I've been watching this thread with anticipation of doing my own 9u direct electric conversion. Great info here. I have started to accumulate some of these same parts as well.

My bell housing has a crack that needs repaired. Is it cast iron, cast steel, or what? What welding process would you use? It has been repaired while still in the machine, and now that it is disassembled, I would like to get it welded a little better. I have a hobart 187 mig welder or an old lincoln buzz box. Thanks.

I read with interest the comment to stitch weld keeping the cast cool. We have structurally welded cracked castings many times on industrial projects by preheating the casting and then wrapping it tightly in insulation after the repair so it cools slowly over several hours. It helps to have it mostly wrapped before the preheat to help hold the heat. If you are taking the case out of the machine then heating is a good permanent repair. At lincolnelectric.com/en-us/support/welding-how-to/Pages/welding-cast-iron-detail.aspx they offer advice on both preheated and non heated repairs. A trick we used at the home to preheat was to build a simple heating forge out of a sheet steel tray with a bed of coal in it and feeding it air from underneath from the blower side of a couple old vacuum cleaners.
Good luck and keep us posted.
Roger

Well, you got your lump of coal for Christmas.....sorry to hear that but it's not all that uncommon, seems they either bust out on the RH side or on the bottom if not running a skid pan. No freezing required.

I'm pretty certain the case is cast iron. I keep a spare case on hand here. From what I've heard they don't take to well to welding repairs due to the stresses involved. I'd look for another trans or case and at least do a reseal and gaskets in the process.

So, you had to go bragging huh!!!!!! that'l learn ya.

While looking things over after running up the pony.
I discovered a crack on the right hand side running almost the length of the transmission.
Its about 4 inches up the side. I suspect a freeze crack and its been there a long time.
Had some sort of sealer on it.
Is this a cast steel or cast iron.
Is it a weld up job or should I be looking for a transmision.
I could just about weld it inplace but would of course be better if removed, v it out and weld it proper.
However if removed should I replace it or do you think welding is okay for a hobby crawler.
Thanks for now.
Chris

That probably could be repaired by someone who has experience with cast iron welding and a way to preheat the whole head in a furnace, do the repair, return the head to the furnace and let it cool slowly over hours. They would also have to remove the valve seat ahead of time and machine the welded area afterwards and replace the seat. I had a couple of Yanmar heads repaired last year that had cracks in the same area. One was entirely satisfactory, but the other had a new crack in another, less critical area when we finally got it reassembled. Had so much trouble getting the heads back from the shop, I really didn't want to send it back to them, so it's running with some block sealer and doing fine.

Unless you 're close to someone who does that kind of work, I would look for another head.

I thought I was looking for a D330 a couple years ago when I found a 922 in the weeds, but it turned out to have the D322 with a turbo. Have an old 944 that does have the D330 that we still run. Wonder if you might find a generator set with a compatable engine somewhere for not much more than the cost of just the head. I have one with a D330C that got "dusted" and needs an overhaul.

if you have experiance with electric welding with rods, take the UTP8 rod (special for cast iron) and give it a try,
clean area, preheat the area you are going to weld with the torch, then after you do a 2 inch weld stop and hamer the weld just a bit for stress relief.

here some pics of a repaired hotbox:

"MARCOTEN" wrote:

hi black,
i think here on the board you can ask for a waterpump, (also on the wanted-for sale division)
make a list of all parts you need, like the governor-spring (T114) , the bushing/bearing around it (t123), the caterpillar big FIFTEEN uses the same 2 parts i just check in my book.
for welding with cast iron i dont have so much problems with it and i did welding of the same spot on a fifteen, it seems "easy" to weld iron on the block ( much better than intake/ exhaust manifolds) but you need the right rods. as i used UTP8 its going good.
are you good with casting pieces??? mabe you can cast 10 CARBURATOR top lids in aluminium,
as a lot are cracked mabe you can sell them, i need one and many people do need one.
what can you cast?? iron or aluminium aswell ??

