Komatsu D20A-6 ?

[GuglioLS]

Just went through the entire thread. That's a neat dozer you have there! Really nice and compact.

You have been doing an amazing job restoring the machine.

Thanks for bringing the thread up with an update.

I love the way it looks with the rubber tracks!

I had this small 1962 Italian Crawler tractor with 26 HP that I restored from top to bottom and I've always wanted to replace the tracks with rubber ones but ended up trading the tractor.

Thank you for your kind comments, I sure would like to see what your '62 Italian crawler looked like before you gave it up, I'm sure whoever snatched it up must very much appreciates your restoration work.

 

[ptsg]

Sure. Here it is. 28HP, 2 cylinder air cooled beast.

How it looked before with some of the nasty stuff I've found:




And after:


By the way, I also made a blade for it, which ended going on the big brother of this tractor, which was a 1964 39HP, 3 cylinder that I also sold.

 

[GuglioLS]

Why not hang some drop cloths and paint inside? Fire off the salamander afterwards to help the dry time. Maybe break out the redneck powder coating stuff again . I missed the switch to rubber track, what do you think of them?

Howdy there ddbackhoe, - amazing you saw and remember my redneck powder coating technique! A procedure I should have copyrighted
"Fire off the salamander afterwards to help the dry time." You do realize that sucker burns kerosene at the rate of about 2 gallons an hour? Have you checked the price of Kerosene about $ 6.50 a gallon in my neck of the woods. Electric heater for me was the way to go. We have an 8 Kw solar system so my electric power is "free"

Rubber tracks - yes my chip and seal drive and yard really appreciate those rubber tracks. There were installed shortly after the construction of my man cave "barn" shop so it can crawl over the chip and seal and onto the concrete slab to keep it cozy in the shop when its resting. Rubber tracks work good, however for working in mixed rock / dirt I would prefer the old steel tracks. Wish there was some sort of way to have "quick attach tracks" to switch between steel and rubber tracks.

 

[GuglioLS]

ptsg -

WOW what a nice looking vintage crawler, you did an amazing restoration job, congratulations. It belongs in a museum for all to enjoy. Nice work.
:thumbsup:

 

[ptsg]

Thank you sir!

Forgot to mention that I've never finished the hood. It was full of dents, needed to be painted and the grill was also a bit smashed.

Actually, while I sold the 3 cylinder crawler to a English gentleman, I traded this tractor and a Kubota B7000 for a new tractor, so sadly this crawler sat outside under the weather for about a year and a half before the dealer finally put it under a shed. It was already getting all rusty again.

 

[GuglioLS]

Setting here in the SLC airport waiting for my flight back to ABQ. Got some time to document the exhaust system restoration with some pics, the airport WiFi is not not that great so will do my best.

Now onto the muffler a.k.a smoke stack repair. A while back I noticed chunks of what looked like fiberglass puffing out every once in a while and an exhaust leak under the hood making everything black with soot. That leak under the hood was especially noticeable when first started in the cold. So I decided something needed to be done. Removed the stack and gutted it out, it was just raw ceramic or glass fiber rolled up and falling apart, nothing to keep it in place or collapsing potentially choking the exhaust flow. And a real bad seal to the spark arrestor canister bolted directly to the exhaust manifold. I went to 4 muffler shops and two parts stores coming up empty handed. Finally, I found the actual wholesale distributor of every muffler and auto shop and parts store in town. He fixed me right up with a Thrush Glass pack blank Its 4 diameter, 18 long with 2.25 inlet and outlet. A near perfect fit.

Links to what I found at the wholesale distributor:
Thrush Glasspack Mufflers 24431 - Free Shipping on Orders Over $99 at Summit Racing
Dynomax 24431: Glasspack Muffler Blank In/Out: 2.25" | JEGS

 

[GuglioLS]

After some test fits with the hood installed, and the smoke stack slipped over the new muffler core it was determined the primary muffler extension tube needs to be shortened by 1

 

[GuglioLS]

Need a means of sealing the two mufflers together without welds or clamps so the two mufflers are not rigidly connected. There needs to be some flex between the engine and hood mounted smoke stack. And it needs to be easily removed for maintenance access. Decided to use some high density high temp ceramic wool used in forges.

 

[GuglioLS]

Put the hood back on, seems to be a good gas tight seal from muffler to hood extension tube. Ready to slip the stack over the new muffler. But first the old smoke stack got a good sanding. What a shame sanding out all that lovely rusty patina. Then it was heated up a bit with the salamander a.k.a kerosene jet engine burner before painting with high temperature flat black stove paint that has a 2000* rating.

Done now for the real test, what is it going to sound like? Hopefully purr like a cat (pun intended)

 

[ddbackhoe]

Howdy there ddbackhoe, - amazing you saw and remember my redneck powder coating technique! A procedure I should have copyrighted

Rubber tracks - yes my chip and seal drive and yard really appreciate those rubber tracks. There were installed shortly after the construction of my man cave "barn" shop so it can crawl over the chip and seal and onto the concrete slab to keep it cozy in the shop when its resting. Rubber tracks work good, however for working in mixed rock / dirt I would prefer the old steel tracks. Wish there was some sort of way to have "quick attach tracks" to switch between steel and rubber tracks.

No sir, you are mistaken. I very much enjoy the stuff you’ve shared here. Ive learned a lot over time with the help of guys like you, Rob (3RRL) and wroughtn_harv. It may seem like little stuff, but the marks people like you all leave are often bigger than anyone can measure.
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