Off Topic Anything 2023

Really!? I have 14hp Vanguard twin in a Noma which is a tiny tractor and it fits fine, guess I'm just surprised because it's not a very big engine. Nice score though that's a great deal!

Nice find @RichieRichOverdrive! Those vannys are great motors…just a warning though, the carb kits for the 2 barrel Nikkis these have will set you back a mighty pretty penny. Mines always served me well though, zero issues.

@Brianator I mean it’ll fit under the hood. It’s actually several inches shorter than the oppy, and like 20lbs lighter, but it’s much longer front to back, so my PTO winch doesn’t even begin to fit. That’s where the issue is.

I pulled the plugs out and established it had good compression last night, I did notice the starter was locked up though. I’ll have to tear into that.

I picked up this thing today for a couple hundred bucks!  


It's a Toro hydro with a Briggs Vanguard 28ci single! I basically just wanted it for the engine, rear tires, front wheels and maybe some other odd and ends, I also figured I could make a small offroad trailer with the chassis rails too. Even though it's a hydro this transaxle is actually really good, it acts like it's locked and is actually difficult to get it to do a one wheel peel! Now I understand why the guy was raving about how good it is in the mud, even in deep snow it just slowly chugs along and pushes through, I literally wasn't able to get it stuck! Lol

For now at least it stays as a tractor...

Nice find! Wonder why they cut off the fenders?  Personal preference I guess.

I'd guess it left no clearance for those huge tires with them being pushed way out because the original wheels have been centered and welded to the ATV wheels, but really who knows?! Why would someone actively modify a muffler to put it a venerable spot? Lol

Really neat! I’d throw an exo cage over the motor, some mud flaps on the back, a light bar, some “non welded” rims and run it! Nice find man!

@Rustbucket Garage I bought it to strip it and scrap it but it's quickly grown on me, I think I might keep it around for friends to ride! If so I won't go crazy on it but it will need some improvements like larger ATV tires on the front, some kind of rear fenders and I like the exo cage idea, that's something I can do pretty cheap!

I did tinker with it this past weekend, I supported the floorboards, cleaned the carb, changed the fuel line/filter and installed the front wheels/tires from Trailblazer to try it out, the thing is almost unstoppable! The front spindle bushings and steering is in sad shape though so that's something I'll need to work on. Don't want to put TOO much time into it but it needs the Brianator touch that's for sure!

I don’t know if it’s just that I’ve been getting more sleep, but I think I’ve been feeling a lot better in general since I’ve gotten back into building tractors. Machining on its own was getting tiresome, with tractors I have so many possibilities and options as to what to do that I can keep my mind active all day, fleshing out designs and ideas to try when I get home. Just a low pressure hobby that I can be excited about.

Brianator wrote:

@Rustbucket Garage I bought it to strip it and scrap it but it's quickly grown on me, I think I might keep it around for friends to ride! If so I won't go crazy on it but it will need some improvements like larger ATV tires on the front, some kind of rear fenders and I like the exo cage idea, that's something I can do pretty cheap!

I did tinker with it this past weekend, I supported the floorboards, cleaned the carb, changed the fuel line/filter and installed the front wheels/tires from Trailblazer to try it out, the thing is almost unstoppable! The front spindle bushings and steering is in sad shape though so that's something I'll need to work on. Don't want to put TOO much time into it but it needs the Brianator touch that's for sure!

I’d betcha that could make a nice beater too, for running through heavy brush or some hardcore rock crawling where you wouldn’t want to take something as nice as the Mud Duck or the Warhorse

Sooo...  Not sure if anyone was on last night to see me abruptly leave and never come back.  I had to do some nader hiding.  We are good, no power still.  Some of the neighbors didn't fare well.  We mostly had the residual mud, and the fence was partially blown over.

Here are some shots of a couple neighbors.





Can you guess which way the tornado was coming from?



Here is a radar shot of the storm.



And a shot of the tornado about 1 minute before it hit.



As I mentioned.  All good.  Only issue at this time, no power.  Fence tied back up.  Few sticks picked up.  Hoping to get power in the night or tomorrow.

Also, I know double posting.  I'll probably be scarce tonight as well.

Geeze that's a little close to home (pun intended), be safe and ready to hunker down! Hope the power comes back on soon for everyone

If I make some of these oppy starter heads with a ball bearing rather than a bushing, would any of you guys be interested in buying one? That’s if the prototype turns out well anyway. I think it would be a good idea. Would just machine the whole thing out of billet. Using a R8-2RS bearing.

