MUT: Murray Utility Tractor

Crazy_Carl wrote:

Oh yeah.  This is a great addition to MUT.  I'm interested to see how you use that winch to make it dump. How do you plan on lowering the bed?  That looks like a boat style winch not designed to lower things.  They do make winched in that style with a mechanical load brake designed for lowering things safely.

The hand crank ratchets in both directions. So it ratchets to lift and you can choose freewheel or ratchet to lower. You just have to make sure you get a “two way winch” when you buy it.

Basically, theres a “pole” with a pulley at the top that you run the cable up and over and then down to the front of the dump bed. As you winch “in”, it lifts the front of the bed. The bottom of the pole is allowed to pivot so it can follow the arc of the bed as it raises.

Like this:



I think I’m also going to remove the axle springs and weld it right to the frame. That will drop the trailer about 4”. Then I will spoon my old 23” turf savers on some old atv rims and pop them on the trailer. It will mean a net drop of 2” on the trailer, but it will mean a 10” sidewall on the bed instead of 8”. I need to be cognizant of the bed wall height because the loader bucket only goes so high and one of the uses for this trailer will be to load soil and move it around the lot. The wide turfs will also be a lot gentler on the lawn and soft soil we have.

Only thing is I will have to take the trailer rims and machine out the center on the lathe, then graft them on to the ATV rims as all the ones I have here are larger bolt spacing than the trailer 4x4”. Not a problem to do, just time and a PITA.

I’m going to change the name from “DUT” to “MUTS”: Murray Utility Trailer System.

So it’s MUT n’ MUTS!

Lol!

That's the coolest trailer I have ever seen in action on a video.  Definitely a design worthy of taking inspiration from.

Crazy_Carl wrote:

That's the coolest trailer I have ever seen in action on a video.  Definitely a design worthy of taking inspiration from.

the strange thing is I was actually thinking of attempting a lift mechanism like this for rusty's bed if I made it a dump bed, now that I've seen something nearly identical to what I was thinking of I might go ahead with a dump bed after all

When you going to put a set of matt-tracks on? LOL.

prancstaman wrote:

When you going to put a set of matt-tracks on? LOL.

No need. Got this for that:



Goes anywhere, anytime. It’s the “tractor recovery vehicle” if you want to think of it that way....lol!

Paint on MUTS drying and MUT wearing its bucket again:





Tomorrow I’m going to go get a couple loads of dirt and see how it all works.

And because trying to back up in the woods when its dark sucks dog balls and is borderline dangerous, reverse lights:



Nothing crazy, just a couple white LED clearance lights. Just bright enough to toss enough light to see roughly 10 feet behind.  

I’ll use a microswitch on the shift linkage to activate them when shifted into reverse. Much more convenient that manually switching a rear work light on/off. Much more “battery friendly” than bigger work lights too.

Ba-da-bing:



Ba-da-boom:



23 bucks cdn, delivered. Thats 6 bucks a light. Cant complain about that!

Yep, that’ll get it done:



Good and bright! 27 watts a piece, so that's about a 4 amp draw for two. Great for a 350 amp tractor battery.

Then I added a “dome light”:



Its there for when I’m packing up at dusk and I need to load the chainsaw or something on to the tractor to head back to the house. I plan to add additional white led’s under and around the tractor to illuminate the ground with the dome light. Nothing sucks more than dropping something in the dark and not enough light to find it...

I was going to cut out the panel where the orginal headlight switch and ignition key were:



But have decided to leave it alone and use that switch for the dome light control. It’s away from the other switches and feels different, so it will easily be found in the dark. The ignition switch hole will either have that red button in it for a horn, or I’ll put the tethered kill switch there. Haven’t decided on that one yet.

I was intending to run the rear lights wiring inside the roll over bar, but changed to running it outside and using split loom to cover it. Had I run it inside the bar, I would have had to remove it when I finished the welding on the bar. I may still route it inside the bar when I get closer to a finished state.

I also wired up the reverse lights and the rear side marker (red) lights. Tailights will be added when they show up and I have amber leds up front to add to the circuit.

Getting kinda crowded in there:





Relays for the new flood lights are hidden under the fuse panel on the RH side. Not much free real estate left in there!

I may have to start hiding electronic components in other places on the tractor soon!

Lol!

Hey dude, when are you going to get your heated seats, wifi hotspot, and touch screen navigation?  Don't forget digital speedo, tac, odometer, tripometer, and fuel guage!

