new tractor ?

[whitearrow]

good morning fellas,i am about to purchase a jd 5203 and a bush hog 286 rotary cutter.i have heard that you should put the engine under load and run it hard for the first few hours to break it in right.is this true?why do you have to do this?i am new to owning diesel tractors,so i need all of you guys help.will bush hogging two 25 acre fields constitute putting the new engine under enough of a load to break it in right?
thanks,
whitearrow->>>------------------>

 

[Bird]

Yes, you do want to put a load on the engine to break it in properly. That helps get the piston rings seated. Generally speaking, you will be just fine to just start out using it the way you'll be using it in the future. You do want to vary the rpm and load pretty frequently during the first 50 hours or so. In other words, I wouldn't start out running it all day at the same rpm as you might do later on.

 

[whitearrow]

bird,how would you suggest varying the rpms when doing bush hog work?i thought that you were supposed to run them at 540 rpm.i guess my ? is how would i differ my rpms and still get a good cut.that is the only implement that i will buy with the tractor because of money reasons,disc and box blade are to come later in the year.but the hogging has to be done asap it is getting out of hand,2 year growth.
thanks for your time,
whitearrow->>>-------------------->

 

[dubba]

I think that you might be taking tractor "work" just a little too seriously /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

My grandfather has several tractors that have no tachometer (RPM's), his method is "run it up till she's cutting good, but will still be cutting at the end of the day"

Seriously though, your set point for *540 PTO is probably up around 2600 RPM? Thats a 4.81-1 ratio. Varying the tractor RPM by 200 is only going to result in a decrease at the PTO of ~40 rpm. Not that significant when you are talking about swinging 2 big heavy machetes around.

Don't forget to take the occasional "tractor break". This is where you drive down to the corner store, feed store, or neighbors. This will help vary the load & if you are anything like me, will be a lot of what the tractor is used for after the initial "tractor work"