1975 MTD 990 Farm King

that governor setup looks complicated!

SebastianAlbrecht wrote:

that governor setup looks complicated!

i would say its one of the most straight forward and easy to work on governors. way easier than whats on a Honda push mower.

Crazy_Carl wrote:

@Double W Cross Ranch I had the same problem with an ebay carb I bought for my K301 in my C-125.  It was a really easy fix.  It turned out there were some small metal shavings on the needle or seat that got in there after I threaded the fuel line adapter into the carb.  

Oh okay, thanks yeah I'll do that then.

SebastianAlbrecht wrote:

nice that U got it running!

Thanks

Okay so I didn't get any work in this weekend, it's just been pouring.  But I figure I should do a list of things I need to do.

Throttle
Choke
Wiring
Change oil
Front tires
Rears (not immediately, they do hold air)

Things I'd like to do:

30" ags on the rear instead of 27s
18" tri ribs on the front instead of 16s
Rebuild the 50" hydraulic lift deck
Ammo can on each fender
Cup holder
Heavy duty car battery
12v power ports
Extend hydraulic and hi-lo levers
Bigger fuel tank
Pulse pump
Sun shade (?)
Obligatory stack
Lights embedded in the fenders
High back seat

I think that most of the things on the want list aren't going to happen, but I can hope.  The top speed on it is 4 MPH in lo, and 8 MPH in hi.  I'd like 10 or so, I think that's a fair number.  Between adjusting the hydro lever so I can get the pump wide open and oversizing the tires, I think I can do it easy.  The plan is for this to literally be a subcompact tractor.  From what I can find out, the only difference between this and modern Kabota subcompacts is it's 2wd and not diesel.  Otherwise, they're the same dimensions and both have 3 points and big, shaft driven belly mowers.  

The other 2 things on the list, which are so not going to ever happen, but I'm still going to dream, lol, are finding the hydraulic front end loader that these 990s could come with factory, and finding one of the 3 point tillers that were shaft driven by the deck PTO. Like I said, never going to happen, but I'll dream.






So let me know what you think about those plans, I wouldn't really call them mods, persay, they're more of just making certain parts of it more convienient.

I think some of your dreams are actually pretty reasonable things you can do like mounting ammo cans on the fenders, 18" tires up front, fender mounted lights, a stack, a car battery, a cupholder and a 12v socket. Those are great ideas.

If you were using this tractor on and off all day long, what are your thoughts on the metal seat?

The Most Mods sound Great! I'd replace the seat 1st, then the Tires, next upgrade the lights & electrical system, then mod the Engine, rebuild the Deck, & whatnot U would do to it!

Crazy_Carl wrote:

I think some of your dreams are actually pretty reasonable things you can do like mounting ammo cans on the fenders, 18" tires up front, fender mounted lights, a stack, a car battery, a cupholder and a 12v socket.  Those are great ideas.

If you were using this tractor on and off all day long, what are your thoughts on the metal seat?

Thanks, yeah I think it's going to be pretty sweet!

Yeah, I love the look of it, and any other seat would probably spoil the patina, but it is pretty uncomfortable.

SebastianAlbrecht wrote:

The Most Mods sound Great! I'd replace the seat 1st, then the Tires, next upgrade the lights & electrical system, then  mod the Engine, rebuild the Deck, & whatnot U would do to it!

Actually, the electricals are probably taking priority, then the deck, then the others somewhere in there, and actually I'm not modding the engine at all, I'm keeping it positively 100% stock.

So today I got decent fronts on it.



And I know, someone is going to say,

Someone wrote:

w why do you literally put the exact same tires and rims on every tractor you get

Don't worry, they're completely temporary. Better than the 12" turfs that didn't hold air, LOL. I'm planning on tri-ribs on the stock 8" 3 lug rims.

Got the kill-switches hooked up.



Tether and toggle, either one kills the engine.

In order for it to be useable, I now only need to change the oil in the engine, the hydraulic fluid in the trans, and hook up the linkage between the gov and the carb butterfly. I'm looking forward to taking this thing around the property some and using the plow on it for sure.

Is that the tether kill from off the JD? Looks identical, even has the gear clamp. Haha.

AllisKidD21 wrote:

Is that the tether kill from off the JD? Looks identical, even has the gear clamp. Haha.

Hmmm...I wouldn't know anything about that....

Okay, so I got things going a lot better. The gas tank is too low in my opinion, it won't fill up the fuel filter reliably. I took the filter off and replaced it with a shut-off and that solved the issue. I'm going to run a pulse pump so I can have a filter.

Did a bit of work with her!



