'75 Sears suburban ss16 "Athena"

Well I finally got a burban! This is the tractor that sparked my offroad mower intrest. Been wanting one for years now. Was rough getting it home an hour and a half away on a wet rainy day with only my escape to transport it lol.The henge area of the grill is a little rough but repairable. Everything else is in great condition. Plans are up in the air as of now. Looking for a decent engine to drop in is first on the list. Unfortunately all my engines are bottom shaft But it's a solid base for a trail rig and I think it just looks like it's ment to be out on the trail.




I was determined to get this thing home.

Nice! You call it bourbon?

Nice score! The Suburban platform is one of the best for offroading, one of the best for anything really!

Nice find, even has the elusive grill corner!

I know that some of the later craftsmans ran a belt twist setup with a vertical shaft engine and horizontal transaxle. No idea if that would work on a ‘burban, but hey, that’s my .02 in Monopoly money heh

That's an SS so your engine options greaten quite a bit. Want old school, throw in a horizontal briggs opposed, newer? They pretty much take a vanguard and many other VTwins without chopping. I've been a bit curious about the new 459CC from Harbor Freight. The 420cc is nothing to shake a stick at either!

Rustbucket Garage wrote:

Nice find, even has the elusive grill corner!

I know that some of the later craftsmans ran a belt twist setup with a vertical shaft engine and horizontal transaxle. No idea if that would work on a ‘burban, but hey, that’s my .02 in Monopoly money heh

Yes sir mightyraze also did a setup like that as well. I'm considering it as I have a nice briggs vtwin I could use on it

MightyRaze wrote:

That's an SS so your engine options greaten quite a bit.  Want old school, throw in a horizontal briggs opposed, newer?  They pretty much take a vanguard and many other VTwins without chopping.  I've been a bit curious about the new 459CC from Harbor Freight.  The 420cc is nothing to shake a stick at either!

Yea I'm going to keep an eye on the marketplace and hopefully something nice pops up soon.

Put a Yanmar 10 HP diesel clone in it! That is why I bought one of the oil burners, for a yard dog tractor build. Though for racing, it probably would not rev fast enough or high enough.

JB_4x4 wrote:

Put a Yanmar 10 HP diesel clone in it!  That is why I bought one of the oil burners, for a yard dog tractor build.  Though for racing, it probably would not rev fast enough or high enough.

I actually wanted to do a diesel on this build but was told they aren't great for offloading. But I have a few options right now. Can fab a 90° gearbox using some old spider gears and use my vertical shaft vtwin, mod the vtwin to run as a horizontal shaft, or wait for something I can afford pop up on fb marketplace. Good ol buddy @RichieRichOverdrive donated an old honda gx200 to at least get her moving. Its a tiny little guy but it's something for now lol.

Mrbrucie22 wrote:

I actually wanted to do a diesel on this build but was told they aren't great for offloading.

Who told you that?  They have lots of torque where they do not have HP.

Heck, the original founder of this site FearlessFront has a diesel in his sears off-roader.

I told him that mighty. The diesels are cool, but not great for anything besides flatland riding. I drove a diesel sears. It was really sluggish, only turned like 3200rpm, super top heavy, etc. Really not a good fit for Appalachian riding.

RichieRichOverdrive wrote:

I told him that mighty. The diesels are cool, but not great for anything besides flatland riding. I drove a diesel sears. It was really sluggish, only turned like 3200rpm, super top heavy, etc. Really not a good fit for Appalachian riding.

My opinion of oppys too, lots of torque, but really heavy, makes them a little dicey for a lot of stuff, just stresses your frame a ton

That 75 Sears has quite the beefy front axle, I did not notice that on the 1st picture.

I have a scale, I think I might weigh the Yanmar clone vs. a Kolher 17 HP I just picked up. They both seem to be around 80-90 pounds. Though the clone has no starter or alternator.

TechnoChicken wrote:

RichieRichOverdrive wrote:

I told him that mighty. The diesels are cool, but not great for anything besides flatland riding. I drove a diesel sears. It was really sluggish, only turned like 3200rpm, super top heavy, etc. Really not a good fit for Appalachian riding.

My opinion of oppys too, lots of torque, but really heavy, makes them a little dicey for a lot of stuff, just stresses your frame a ton

Oppys actually aren't terribly heavy. Briggs oppys are actually a few pounds lighter than a kohler command V twin. Now the kohler magnum and onan opposeds are like 140lbs or something crazy. Lots of front end weight though, good for holding your front end down on a hill. And really, even the heavier oppys aren't terribly stressful on a frame. Lot of guys running onan and kohler oppys with no frame issues. The big advantage to an oppy is that while it may have similar torque to the single cylinder diesel, they can turn almost double the rpm of the diesel, giving that extra bit of speed to get up a hill or clean the mud out of your tires when you need it.

But that's enough thread hijacking for now. Feel free to continue the discussion in the talk about anything thread.

Got alittle done today. Mule gear and deck parts removed, steering wheel, shaft and dash removed. Dash has a couple cracks in the fiberglass part I want to repair along with.





Done some test fitting with one of the twins I have. Going to fab an engine mount that can bolt to the factory mounting holes to avoid making permanent modifications to run this vertical shaft vtwin. The idea is to have the engine lifted so that the output shaft and pulley sit right above the frame and use a short belt twist setup to a jackshaft right under behind the engine. This way the twist setup can be removed for either a rhgb or a horizontal engine. It will be tight in there but if my measurements are correct, I should have just enough space. May have to mess with clutch location some but we will see!

Why not just do some horse trading and find a horizontal shaft kohler command twin, briggs or honda clone swap it?

Crazy_Carl wrote:

Why not just do some horse trading and find a horizontal shaft kohler command twin, briggs or honda clone swap it?

I've been trying. Nothing in my area and most horizontal engines around me are $500+ used. Alot of pulling tractors around me and most use horizontal and not looking for vertical shaft engines. So I'm just going to use the tools, engines and parts I have readily available. Not ideal sure. But I'll get this tractor going one way or another.

@Mrbrucie22 People are really happy even when they predator 212 swap those sears because you can zip tie the governor and rev it to 5k rpm, but I also understand sometimes you just have to work with what you have. Your build will be challenging but equally interesting to see.

Crazy_Carl wrote:

@Mrbrucie22 People are really happy even when they predator 212 swap those sears because you can zip tie the governor and rev it to 5k rpm, but I also understand sometimes you just have to work with what you have.  Your build will be challenging but equally interesting to see.

Also, in canada at least, you can get a 212 clone at Princess Auto for $138 Cad.
That's about a $100 american. At that price, I could remove the governer and not lose sleep over it.

I have honda gx200 to get the build off the ground, but my thing is, why spend money when I have several twin engines laying around? I work in a fab shop so materials are available and by design, it will be easily removable in the case it doesn't perform well or I get my hands on a horizontal engine. I don't see any harm in trying something different unless I'm not understanding the issue

@Mrbrucie22 this is why I think you should swap in the vertical shaft because you have the ability to do it and it will be interesting to see

Careful with the dust from that dash and the nosecone, they used asbestos back in the day for that stuff...

Update

Good Ole @RichieRichOverdrive have me a great deal on a set of 25x10-12 kenda executioners for the build and @Hot Lap with a ragb! So this means I won't have to use a belt twist setup. Now to haul the frame and parts to work to start fabrication!

Tires still in good condition. Can't wait to try them out!


RAGB is 2:1 with 3/4" shafts. Going to take it apart to inspect, clean and change the gear oil. Should work perfectly for my plans.

I am interested to see the gearbox in action

Executioners in the living room! Hahaha. This pulley setup should be interesting!