Fixing the 222 (aka "Maxine")
Posted: Fri Jul 21, 2023 10:49 am
So, a couple of months ago I was all excited and bought my 2nd tractor - a nice shiny '88 Ingersoll 222 (aka Maxine)
Drove it around the owners yard, even cut some of his grass with it. Everything seemed ok and we agreed on a price. I returned a couple of days later with the truck and trailer and brought it home.
The next day I was online and saw the great deal for Grandpa (the 195) - so we hurriedly unloaded the 222 and took off on a crazy drive to Sarnia to pick up the 195 and bring it home...
The following week I went to start Maxine and do a couple of laps around the yard as the grass was getting long... Maxine didn't want to start...
Words were said and Maxine was pushed to the back corner of the yard and the tarp of shame was draped over her...
So yesterday before the storm I took the mower deck off and pushed Maxine back into the tent garage behind Max so I could start figuring out why her attitude.
Popped the hood open and I immediately noticed the pile of dried grass behind the dash,
I'm sure I didn't notice this when I was originally looking at the machine before I agreed to the price...
and all the messy electrical tape covering most of the wires. Cleaned up the grass and pulled back some of the electrical tape... seems a previous owner had problems with mice -
- every wire on the back of the ignition switch had been chewed on
Spent several hours this morning doing a combination of making up new wires, or cutting out the mangy sections and repairing them with heat shrink butt connectors.
Handy thing to have is this generic electrical connector kit - perfect for releasing connectors from plugs so you can re-use the original plastic connectors
Going to go out later and get some liquid electrical tape to seal up the wires coming out of the plug with the resistors / diodes or whatever is hiding in the chunk of epoxy...
might have to get a replacement for that eventually...
So far mission accomplished, the back of the Ignition switch looks all nice and clean and tidy now.
Drove it around the owners yard, even cut some of his grass with it. Everything seemed ok and we agreed on a price. I returned a couple of days later with the truck and trailer and brought it home.
The next day I was online and saw the great deal for Grandpa (the 195) - so we hurriedly unloaded the 222 and took off on a crazy drive to Sarnia to pick up the 195 and bring it home...
The following week I went to start Maxine and do a couple of laps around the yard as the grass was getting long... Maxine didn't want to start...
Words were said and Maxine was pushed to the back corner of the yard and the tarp of shame was draped over her...
So yesterday before the storm I took the mower deck off and pushed Maxine back into the tent garage behind Max so I could start figuring out why her attitude.
Popped the hood open and I immediately noticed the pile of dried grass behind the dash,
I'm sure I didn't notice this when I was originally looking at the machine before I agreed to the price...
and all the messy electrical tape covering most of the wires. Cleaned up the grass and pulled back some of the electrical tape... seems a previous owner had problems with mice -
- every wire on the back of the ignition switch had been chewed on
Spent several hours this morning doing a combination of making up new wires, or cutting out the mangy sections and repairing them with heat shrink butt connectors.
Handy thing to have is this generic electrical connector kit - perfect for releasing connectors from plugs so you can re-use the original plastic connectors
Going to go out later and get some liquid electrical tape to seal up the wires coming out of the plug with the resistors / diodes or whatever is hiding in the chunk of epoxy...
might have to get a replacement for that eventually...
So far mission accomplished, the back of the Ignition switch looks all nice and clean and tidy now.