The Projects Never End

[DavidBarkey]

for diag. reasons .

Pull the fuel line off and block off it at the pump. Using a short hose and small augsilery fuel tank , give it a new fuel source and see if it changes or not .
If yes , you know something is wrong between the "tee" and the pump . If no then try adding propane gas down the carb and see if it helps or not.
You mentioned before that the PCV is plugged by someone prier to you . That makes me beleave that there is an intake leak to the crank case . If you block the fresh air side of the pcv it should richen up and not need so much choke . The intake gasket and or a flaw in the intake it self is bleading non metered air below the carb is what I suspect .
Have fun .

[Toolslinger]

That leaking intake manifold is kinda my fear, but I'll hope for something less obnoxious. The carb cleaner all around the base of the carb didn't show any change, so I don't think it's just the carb base gasket...

If it's the intake manifold, it's just going to live like it is for the forseeable future. No way am I going to try to remove those bolts until I can park the whole unit for a while, because odds are good that will end up with the heads pulled due to broken bolts.

[Toolslinger]

I've been a bit remiss in my posting it would seem...

The last two days I needed the 646BH... My big JD310 is loosing coolant, and I haven't had time to even think about that for a whole bunch of months... I doubt I could have gotten it back where this stump was anyhow.

2 or 3 years ago I took this big old birch down that stood 7 or so feet from one of the corner piers my house sit on. It's been a bit in the way during leaf cleanup, but now, I need to get a bigger machine behind the house for another project, so it has to go.

Digging where I am means rocks. This isn't the worst I've seen, but it aint fun...

Once I got all the lateral roots exposed, and cut, I could get it to twitch with the D100, but no way I was going to move it with the 646. The JD300 was called in. The root put up quite the fight, and eventually I had to run the D100 while my uncle pulled with the JD300. We got it to turn 20 or so degrees, so we knew it was now loose. The stump cut is somewhere around 20-22", 16" backhoe bucket for scale...

I had dug the back side of the pit deeper, so I used the JD300 to lift, and roll the root about 90degrees back to expose the bottom. The JD300 will lift around 2000 lbs. It wasn't picking this thing up as is with the mud, and rocks.

I clawed what I could with the hoe, and then hit it with the pressure washer, interspersed with working some of the rocks with a bar.

They aren't all comeing out by any stretch of the imagination. I will let the pit drain a bit overnight, and then hopefully I can now lift the whole thing with the loader. I'm sure I can drag it, but it's less messy if I can lift it. Off to the woods it will go, to eventually rot and release all the rocks again.

Managed to rip two teeth off the hoe on day 1... Spent the morning dealing with the dental work before getting to where it is now.

[DavidBarkey]

That sure is a bit of work for the . Even though it needed some help , imagine doing that back in the day all by hand .

[Toolslinger]

When I was young, I did a few the hard way...

Never again. Hydraulics are the only magic I need...

[Toolslinger]

Up and at it this morning...

Got the root chained up, and hooked on to the JD300. Ol John was only able to lift it with the curl. Boom could hold, but couldn't lift. That puts the stump just over 2000#. This was about all I could get it off the ground.

So, back the dump trailer under it, and strap it down. I for sure didn't want it sliding out the back on the way to wher eI'm going to dump it.

And because nothing at all is ever easy, the lower radiator hose blew on the MF-202, about 100' from where I was going to dump... Shut it down, and it will sit there until I can get that fixed. In a pinch, I could swap tractors, but there's no emergency that I rate enough to play with the stump... Hose wasn't in stock at either of the Massey dealers. It will arrive Saturday.

In Case related news... I was living on borrowed time with the 646BH... I noticed two days ago that the front right tire was shot. There's almost no weight on the fronts, so I wasn't too stressed, but it was unnerving with pieces of it flapping around every time I repositioned.

Tires came in today. The tires that came off were Firestones, and had tubes. The new tires are tubeless, but apparently I got the wrong size valve stems, so I put the existing tubes back in. Amazing that they were in execellent shape.

As for the hole... Well, I had a big rock that was also in a bad spot. It's peaking out from one of the dirt piles.

Typically I try to let sleeping stones lie... It might just be the tip of a mountain... So I gave it a nudge with the loader, and it twitched, so it was mostly exposed... Pushed that to the bottom of the pit with the Deere, and then worked through the pile to backfill with the second 646. I probably sorted about 1000# of rocks out of the dirt pile, and buried another 1000# besides the monster. The fill is roughly graded, and I packed it to the extent possible with the deere. I really need to get some topsoil to finish up, but it's done enough for the moment...