LOL, seriously though, awesome build.  You're doing a great job.

Lights are all wired up, except for the tailights which are yet to arrive and a switch I have on order for the reverse lights.

I’ll just toss up some pics and let them speak for themselves.

Double W Cross Ranch wrote:

Hey dude, when are you going to get your heated seats, wifi hotspot, and touch screen navigation?  Don't forget digital speedo, tac, odometer, tripometer, and fuel guage!

LOL, seriously though, awesome build.  You're doing a great job.

Actually, heated seat sounds like a great idea for winter snow removal runs....

I can see those gears turning from here...

MightyRaze wrote:

I can see those gears turning from here...

Wouldnt take much to do; heated seat covers can be picked up cheap at nearly any auto parts store.

Likely too much electrical load for the tractor charging system though. Even with a larger alternator.

My tractor is kept in a heated garage anyways...

So, the build continues with more purchases.

Picked up 4 more of the 27W LED worklights:



Two I will tint yellow and two I will leave clear. Whichever is more effective in snowing conditions will be permanently mounted on the snowblower housing. I'm betting the ambers will work best, which I what I'm hoping. Then I can use the 2 extra clear floods on the Argo.  

The front flood lights on the tractor grill guard are installed with weatherpak connectors so when the snow blower is mounted on the tractor, I'll be able to unplug the front floods and plug in the blower mounted floods. No extra switches, no extra wiring, no extra relays required. No worries about not having enough light when I need it with the set of ROPS mounted floods. Of course; I had planned it that way when I installed them.



Then, found an inexpensive (IE:cheap) high/low horn set:



Supposedly does 18 sounds, but I just want it to do the high/low tone so it's all good:



Skip to 0:58 to hear the "programmable" horns, skip to 2:05 if you want to hear how I will install them.

13 bucks Cdn made it worth a try. You don't NEED a set of horns on a garden tractor, but I can't bring myself to not have something on there that I can't sound off if I get in trouble (or hurt) when working on the far side of the lot in the woods. Horns are louder and carry further than my voice ever will. Sure, cell phone is an option, but still harder to use if "farged up" by something like the chainsaw or pinned under a flipped tractor than just whacking a button with your hand.

Also nice to have a horn on the tractor if I'm out snow-blowing driveways and someone just doesn't see me when driving down the road. It's not like there's a lot of stunned or distracted people driving on the roads these days.....

I'll probably never need to use them, but I just can't bring myself to have a vehicle that doesn't have a horn on it. It just seems like "a safety thing" to me.....

Then ordered up some small green LEDs:



Ordered 10, but will likely only need 4-8 of them. They will be used to illuminate the shifter area, the dash switches and the gauge area for night running and will come on with the marker lighting switch. They'll be installed in a small "hood" so they throw light on the panels, but won't be visible to the eye. I've had the tractor out in the dark several times and finding the shifter points and ignition key sucks when you can't see them. THe green LED's will cast just enough light to see things, but not glare and wash out my vision. I have a pref for green lighting at night, most likely an occupational hazard from flying so many night ops on NVG's.....

I wanted to be a bit more visible from the rear at night, so I ordered up a high mount led brake light:



That will go up on the ROPS, between the ROPS floods. With the side markers, the tail lights on the fenders and the flashing ambers high mounted up on the ROPS, there should be no risk of someone not seeing me out in the early morning blowing snow out of the neighborhood driveways.

Lastly, I ordered up a dished glass cover for my fuel cap:

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I rebuild my fuel gauge cap a while ago, but the clear top was fogged and cracked so it had to go. It was plastic and 26 years old, so no shame in it having hazed over to nearly solid white. So my nice, new gauge and needle have been open to atmosphere, as well as there being a way for dust and other crap to get into the fuel tank. Anything clear and plastic was just going to be destroyed by the fuel fumes, so I had to find something in glass. This will work nicely to seal up the cover and still allow me to see the fuel level needle, As a bonus, being glass it will never fog over again. Unfortunately, I had to order a lot of 10, but at least I'll always have a spare in case it gets broken. I'll have to put a precision drill hole in the cap somewhere, as the original "clear" cover had a pinh0le in it to allow the tank to vent. That's an easy fix: I'll just grab a .05 mm drill, put it in the pin vice and make a small breather hole where water won't be able to find it's way in.

