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My trigger for picking up my first Wheel Horse was seeing my neighbor's Raider 10 buried back in the corner of his shed, along with a host of attachments. It has a hole in the side of the block, and he says he's saving it for a retirement project. When I brought home my C-120, he was almost as excited as I was. Well today he came rolling up on a '76 B-100 8-speed he picked up from the original owner who is heading for an assisted living facility. It was listed for $650 and my neighbor was going to give him the full asking price (w/snowplow). The gentleman showed him receipts for everything that has ever been done to it, including a recent one where his mechanic pulled the head and carb and gave it a full service. The old boy wanted to drive it one last time, so my neighbor let him drive it up on the trailer. When he went to pay, the old man says, "Well, I think it's going to a good home so just give me $500."

Just wanted to share a bit of art I've done recently.

August 2022

The one in the middle. He doesn't have to drive or get out to open and close the gates.

I built this bat "rocket" house a few years back. I understood that it might take a few years for the bats to take to it, but I had almost given up hope. Then today I noticed this...

Bats moving in..........Whew, I thought your MIL was coming for a long visit.

Got the @76c12091520h hitch installed on the Tecumsehorse this morning. I'll make a thread about that later. Then we all worked on firewood processes.

After work, the bezel had dried fully so on it went for now. I still need to add the chrome accents and horse but that’s the easy part. It’s getting there piece by piece.

Only on the bottom

My top add ons: Marine bulb Front / Rear LEDs Winch for plow blade (2" hitch) HF lift for back end (2" hitch)

National Day of the Cowboy, on the fourth Saturday in July — falling on July 26, this year — is here to prove to us that cowboy culture, despite the misconception that it has faded away over the years and been beaten down by the Information Age, is alive and well. It wouldn’t be too outlandish to say that the National Day of the Cowboy movement got its real start when ranchers and cowhands first started working herds in the American West before all 50 states were even formed. Roping and riding, herding cattle on horseback, living by the lariat on your saddle horn, and camping under a big, starry American sky — these things were integral to the American cowboy experience. For a long while, other countries’ perception of what Americans were like was exemplified by the ‘Marlboro Man’ image — a stoic, soft-spoken, self-reliant master of herd beasts and the wilderness.

Great, I always liked using these. Easy to tell when they were empty.

“Heroically" repaired my spouse’s “go to” hairdryer. It kept turning itself off while in use. I discovered the internal air inlet screen looked like the dryer lint filter after a load of wash—low airflow caused it trip the overheat protection. Joined a village-sponsored “Paddle” accompanied by the village historian who shared stories (and some tales) of happenings on, in, and near our river over the last 200+ years. The tip of the bow of my wood-oared Adirondack Guideboat is at the bottom—all the other boats were plastic!

Got the 400 and making my way back home

Took a morning walk around the farm. My Amish neighbors sweet corn on the left and the corporate farmers field corn on the right. The field corn is 10' tall with 2-3 ears on each stalk.

My Grandfather always had a few Gallo wine jugs kicking around. If you couldn't find an empty one just wait an hour!

LEDs will spoil you. It's nice having lights that actually light up what is in front of you...

I like ideas that break away from the factory stuff. Mods that add a different look and some that add convenience. I seen this 520 on marketplace and liked the red rim on the front. Kind of a throw back to the red stripe tires. The gas tank is a killer idea. Sure would add miles to the mowing before a refuel.

I can just about imagine the smell of that cheap orange Wal-mart paint burning off that muffler.

Bet you have more than that. You just have not seen them.

All I can think of: 1) Carb leaks gas and raw gas runs into cylinder causing a hydro lock 2) Starter pulling too many amps (broken magnet? brushes sticking? loose connection causing bad ground path? Thermal issues with starter? (tight bearing that gets worse when hot for example, or assembled not quite in-line, causing binding, etc.)) 3) Electrical connection (Cable to terminal contact - thermal expansion causing poor connectivity? loosening bolts? any paint/rust between terminals and points of contact?) 4) Battery seeing thermal breakdown (surface charging only?) 5) Battery been load tested? Sometimes they test fine when cold but warmed up, they fail? Before you say "But it has new starter" - bear in mind that "New" is not the same thing as "Good" - like pretty much anything else electrical related especially. (Common with spark plugs, can't tell you how many times customer said "I put new plug in it it still won't start" , I took out the new plug and put in another one,, fired right up and ran fine. Oh yeah, or the brand new OEM Battery cable another tech installed in the shop I worked at, wasted half an hour trying to figure out why it still wouldn't get any power, I showed him how to do a voltage drop test, and immediately found that the terminal had been crimped over *insulated cable*

Doing a little firewood processing today.