Doing some real high tech R&D here with the DRO on the Bridgeport. Picking up hole locations and heights to aid drafting.

MightyRaze wrote:

Sooo...  Not sure if anyone was on last night to see me abruptly leave and never come back.  I had to do some nader hiding.  We are good, no power still.  Some of the neighbors didn't fare well.  We mostly had the residual mud, and the fence was partially blown over.

Here are some shots of a couple neighbors.





Can you guess which way the tornado was coming from?



Here is a radar shot of the storm.



And a shot of the tornado about 1 minute before it hit.



As I mentioned.  All good.  Only issue at this time, no power.  Fence tied back up.  Few sticks picked up.  Hoping to get power in the night or tomorrow.

Same storm must've hit us yesterday.



It's hard to make out, but that's a tornado. My calculations based off the time frames that were given by the warning said that it should be exactly where it was at the time it was in this picture. That made more sense in my head but anyway there's no doubt that's a tornado. Must've not done too much damage cause we haven't heard of any yet, but everyone's been talking about it. Have some friends who had some type of metal roof taken off and thrown onto their car. My dad was in town when it started and said sirens were going off for a while too.

@Murraymountain Does this sound about right?

Pretty much except it came from the left side of the pic and was moving towards the right.

I didn't actually becoming frightened until I saw one band of rain not fall, but get shoved down on the roof of the barn so hard that it hit the ground 10 feet away from where the run off is. I immediately knew that was a hard downdraft and that's when I decided it was time to get near a shelter lol.

We had some pretty severe winds here yesterday. Power has been out for over 24 hours now. Apparently there had been 3 deaths in my area related to the wind. Crazy. Glad you guys are alright

This also happened…

Hey, I've been MIA for a while, just didn't really feel like posting for whatever reason, but I guess I should be back, bought a pre-1981 club car golf cart for 125 bucks (Basically highway robbery in these parts) it has butchered coil packs, but I hopefully plan on putting a go-cart axle in and either a 420cc china clone or a kohler 18hp out of a shaft drive cub. Storms look pretty nasty down there, we got about 2 1/2 inches of snow and that was pretty much it.

RichieRichOverdrive wrote:

We had some pretty severe winds here yesterday. Power has been out for over 24 hours now. Apparently there had been 3 deaths in my area related to the wind. Crazy. Glad you guys are alright

This also happened…

That White Castle sign waved the white flag….

Seems like a bad sign

I can’t run most of my machines off the generator, so I went foolin around in the woods by a local lake. Found this old car, still has the manual steering box. Might be good for a mower…

Cue the mission impossible music...

Been awhile since I've been on here. Hope everyone is doing good! Ive been pretty busy this semester taking 6 classes and I'm on campus a lot, Tuesdays I'm on campus for 12 hours straight. I'm also a part of CRU which is like a campus ministery which I really enjoy and have definitely grown in faith being a part of! I do have Friday's off which is pretty cool but I normally use the entire day to do homework. I also work at Advanced Auto Parts....been working there for about 10 months now. They're pretty cool about working with my school schedule so I only work a 12 hour day on Sundays. So Saturdays are really the only days I have off but they normally get filled with homework assignments as well lol. I am taking a stick welding class this semester which I've enjoyed, definitely learned a lot and my instructor has even offered me a part time job working for him since I've had some experience in fabrication. Not sure how or if that's going to work out but I told him I was interested. One of my other instructors also gave me a job opportunity that I'm very interested in working as a student worker. Basically he wants me to go through and make sure all the lathes and mills are working properly and can machine within a certain tolerance. Went to trade school to be a machinist and was one for a year so I really enjoy that kind of stuff.

Ive lost motivation to do anything tractor related. It's not that I dont like it anymore I'd just much rather wrench on my old cars in the little free time I have. I also try to go to car shows when I can because it's very relaxing and keeps my mind off life.

Sorry for the long post, just thought I'd give an explanation to where I've been and why I dont post much anymore. I dont mean this in any bragging way or in any complaining way, I feel quite blessed to be able to go to school and have all these doors open but it can be quite stressful and aggravating. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm in the part of my life where I really dont know what I'm doing I'm just trying to keep my head above water but I'm sure God's plan for me is in process, I just have to be patient, have faith and trust and follow my heart. Hopefully I'll have some motivation to do more tractor stuff in the future but for now a lot of my projects are on the back burner.

I am be welderous now.

What kind of mechanical contrivance are those for, hamburger man?