Hi guys, Nice video. Good attention to detail. Good closeups and nice editing. You brought back some memories. I've had a 1948 8N my whole life. My grandfather got it off the Dearborn proving ground as partial payment for helping settle the hydraulic lift lawsuit between Ferguson and Ford in late 1947. On my very street 2 of my neighbors owned very similar 8Ns with the distributer in the front. That's how popular it was. I did the axle seal replacement when I was about 15. In my case there was too much axle endplay. If I remember right, I filed one hub down until the play was just gone when the axle nut was fully tightened. It was amazing to have brakes that actually worked I remember that real good. My Dad grew up in a farming community in the very fertile Saginaw valley area of St. Louis, Michigan so he always had a big garden. Dad set up a single bottom 16" Dearborn plow set to cut 20". Once he got the plow tuned correctly we could pull it thru heavy clay down 8-10" deep in 3rd gear at less than 1/2 throttle. We used a tow around disc and 2 drags and a float to finish our garden. One drag was a spring tooth and one was a spike tooth. The spike tooth had like railroad spikes welded onto shafts that spanned the drag. They were adjustable for depth. Dad liked sweet corn, so he got an old horse drawn 2 row corn planter and adapted it to the draw bar. We had a 2 row cultivator with an anti sway bar that went to the pin under the left fender like you have. Dad got us a Mott 72" flail mower to mow about 10 acres and that Mott mower did a super great job of mowing. It mulched the grass so fine and with the roller, it made our mowing job look professional. That Mott was no slouch though, with fresh knives it would take down 4' tall weeds easily and leave them mulched up real fine. We made a 300 yard long ditch across the low part of ours and 2 neighbors properties using only a grader blade and 3 pt hitch scoop bucket. In the winter we plowed snow with chains on it and pulled neighbors out of the ditch. I even made a hand crank for it when I got into Highschool because somebody always left the lights on and ran the battery down. *(6volt) If there was anything in the battery, it would start right up. That tractor was a very useful learning tool for me growing up with, in a rural neighborhood during the 50's 60's and 70's, where I lived about 20 miles north of Detroit. I'm 71 and still have it and most of the tools. Thanks for a very meticulous, well done video. Oh, I almost plumb forgot, one more thing: I've known 3 people who killed themselves flipping 8Ns over backwards. When you get hooked up to something that's too big, the front wheels rise up so fast you can't believe it. So please tell your father-in-law to keep something on the back that can keep it from going all the way over. ben/ michigan
Thanks Ben. Glad we brought back some memories for you. You've got some great stories there! We really enjoyed reading about your 8N adventures. Your tractor has some great history behind it. And thank you for the advice on the light front end!
need some help!!! what seal are you putting just before the flat steel washer and nut. Can't find a part number anywhere. some help plz if you don't mind ..TYVM
Honestly, I don't know the part number. It was a rubber washer and It was part of the assembly on our tractor. After rewatching the videos linked in our description from Claremont Classic Garage, neither of their tractors had that rubber washer only the steel washer then the axle nut. I do not have the manuals with me to look it up either. Internet parts search on my end has shown nothing on any diagrams I have found. If you're tractor didn't have a rubber washer Behind the steel washer when you dismantled it, I'd guess you'd be ok to put it back as it was and see how that works. I'm no expert though so I'm only suggesting what I would do in your situation.
The fact that the hub came off so easily may indicate that the hub is worn on the splines and needs to be replaced. The splines should be slightly below the rim of the hub. Otherwise, the hub nut/washer will contact the axle splines before contacting the hub and tightening the hub nut will be useless. Could also explain why the hub nut was not up to torque.
This may be a silly question but do you really need to rebuild the brakes when you fix the axle seal? If the leaking oil is causing the brake to not work fixing the leak and some brake cleaner should fix the problem or no?
That's a great question. The problem is that the oil penetrates into the shoes. In our research we saw one person that used a torch (very delicately) to evaporate the oil out of the brake shoes. The shoes are inexpensive and we were using our parents money so it was faster and easier to just replace the shoes.
It would have been better if you adjusted the brake shoes up to where they were rubbing when you put the drum on it. Makes it a lot easier for fine tuning The final brake adjustment.
