Antique Farm Tractor Restoration

Question from Joe C.

I am currently restoring my 1951Farmall M and I was cleaning the front
grill “Farmall” emblem and it appears that the letters and the edging
are an off white color under the surface rust. I have seen some
replacement emblems which appear to be silver color but I have been
around this tractor for 40 plus years and dont remember it being
siver. What was the original color of these emblems?

If anyone has a definitive answer for this, it would be appreciated if you could reply using the comments feature.

Here is a picture of the emblem.

I just added a new category called “tractor restoration information”. If you have any questions about your restoration project email them to me using the contact form found at the top of this site. I will post them in that category and hopefully one of our readers can reply with an answer for you using the comments feature of this site.

I am currently working on adding back the free classified ads section as well as the events calendar to post information about tractor shows that you or your club is hosting. General ads and shows will be free to post. There will be a nominal charge for any featured listings or commercial ads. Hopefully I will have these new features added in the next few weeks.

A lot of old tractor restoration projects come with a little history. This is one tractor I know almost nothing about. Our neighbor came home with the Farmall Cub for whatever reason and decided it wasn’t going to do what he expected. A little negotiation and we purchased the old tractor from him.

It really did not take a lot of work to at least get this tractor running. Some gas and jumper cables brought it back to life. It was obvious right away that there were problems in the valve train as the engine ran rough, lacked any power and the signature popping sound out of the exhaust.

The only other mechanical problems noted was an internal leak in the hydraulics. Fluid was leaking past the pump into the engine and the lift would eventually bleed down as the fluid went into the engine. Other than that the rest of the needed repairs were fairly obvious from just walking around the tractor. The steering shaft support was badly worn as was the steering box. Also on the steering end, the tie rods were badly bent and the ball sockets were worn. The hood and grille were bent, a small leak in the radiator, the battery box was pretty much non existent and just a few other basic wear items along with some surface rust. With all these items noted it was time to start taking this thing apart and start the restoration process.

Most of the sheet metal came off with ease. The hood was only held on with two bolts due to the damage on the front end of the Farmall Cub. The fenders came off with ease and what was left of the battery box was taken off with an air chisel due to the bolt heads being badly corroded. The first real problem encountered with the tear down of this restoration was removal of the radiator. At the time we were thinking the radiator could be saved or at least re cored. The problem being, the bolt heads that mount the radiator were corroded so badly a socket could not grip them enough for removal. (See how we approached this problem in the tips section of this website.)

The rest of the tear down was uneventful. Everything came apart as it should and was set aside to be rebuilt one piece at a time. I highly recommend using a digital camera to take pictures of everything during disassembly of your antique tractor. They are invaluable later in the restoration process.

First up after the disassembly was the engine. After tear down, the only real problems other than normal wear was the valve train. There was some valve guide wear and a few burned valves. The block was check and the cylinder walls were in perfect condition. The block was sent out to have new valves and guides installed and the engine was re-assembled with all new pistons, rings, bearings and seals, cleaned up, primed and a coat of paint to keep it from rusting. NOTE: removal of the front crankshaft pulley has given some people nightmares. It will come off without breaking it if you use a heavy-duty puller and make sure you pull from as close to center as possible. I did not think to take pictures of this, but you want a puller that can get behind the pulley. If you try to pull from the outer edge, you will break the pulley.

Part 2 coming soon in the meantime you can see some pictures of this tractor during restoration. Click Here To View Gallery