Dismantling the Bolens 1250

Frank Glatzl came over today to help restore the Bolens 1250 to perfect running condition.  Unfortunately, there were a few hiccups along the way, as you will see in a moment.  The first was that I was unaware some wasps had built a nest inside the body until I stuck my hand down inside to unscrew a bolt.  Ten minutes later, after placing ice on two or three stings on the hand, I was back and the culprit(s) were dead or dying.  But more continued to arrive during our work session, necessitating quick and lethal resort to the wasp and hornet spray.

We raised an EZ-Up to keep the sun off us, which it did, until the wind came out of the north so strongly we had to take it down.  By then, the cold front blowing in had taken the temperature from about 90 down to low 60's or so.  I had to put on a jacket to put things away after Frank headed out, it was that cool.

Anyway, I began by replacing the starting sheave, which had a break in it, with one obtained via the Internet.  After Frank arrived, we decided to replace the engine isolators.  To do so, however, required unbolting various assemblies, including the main control tower.  Eventually got the new isolators installed but had to go to Home Depot to get a 3/8" tap to clean out the threads that the isolator mounts onto.

Then we decided to disconnect the main driveshaft, since it was not going to be used anymore in any event (we are removing the hydraulic transmission in the rear).  But it turned out Bolens did not make it easy to disconnect the driveshaft so it took a while to find a way to take apart the front coupler.  That got the driveshaft out of the way for the next project:  removing the hydraulic cylinder.

Removing the hydraulic cylinder consumed the rest of the afternoon.  Had to remove a bunch of bolts and spread the frame apart, and remove the main PTO control rod, all to get sufficient clearance to take the cylinder and its mounting plate off.  But we did it.  Frank is going to remove the cylinder from the mounting plate and fabricate a linkage to be used in place of the cylinder to control the height of the mower deck.  It will be adjustable.  We will decide on a height above the rail for the mower deck and then install the linkage and leave it at that height, unless experience teaches us to set it at a different level.

By this time, we had had enough so we started to wind things down.  Frank brought two u-bolts he fabricated to secure the motorcar trailer tow bars, replacing rusted out u-bolts.  They look great.  All I need to do is prime and spray paint them orange, same as the rest of the trailer.

I might do some cleaning up of the parts of the 1250 exposed by our general assault.  We now have the engine entirely removed and sitting on the ground in front of the carcass, as you can see from one of the pictures below.

All in all, I'd say we found out that an old, rusted-out tractor can present quite a challenge to take apart.  I am optimistic it will be somewhat easier to put back together.  Will have to start buying hardware to replace the junky stuff we took off.