watching for those for close to a decade and probably have only seen a total four or five G194/244s for sale. One was non-running but the asking price was still around $1500 if I remember correctly while the rest were all over $3000 but in generally good condition. I realize you may be willing to pay $1500 for a used parts tractor vs. $650 for just the parts you need but it might be a long wait. And if you do pay $1500 for a parts tractor and only ever use the axle parts then you paid twice as much as you needed to and it is likely you'll want to get that tractor working too because I've been there - many times. I understand where you're coming from though and I think a lot of parts dealers seem to appear high but compare the prices to a local green or orange tractor dealer's axle parts for a similarly sized tractor and it won't seem so bad anymore.

Keep in mind many dealers have a lot of money invested themselves for tractors and parts that may never sell, all the while having to store, catalog (if they are thorough), and ultimately disassemble them as needed. And if it wasn't for their desire to sell parts, whether for profit or whatever, there would be no simple options to keep what could be an otherwise perfectly operating tractor in fully working order.

I'm not a tractor parts dealer by the way and have never sold a tractor part to anyone in my life. Probably because of what I stated above and there definitely has to be some incentive. To fill up my truck with gas 10 times costs more than what you are looking at spending for parts. That will last me a few months but fixing an axle should last decades.

lens12 · Jan 26, 2018

I'm not trying to justify any pricing you received . I'm trying to inform on how prices are determined. I do sell parts. i have tractors in my inventory that I have never sold a part off of. I also have some models that I sell a lot of one or two parts but nothing else. If it is a part that is easy to come across, used is usually around 1/2 of new. If it is a part that is no longer available new & hard to find used, the price approaches new or what it would cost to make a replacement. Some common breaking parts are impossible to find used or new. If i have the last one available, it will be priced close to what it will cost me to have another one made or repaired.

hcforde · Jan 26, 2018

lens12 said:
I'm not trying to justify any pricing you received . I'm trying to inform on how prices are determined. I do sell parts. i have tractors in my inventory that I have never sold a part off of. I also have some models that I sell a lot of one or two parts but nothing else. If it is a part that is easy to come across, used is usually around 1/2 of new. If it is a part that is no longer available new & hard to find used, the price approaches new or what it would cost to make a replacement. Some common breaking parts are impossible to find used or new. If i have the last one available, it will be priced close to what it will cost me to have another one made or repaired.

I bought the part and it arrived yesterday. I understand the theory and concept and everybody has to make a living and pay their overhead. There is no way a forged part is going to be manufactured unless we get to a point where we can print cast iron parts. But consider the other side of the argument how much would you sell the whole tractor for that you have not taken any parts off of? Would you let it go cheap? I am into Fiero's and I have a couple of parts cars just for that reason. good tail lights on a GT model can go for $750 easy, but you can buy the whole car for $1000 easy. Both my tractor and the Fiero is over 30 years old. The part I needed for my tractor very rarely breaks unless abused. In the Bolens forum I had a post looking for a parts tractor. So that is my mindset. for these old vehicles. I may never need another part but if I do a spare will pay for itself in $$ and idle downtime.

lens12 · Jan 26, 2018

I don't know what part you bought or who you bought it from so I can't comment on the possibility of reproducing it or the pricing of it. I wouldn't sell a G194/244 that I hadn't sold a part off of because I know I will sell some parts eventually. I've been doing this for 20 years & I have only been able to find 1 G194/244 that has been cheap enough for me to part out. I agree with you that if you can buy a parts tractor for your tractor parts it is the cheapest way to go. When I bought a better combine that is what I did. Kept the old worn one for parts. It wasn't worth much except for salvage.

hcforde · Jan 28, 2018

lens12 said:
I don't know what part you bought or who you bought it from so I can't comment on the possibility of reproducing it or the pricing of it. I wouldn't sell a G194/244 that I hadn't sold a part off of because I know I will sell some parts eventually. I've been doing this for 20 years & I have only been able to find 1 G194/244 that has been cheap enough for me to part out. I agree with you that if you can buy a parts tractor for your tractor parts it is the cheapest way to go. When I bought a better combine that is what I did. Kept the old worn one for parts. It wasn't worth much except for salvage.

It was the front wheel assembly for a G244.

Ilikeurtractor · Jan 29, 2018

hcforde said:
I bought the part and it arrived yesterday. I understand the theory and concept and everybody has to make a living and pay their overhead. There is no way a forged part is going to be manufactured unless we get to a point where we can print cast iron parts. But consider the other side of the argument how much would you sell the whole tractor for that you have not taken any parts off of? Would you let it go cheap? I am into Fiero's and I have a couple of parts cars just for that reason. good tail lights on a GT model can go for $750 easy, but you can buy the whole car for $1000 easy. Both my tractor and the Fiero is over 30 years old. The part I needed for my tractor very rarely breaks unless abused. In the Bolens forum I had a post looking for a parts tractor. So that is my mindset. for these old vehicles. I may never need another part but if I do a spare will pay for itself in $$ and idle downtime.

There is certainly an argument for both cases. I would say in general a spare parts tractor is the way to go in terms of value because good deals are out there even if they are hard to find. I have been collecting "parts" tractors for a while and for some reason I end up turning them into regular running tractors eventually. Tractors tend to age gracefully and are relatively easy to repair most of the time. Even though a parts tractor should bring more monetary value, it bothers me to tear down something that could be made to work as designed again. I would much rather sell a working tractor than one for parts, but I'm not a finance guy I guess and so far I haven't sold any whole tractors either. Most of the time the tractor is worth more to me than what I think I could get for it anyway since I don't really understand why a perfectly operating old tractor is only worth 10-15% of a new one. Let me get this straight, I could have 7 older tractors that all work fine or 1 new one? Hmmm. Or how about 1 older one and put the other $18,000 in Amazon stock so it will go up 10x in the next 10 years*. Hmmmm... Or take $21,000 and buy Amazon stock and forget about the tractors altogether. Life presents a lot of interesting dilemmas :banghead:

*Past performance is no indication of future performance