She starts up and runs reliably now, but the hydraulic lift cylinder pours fluid when it's running, which is apparently a common problem with these. I'm going to try to talk to some people on an MTD forum, because I know nothing about hydraulics or how this set up works, but it looks like I'm going to have to at least replace the seals in it. I have a few videos I need to upload of it.

So I pulled the fenders off to get better access to the various hydraulic lines and what not. Something else I was noticing was that the trans was getting pretty hot. Here's why LOL.



The cooling fan was not helping much, LOL.



Pressure warshed it all off, looks pretty good actually!

clean again... nice

Oh wow! That thing was dirty!

holy moly, that looks like something I would normally see, with mice and other creatures.

Mudder-ers, Romprs, Hydro-static Skitsafrentic!
(for thoes who dont get it its a lyric change to the chouris of "Project Pat - Murderers & Robbers")

SebastianAlbrecht wrote:

clean again... nice

Thanks!

Murraymountain wrote:

Oh wow! That thing was dirty!

Yeah, lol.

mrshaft696 wrote:

holy moly, that looks like something I would normally see, with mice and other creatures.

Yep, I'm pretty sure a mouse or rat or something did make it a home, LOL.

RockeyDA wrote:

Mudder-ers, Romprs, Hydro-static Skitsafrentic!
(for thoes who dont get it its a lyric change to the chouris of "Project Pat - Murderers & Robbers")

As a rule, I don't listen to rap music, and I just googled it and listened to the first few seconds of that song and I can tell I don't like it. To each his own.

Double W Cross Ranch wrote:

RockeyDA wrote:

Mudder-ers, Romprs, Hydro-static Skitsafrentic!
(for thoes who dont get it its a lyric change to the chouris of "Project Pat - Murderers & Robbers")

As a rule, I don't listen to rap music, and I just googled it and listened to the first few seconds of that song and I can tell I don't like it.  To each his own.  

Yep, IKR U hate every other kind of Music besides your strange old people Music LMAO

SebastianAlbrecht wrote:

Double W Cross Ranch wrote:

RockeyDA wrote:

Mudder-ers, Romprs, Hydro-static Skitsafrentic!
(for thoes who dont get it its a lyric change to the chouris of "Project Pat - Murderers & Robbers")

As a rule, I don't listen to rap music, and I just googled it and listened to the first few seconds of that song and I can tell I don't like it.  To each his own.  

Yep, IKR U hate every other kind of Music besides your strange old people Music LMAO

Okay now, I don't know what kind of Grandma would listen to Devil Went Down to Georgia, or Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue or what have you, but for one thing I didn't insult his kind of music, I just said it's not for me.  Could you do the same?

If we're gonna jack the thread with music then considering you mentioned Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue, a Toby Keith song, and that you live on the farm, Country must be your genre. I know that's what I listen to all the time. Nothin' better than a good ol' Toby Keith or George Strait song. Okay, I'm done jacking your thread now...

Murraymountain wrote:

If we're gonna jack the thread with music then considering you mentioned Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue, a Toby Keith song, and that you live on the farm, Country must be your genre. I know that's what I listen to all the time. Nothin' better than a good ol' Toby Keith or George Strait song. Okay, I'm done jacking your thread now...

Haha, you're fine. That's pretty much all I listen to!

So I've been looking around, asking around on various other garden tractor forums and an MTD group on Facebook. From what I gathered, here is the internals of one of these cylinders.



The 2 o-rings are the only form of seals in this, apparently, and that's what is leaking. Someone says that he bought the bulk kit of o-rings from China Freight for $8 and some of them fit, so I'll probably do the same. I went ahead and pulled my cylinder out in advance.



And after pressure washing it, I cleaned off some surfaces that show me the original color (because this was painted at some point) and it's some sort of vomit-colored greenish gold. It looks horrible. Apparently, that makes it a Dayton, especially because I can barely make it out but the stickers say "16 HP" and that's it. I'm still calling it a 990 Farm King because they're all the exact same thing.



Anyway, I'm pretty tempted to paint the fenders, hood, and frame while it's apart. I can't decide if I should or not, I kind of like the thought of my 2 main tractors looking almost prestine. I found 2 color schemes I really like.





Lemme know, should I paint it or not, and if so, which colors? The one thing that makes me not want to paint it is I won't feel bad for beating it up every day, LOL.

I like the red, but if your gonna paint it, I'd maybe think on restoring it. Just my opinion...

I like the red!

I'd go with the red and black ! looks pretty sharp to me. but to paint different or restore is a call only you'll be able to decide.

well, were the dation brothers then... know were i can buy just the rings for my motor?

@Double W Cross Ranch I like your original plan of keeping the patina. I'm not diggin the other color examples you showed.

you should do somthing like i did with dinky, put your fave flag on the hood.