Tires MFWD John Deere 750

jonathco · Apr 30, 2020

Howdy Folks,

I've got a MFWD JD 750 with with turf tires and I need more traction. From other posts I've read, I understand I would need to secure a set of Ag rims in order to run Ag tires, but I am curious if anyone knows a more aggressive turf tire I could run? My 750 is my only "big" tractor right now on the hobby farm, and thus, does everything from pulling the finish mower, brush hogging, pulling a 1 bottom plow and disking about an acre of garden plot.

Anyone have some recommendations on a good aggressive turf tire that might improve traction a bit?

Cheers,

Jon

BCinMI650 · Apr 30, 2020

Right there with you with my 650 and trying to figure out the same on a similar thread (started a day ago). I may luck out and be able to use my turf tire rims and get tires that fit (Carlisles, Super Trenchers, Deestones, etc), you may not be so lucky. I am currently trying to decipher if changing the front to rear ratio (even with the same sized tires, the actual rolling circumference is slightly different) will harm anything.

jeff9366 · Apr 30, 2020

Add rubber or steel chains to your turfs.

MORE: rubber chains for tractor tires site:tractorbynet.com - Google Search

rScotty · Apr 30, 2020

BCinMI650 said:
Right there with you with my 650 and trying to figure out the same on a similar thread (started a day ago). I may luck out and be able to use my turf tire rims and get tires that fit (Carlisles, Super Trenchers, Deestones, etc), you may not be so lucky. I am currently trying to decipher if changing the front to rear ratio (even with the same sized tires, the actual rolling circumference is slightly different) will harm anything.

Yes. If you have good traction from the tire to the ground, changing the front to rear ratio more than a few percent will cause the rear to front drive shaft and associated splines & joints to "wind up" in torsion. Transmission shafts can do this as well. Then either a shaft will fail or a tire can slip .... in either case the tension is released.

In 4wd, the factory makes sure that the front tires rotate faster so that there is steering control. The downside to that "over-rotation" is that there is a certain amount of torsional windup built into all standard 4wd tractors. You may have noticed that if the you are in 4wd and go a distance on a good traction surfaces it can be difficult to shift out of 4wd. That happens a lot on good traction, 4wd, and a load in the FEL bucket. The torsional stress in the shafts is what is preventing you from shifting out of 4wd. Sometimes backing up will help you shift out. If you just can't get out of 4wd with the lever, chances are your poor tractor is suffering a lot of windup.
rScotty

BCinMI650 · May 1, 2020

that makes a lot of sense. I was in the camp of "oh i will just leave it engaged all the time, no harm there" but after research on tires and the tangents it led me on, i think i will be more cautious about when i engage it. Hopefully the previous owner was smarter than me and i have not caused any longterm damage.

jonathco · May 5, 2020

Very good advice; thank you. I am still stuck on whether or not to find a more aggressive turf or just drop the cash to pick up a set of Ag rims. I guess we'll see.

rScotty · May 5, 2020

BCinMI650 said:
that makes a lot of sense. I was in the camp of "oh i will just leave it engaged all the time, no harm there" but after research on tires and the tangents it led me on, i think i will be more cautious about when i engage it. Hopefully the previous owner was smarter than me and i have not caused any longterm damage.

Just use your head. In 4wd, you need to be able to let a tire slip in order to unload the torsion on the gear and drive shafts.
So unless the ground is really slippery, 4wd isn't for driving around; it's for getting you out of a loss of traction situation.

That means you probably shouldn't use 4wd with a load in the bucket - but we all do and we get by with it. Just be careful to put it back into 2wd when you get going again. And if your tractor is really hard to shift OUT of 4wd then take that as a warning.

If you don't hear any bad noises now, then chances are you don't have any damage. The driveshaft system can stand a surprising amount of torsion without failing. It's true that using 4wd with a torsional load will shorten the life of the front driveshaft Univeral Joint. (U-joint), but that's an inexpensive easily replaceable part with a limited lifespan anyway. And U-joints tend to make a lot of obvious clanking and popping racket to let you know when they need replacing.
I wouldn't worry about it.

When we had a little 4wd turf-tired tractor that we used for firewood in the snow, we put lightweight chains on for traction. Gotta be double careful with chains on, though. Sometimes with a load we had trouble getting a tire to slip at all.
rScotty