I have a bash at anything, plumbing is easy for stuff like new taps, radiator swaps etc. Electrickery is a bit more involved due to the constantly updated regulations that sparkies have to adhere to. But wiring in extra sockets or a new lighting circuit is well within my grasp. Getting a decent tradesman to do small jobs is almost impossible, they either don't want it or charge the earth. Odd job blokes are everywhere but thats no different to doing it yourself. My tools all came from buying to do a specific project and make it easier. There is no one for me to pass them onto as we don't have kids and my nieces and nephews couldn't change their own mind, let alone a flat tyre or light bulb. I took my car in for service yesterday, it's a hybrid electric so there is nothing I could do on it anyway. As I sat having a coffee in the dealership they sent me a live feed video of the mechanic actually doing my service, he has a body worn camera on and takes you round the car during his inspection. Nifty.

My brother is giving me his C-160! It hasn't run in at least 15 years. It was put away because his significant other did something? Don't know what. But, I do know that the motor isn't frozen and it doesn't feel like the connecting rods broken. New battery, obviously, replace the gas and oil. What else should I do?

What you don’t see in this picture is the couple of ears of sweet corn that are in Ed’s pockets 🤣🤣

I was the winning bidder on a pump powered by a Kohler K91R engine. Based on its specs it’s a 1961. I don’t really have a need for it at the moment, but couldn’t pass it up. Here’s what I found about the K91… Model: Kohler K91 Spec Number: 31504A Serial Number: 3019680 Horsepower: ~4 HP Shaft Orientation: Horizontal (most likely, based on spec) Year of Manufacture: 1961 About Spec Number 31504A Kohler’s spec number identifies the exact configuration of the engine — including shaft size, PTO options, mounting patterns, and whether it’s for a tractor, generator, or industrial use. While full public spec decoding guides are rare, the “A” suffix usually designates a factory revision or minor configuration changes. Spec 31504A is known to have been used on early Wheel Horse tractors, most likely models like: RJ-58 RJ-59 Suburban 400 or 550

One thing that is not on the list that I learned the hard way. Always tent the new to you tractor with a tarp outside before you ever bring it in side and set off a bug bomb to kill of any mice or other critters you don't want moving into your shop.

I bought what might be the ugliest bronco 14 in existence. I bought it from a guy at my local sportsman club. It was his father’s. It looks like somebody dipped it in an orange paint can. I have absolutely no need for this thing, but it has great tires and their wheel horse branded. He says it runs and I may stick a battery in there to see if he’s right. But it’s likely I won’t keep it. I have too many other projects.

Repurposed two blower fans to shop fans today. Nice to have hot air flow on these 100 plus summer days. They work great.

v Not even close. Looks purdy in some body's eyes. I gotta see the orange glow from those bulbs.

I think if the left bracket Ron the right and the right was on the left it would work. I ran into something similar once but don't remember how I solved it. The plow looks right.

Trina and I BOTH call her momma "Old Bat" near to daily.

I'm clearly getting old. My first thought was of a cheer made famous by George Carlin... And I can't type a single phrase of it on the forum, but the first word was "batsh*t"...

Did up an adjustable assist spring to help keep the underside of the seat from rubbing on the toolbox fenders on the 854 8 speed. Mounts to the existing C shaped seat spring holes in the Unidrive...

Me too. Everything I have is modified and not one machine is 100% factory correct. Very few of my attachments are unmodified, and most are complete fabrications. And let me say I love Wheel Horse equipment. It's just rare to find complete machines here that aren't chopped up already. I've always had to do the best with what I have. Sorry for posting the same old pictures. I'll get new ones when it isn't 102 degrees with 80% humidity. At 10:00 PM last night, it was still 89 degrees here. It's bleeping warm!

Grand kids are visiting. IMG_1464.mov

Yes, very much so. Nice weights too!

That’s almost disgusting 😂 Help us feel better and tell you had to spend a lot on gas or something going to pick it up!