I now need to find a way to get an alternator on the tractor. The 3-4 amps the Briggs alternator puts out is just not going to cut it. I'd like to get a GM one wire 55 amp alternator on there somewhere, But I'll have to figure out some kind of mule drive/pto arrangement.

whats the diameter of the glass lens? Id buy one off of you to help you recap some of your money if they will fit my amf

Creepycrawler wrote:

whats the diameter of the glass lens? Id buy one off of you to help you recap some of your money if they will fit my amf

50mm.

Probably more economical to buy 10 yourself. It was 15.99 cdn, shipped. I doubt I could send one out canada post for much less than that...

Got some work out of the ol’ Murray today:





Man, I can’t wait to be able to tear this SOB apart and do a proper bodywork and paint job on it! Call me crazy, but there’s just something cool about the way that reverse louvered hood looks! It cries out for bodywork and paint! The square nose lights? Meh...swing and a miss. Hding them behind the grill guard and front flood lights didn't bother me one bit! Lol!

Observations:

Yep, charging output sucks. Couple hours running the bucket and the battery is pretty flat. Not surprising as it means running the winch to work the bucket and the battery is only a 325 a/hr batt.  Definitely need to figure out how to get a proper alternator on there. It won’t be the cure for heavy winch use, but it will certainly be better than the stock 3 amp output and will let me run the lights without having to charge the battery every time the tractor gets used.

Stock brakes: suck to the point of being dangerous. Actually, they ARE dangerous. Maybe ok for a ride on mower, not even close for garden tractor work. Flat out damned dangerous for MUT work!

Had a load in the bucket and the tractor bloody well damned ran away with me down a hill and out into the road with me absolutely STANDING on the brakes. Thank gawd there were no cars coming. Useless brakes. Totally, utterly useless. Damned dangerous!

Next project; proper disc brakes on each rear axle. It will be two separate systems with two separate brake pedals. But right next to each other so I can hammer both brakes with one foot. Should be pretty easy. I’ve got lots of motorcycle and quad parts lying around. I’m thinking a couple front discs off the Polaris quest 500 front end I've got out back, a set of Honda sp1 front calipers and a couple master cylinders should do it. Lots of motorcycle brake hoses laying around. A smattering of parts spun out on the lathe or mill and should be good to go.

Why two separate systems you may ask?

Its so I can step on left or right pedal depending on which rear tire is spinning. Its a way of turning an open rear differential into a “sort of” limited slip diff.

When one wheel is spinning, its because that wheel has the least traction. By braking that spinning wheel you make the diff think the other wheel has less traction, forcing power to that wheel instead. But, you’re just tricking the diff to turn the wheel that has the most traction with the ground. IOW: poor mans limited slip. Its actually pretty common in newer vehicles like my F150 that has abs and traction control: it applies brakes to the spinning wheel and forces the other to spin at the same speed, making  it act like a locked rear diff. I’ll be doing the same thing, except my right foot will do the work instead of a vehicle computer...

All that means I’m going to have to stick with a hand throttle though. Right foot brakes, left foot clutch. No feet left for throttle.  No big, hand throttle work fine at the speeds I need. I do have an idea for a hand clutch and fender shifter, but that is a long way down the road...

I also need that new 820 shift shaft to show up. With the gear selection spots “ambiguous”, I’m beating up the keys pretty badly. I’ve got new ones waiting for the tear down, but I’d rather not beat up the transaxle any more than I have to before rebuilding it...

All that electrical going on, once you get a real alternator, it may be best to get a car battery in there as well. Great Idea on the brakes.

MightyRaze wrote:

All that electrical going on, once you get a real alternator, it may be best to get a car battery in there as well.  Great Idea on the brakes.

I'd like to but there's not much room left in the original battery area. I could use the extra weight over the rear wheels as well.

But I'll probably end up going with the biggest AGM or deep cycle I can fit in the space available. Either would be better in the application than a regular car battery.

Has to be least a 350-400 a/hr battery though. Need it to turn over that cranky old Briggs flat twin...

Supposed to be crap weather this weekend. Maybe I'll pull the heads off and clean the carbon out. Been meaning to get to that for a while now as i know they've never been off the engine and Briggs calls for it every 100 hrs....

Well, this morning, me n’ MUT went back to work moving the dirt pile from the new neighbors yard to my back yard. They need it gone and I need fill, so it benefits both of us.

All was going well as I was trying to beat the crazy rain coming over the next few days. Then, tried to stop on a slight slope in our back yard. But MUT had other ideas.

With me standing on the brake/clutch lever MUT decided it wanted to see what was at the bottom of the slope, which is the Cornwallis river!