Hi guys, Nice video. Good attention to detail. Good closeups and nice editing. You brought back some memories. I've had a 1948 8N my whole life. My grandfather got it off the Dearborn proving ground as partial payment for helping settle the hydraulic lift lawsuit between Ferguson and Ford in late 1947. On my very street 2 of my neighbors owned very similar 8Ns with the distributer in the front. That's how popular it was. I did the axle seal replacement when I was about 15. In my case there was too much axle endplay. If I remember right, I filed one hub down until the play was just gone when the axle nut was fully tightened. It was amazing to have brakes that actually worked I remember that real good. My Dad grew up in a farming community in the very fertile Saginaw valley area of St. Louis, Michigan so he always had a big garden. Dad set up a single bottom 16" Dearborn plow set to cut 20". Once he got the plow tuned correctly we could pull it thru heavy clay down 8-10" deep in 3rd gear at less than 1/2 throttle. We used a tow around disc and 2 drags and a float to finish our garden. One drag was a spring tooth and one was a spike tooth. The spike tooth had like railroad spikes welded onto shafts that spanned the drag. They were adjustable for depth. Dad liked sweet corn, so he got an old horse drawn 2 row corn planter and adapted it to the draw bar. We had a 2 row cultivator with an anti sway bar that went to the pin under the left fender like you have. Dad got us a Mott 72" flail mower to mow about 10 acres and that Mott mower did a super great job of mowing. It mulched the grass so fine and with the roller, it made our mowing job look professional. That Mott was no slouch though, with fresh knives it would take down 4' tall weeds easily and leave them mulched up real fine. We made a 300 yard long ditch across the low part of ours and 2 neighbors properties using only a grader blade and 3 pt hitch scoop bucket. In the winter we plowed snow with chains on it and pulled neighbors out of the ditch. I even made a hand crank for it when I got into Highschool because somebody always left the lights on and ran the battery down. *(6volt) If there was anything in the battery, it would start right up. That tractor was a very useful learning tool for me growing up with, in a rural neighborhood during the 50's 60's and 70's, where I lived about 20 miles north of Detroit. I'm 71 and still have it and most of the tools. Thanks for a very meticulous, well done video. Oh, I almost plumb forgot, one more thing: I've known 3 people who killed themselves flipping 8Ns over backwards. When you get hooked up to something that's too big, the front wheels rise up so fast you can't believe it. So please tell your father-in-law to keep something on the back that can keep it from going all the way over. ben/ michigan
Thanks Ben. Glad we brought back some memories for you. You've got some great stories there! We really enjoyed reading about your 8N adventures. Your tractor has some great history behind it. And thank you for the advice on the light front end!
Thank you for making this video. I followed you step by step out in my garage as I did the same.
Thank you! Hopefully you made fewer mistakes than we did. We are glad we could help!
Well done! Your work here is much appreciated.
Thank you! We were glad to help!
Good video. Has me well prepared for doing the same seal.
@johnwallacemcclure1143 Thank you and good luck to you!
Vice grips work well on springs
Thanks. To be fair, I've never had much luck with pliers or vice grips on brake springs. I should've used a philips screwdriver for a smoother surface
Reinstalling springs that go into a hole i use a phillips screwdriver. I actually use it installing all brake springs.
I never said I was a smart man. At least it worked. Tractor stops now so that's good
Great video … I have a ‘47 8N and this needs to be done. Thank you for the insight…. About how long do you think this took ?
It took 3 hours but that was with filming involved. Without filming I could've done it in about half an hour each side I think.
@@flightofthecrowswing Thank you for the information…. Nowadays I have the strength of a 6 yr old so I’ll allow the 3 hours..😂
You can do it!
need some help!!!
what seal are you putting just before the flat steel washer and nut. Can't find a part number anywhere. some help plz if you don't mind
..TYVM
Honestly, I don't know the part number. It was a rubber washer and It was part of the assembly on our tractor. After rewatching the videos linked in our description from Claremont Classic Garage, neither of their tractors had that rubber washer only the steel washer then the axle nut. I do not have the manuals with me to look it up either. Internet parts search on my end has shown nothing on any diagrams I have found. If you're tractor didn't have a rubber washer Behind the steel washer when you dismantled it, I'd guess you'd be ok to put it back as it was and see how that works. I'm no expert though so I'm only suggesting what I would do in your situation.
thank you for getting back with me....
much appreciated
Sorry I couldn't be more helpful. Good luck to you sir!
The fact that the hub came off so easily may indicate that the hub is worn on the splines and needs to be replaced. The splines should be slightly below the rim of the hub. Otherwise, the hub nut/washer will contact the axle splines before contacting the hub and tightening the hub nut will be useless. Could also explain why the hub nut was not up to torque.
Thanks. That'll be something to look at next time we're there.
This may be a silly question but do you really need to rebuild the brakes when you fix the axle seal? If the leaking oil is causing the brake to not work fixing the leak and some brake cleaner should fix the problem or no?
That's a great question. The problem is that the oil penetrates into the shoes. In our research we saw one person that used a torch (very delicately) to evaporate the oil out of the brake shoes. The shoes are inexpensive and we were using our parents money so it was faster and easier to just replace the shoes.
It would have been better if you adjusted the brake shoes up to where they were rubbing when you put the drum on it. Makes it a lot easier for fine tuning The final brake adjustment.
That's good advice. I just don't work on drum brakes a lot, so I didn't even think about doing that. Thanks
@flightofthecrowswing No problem, I have 2 9N's and 1 8N and a 640 Ford tractors. There is always something to fix.
Maybe you should have repacked that wheel bearing with grease before you re-assembled it. It didn't seem to have any grease on it.
In this application, the bearing is lubricated by the differential oil.
@@flightofthecrowswing Oh ok - my bad -sorry.