Just got home before another thunderstorm. We spent the day with my oldest Grandson in at Lehigh University. He gave us a tour of the biophysics lab where he works while working on his dissertation for his physics PHD. Then we took a walking tour of the Stacks. the stacks bethlehem pa - Search

The whole water softener is branded as a Fleck. I think the boxes said Fleck-Pentaire on them or something like that. I was a little hurried and paid less attention to this than I usually would have…more on that in a moment. The filament wound tank was only partially filled with resin. The balance had to be added from the pre-measured bag. I assume this was done to keep package weights within standard UPS/FedEx limits. Now, when the wheels fell off… I had a minor surgery scheduled for last Friday that’s going to keep me from doing many strenuous things for the next few months. So in the leadup to that I had a flurrry of things to do at work and around the house. One of those was finally getting around to replacing the water softener that I had been putting off. Ironically, I was procrastinating on this replacement as a means to avoid the surgery but once one was on the docket so was the other. i had already removed the old softener when I considered rebuilding it so installing the new wasn’t a big deal. I had all my plumbing pretty close already and used PEX for the final connections figuring that would soak up some misalignment if I needed it and help speed things along. Wednesday night at 730 I began. 45 minutes after I started I was done and putting water to it. No leaks, and we had soft water right away. Patted myself on the back for being perfection personified. Hubris. Surgery Friday. Came home. All great. My wife noticed that some fine resin particles had settled in the bottoms of the toilets. I figured it was just fines that got out during initial fill and it would go away after another regen to flush the bed. It did. Or seemed to at least. Until we saw it again on Sunday morning. I thought for a microsecond about the infinitesimally small chance I’d hooked something up wrong, but just as quickly dismissed that improbable idea. In addition to being incredibly smart, handsome, and humble I also have great attention to detail so I figured that we’d find that the piping was fine and that my softener probably came from the factory with a statistically rare failure escape. She went downstairs and took a picture from my piping for me. And… It’s hooked up backwards. Water goes in the outlet and out the inlet. It couldn’t be more clearly marked on the unit itself and my plumbing loop is incredibly obvious so mixing it up really takes some intentional chicanery. Clearly this is a case of some miscreant sneaking into the house while we were at the hospital and reversing the plumbing as a prank. I hear this happens all the time in my neighborhood and the same guy is probably the one who occasionally runs the hot water to toilets as a neat party trick. So now I have a small project waiting for me. I think the PEX connections here will make the reconnection easier than it would have been if I’d run my copper all the way as I originally had planned. At least I rationalize it this way. And to close the loop for the curious, we isolated the softener in its bypass loop (I have a plumbed-in independent bypass for this in addition to the softener’s valve) and ran a million gallons of water through everything to flush out the mobile resin. My wife ran water into the sinks, toilets, and tubs and ran the outside faucets into a washtub to look for resin that would settle out. Very minor amounts here and there and I guess we lost very little overall…perhaps a cup full. We luckily hadn’t washed clothes so nothing got out in that run of plumbing. Hardly any in the water heater when she drained it thru the washtub. I have one slow bathroom faucet that I suspect has a clogged aerator in it, but so far that’s all I notice as an issue. It’s seized up and I can’t get it off to clean it out so I’m saving that for later. I called the seller’s water softener hotline asking if I should check the resin level or screw with it when I correct the plumbing and they said resin loss is usually minimal. If it pulls brine, it’s good to go. If not, I’ll get to see how easy it is to install a rebuild kit. They also said that reversed connections happen all the time…they field this call many times each week and likely more often after a professional install than a diy. So there must be a lot of these plumbing pranksters out there. So my haste that had me ignore the box labels also resulted in getting to do the job a second time. C’est la vie. Steve PS - it’s ok to laugh at me by the way…at least I’m still handsome.

Rototilled the garden with the C-145

No you have the newer bracket, the plow is correct

Really helpful on those days where the other half is super cranky and you need to get far away out of griping distance - for a long time.....

I was gonna say. The first thing I thought of was Agnes Moorehead on Bewitched!

Custom? He says..... we ain't got a "factory" horse here. That gas tank is a Wheelhorse Implement option. I believe it adds 5 gallons.

https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/make-gas-cans-great-again-improving-flow

A LOT of us had good input there. I've used it myself quite a few times now.

Awesome! Check the "New to the Herd" list.

The LEDs run cooler, as well, so less likely to warp your new bezel!