Oh no you don’t you little bastard! We are NOT going swimming today!

With MUT picking up speed, I pointed the bucket edge straight down and dropped it into the lawn. Stopped MUT dead in its tracks. Damned near tossed me over the hood too! But; we weren’t up to our necks in river water so its all good!

So the brakes are gone. Totally gone. Not a surprise i guess, knowing how pathetically small they were to start with. But I had expected the brake pads to last more than one day of regular use.

So, time to get the parts together to build a proper brake system. I can still use MUT to move dirt, i just have to plan my route so I’m either running is gear on a slope, only have to stop on level ground or place a “stop” where I need to like the 4x4” post I’m using as a stop at the dirt pile I’m making in the back yard (top of the slope).

One of these days, I’ll actually be done building this thing and just be abke to use it....yeah, right....lol!

And so begins laying out an effective braking system for the MUT:




Thats a front brake hub off an old polaris quest 500 I have rusting away out back.

The rotors are only 8 inchers, but two of them will be more than enough to stop the MUT at its 5-odd mph top speed. More importantly; no running away with me becuase they cant hold!

The center is where the cv joint attaches. But you’ll notice the wheel mounting flange is flat. Plan is to press or machine the cv joint splined portion out and machine it to the 1” size of the MUT’s rear axles. Then mount the Polaris wheel flange to the back side of the MUT’s wheel flange. A couple countersunk bolts will join the two and I’ve got a disc brake hub and disc mounted to the rear axles. Since the hubs have a “hat section” already, that will move the calipers outside of the wheel rim so no clearance issues there. I may have to clearance the 820 housing a bit, but that's the price of custom work. I’ll add reinforcement in the form of a truss/skid-plate if I have to.

Then its work out caliper mounting and pedals. Caliper mounts will be easy as I can just make a support bracket between the axle housing and chassis since there's no suspension to change the alignment.

Pedals is just getting some geometry right and fabricating them.

The rest is all just hydraulic lines. Easy peasy.

Yeah that'll be a cool upgrade for sure, a lot safer too.

For the tractor style brake pedals side by side, are you gonna try and make them look like the factory clutch pedal? That'd be neat, then it'd look like the brake pedals were there when it was built.

Either way it should be a sweet setup.

AllisKidD21 wrote:

For the tractor style brake pedals side by side, are you gonna try and make them look like the factory clutch pedal? That'd be neat, then it'd look like the brake pedals were there when it was built.

Nope. The stock Murray one is pretty much just a rod with a piece of rubber wrapped around it. In my case, rubber is long gone and now its just a rod. Looks like shiat and sucks even more trying to use it.

The plan is to put a proper styled pedal on the clutch side and similar set up on the brake side.

I may go with a couple cbr/F2 rear calipers and rear master cylinders. I’ve got several of them lying around (swapped cbr/F2 wheels on my VF750F) and they’re easily adapted to what I want to do. They're relatively small (ie: easy to get the calipers in the limited space between rim and chassis and masters are easier to mount under the floorboard). That each master is sized for only one caliper is also a bonus since I’m making a “divorced” rear brake system...

Dug through my bins of brake parts:



Yep, plenty to work with there. Calipers, pads, reservoirs, masters, mounts, lines, etc.

This is going to be relatively easy, not to mention, inexpensive.

Me like that part!

Also found a better way to secure things on the rear work shelf in addition to cargo straps:




Thats a trunk net from a Dodge Intrepid I used to own many, many years ago. Its been hanging around in a bin since I sold the car. Its not perfect, but a little sewing and it will fit just right.

Yep, witha little fabrication, that will work nicely:



And I have enough parts to mirror the same setup on the lh side.

Coming together nicely.

Of course, it will all have to be torn apart and rebuilt first. Brake parts dont like to sit in bins for years without things leaking or seizing. But thats just busy work for me some afternoon...

Well, this is almost going to fall together all on its own.

I was thinking I was going to have to make mounts and brackets under the floorboards, but it seems all I’ll need to do is cut slots in the floorboard, make a simple right angle bracket and then cut/weld one brake pedal (so it points the opposite way to the other):  





The whole brake pedal pivot and master cylinder will mount as a complete unit with just a simple bracket. No geometry to work out, no aligning parts and pieces. Just weld up a bracket and bolt it on. It even has a brake return spring so thats another thing I dont have to worry about.



Then its just a matter of the right length brake lines and we’re off to the races.

Easy peasy!