My friend has a business on casting and can cast basically anything, but he must have the useful original piece for the manufacture of form for casting. Can cast copper, tin, brass, aluminum and cast steel.

hi black,
i think here on the board you can ask for a waterpump, (also on the wanted-for sale division)
make a list of all parts you need, like the governor-spring (T114) , the bushing/bearing around it (t123), the caterpillar big FIFTEEN uses the same 2 parts i just check in my book.
for welding with cast iron i dont have so much problems with it and i did welding of the same spot on a fifteen, it seems "easy" to weld iron on the block ( much better than intake/ exhaust manifolds) but you need the right rods. as i used UTP8 its going good.
are you good with casting pieces??? mabe you can cast 10 CARBURATOR top lids in aluminium,
as a lot are cracked mabe you can sell them, i need one and many people do need one.
what can you cast?? iron or aluminium aswell ??

"MARCOTEN" wrote:

you can weld it with a utp8 welding rod special for castiron,
if some body has a governor spring laying for a TEN and can measure it that would be ideal as otherwise i have to do a lot of taking apart of the ten i have here for measuring the spring, it is a pul type spring not som muuch power required of puuling it outits aprox. 1" in diameter coils 1 mm thick15 cm long but that's all approxemately.

Thanks for diameters Marco Aprox is better then nothing. I have to clean the surface of cracks and probably make some threads and screw broken pieces back at place and whole seam sealed with tin. Problem with welding rods and cast iron is only 50-50 chance for succes If the tin will be not working I will do casting of cracked piece and soldered with brass. Welding rod is the last chance. Do you know if I can somewhere buy an original waterpump, or only the body or another parts of it?
Black

you can weld it with a utp8 welding rod special for castiron,
if some body has a governor spring laying for a TEN and can measure it that would be ideal as otherwise i have to do a lot of taking apart of the ten i have here for measuring the spring, it is a pul type spring, not so much power required of pulling it out.
its aprox. 1" in diameter and the coils are 1 mm thick, 15 cm long but that's all approxemately.

potmetal melts at about 350 degrees most always welded with torch oxy act or propane and yes it sometimes contains iron not done often because melting point of iron is about 2200 degrees.
I think your bracket is cast iron that is what the 165 i have seen were cast iron just take your torch and heat it to about 400 degrees if it melts its pot metal which is mostly tin and and scrap metal mixed including alum. potmetal not usually magnetic but can be. You have to be careful when welding potmetal like car door handles and such if it gets too hot it will run off just like solder. jw45

I heat my Cast Iron parts in an OLD Gas fired BBQ grill so that I can maintain the temp, then post heat and cool slowly over time. Charcoal fired works too, just harder to get the correct "welding" temp.

"Deas wrote:

Hi, Irolla.
Uh,oh! You've had it now. Done gone and caught 'yellow fever' like most of the rest of us here. But all is not lost. There IS a cure. Trouble is it's a tad permanent. It's called Death.

Another way of welding your manifold is to make a substantial mounting plate for it out of about 3/4" plate, with bolt holes in the appropriate places, to which you bolt your manifold after suitably preparing it, veeing out the crack, etc.. Ideally, this plate would be faced in a milling machine or similar to garantee an accurate flat surface. If you wanted to get REAL serious about this, you could rib the underside of the plate before surfacing to reduce the risk of warping with the heat. Then, when pre-heating, heat the plate as well as the manifold and keep both warm during welding.

I would suggest doing the peening with a smallish ball pein engineer's hammer rather than the chipping hammer as I believe this would reduce the risk of cracking.

I last anything to do with Magna electrodes a LONNGGG time ago but they did useta make some VERY good products, expensive but good. I used Magna 307's on cast iron, cast steel and high tensile materials with excellent results on all of them.

When welding, do as Andy suggested and weld only a small run at a time and spread them out. This helsp to even out the heat and keep the whole piece warm at the same time. The benefit of having the manifold bolted to a plate is that you can turn it during welding to make it easier to access the crack(s).

Hope this helps. Happy Catting.

Thanks for the welding tips and suggestions. I'm going to see if I can find a replacement manifold. I attached pictures so you can see the size of the crack that goes all the way around the manifold.

The yellow fever is a funny illness. Don't think I'm ready to be cured yet....if ever. I had such joy today firing it up after dipping the carburetor and fixing the flooding issue. I drove it about 100 feet until it choked and died. Found out that that gas tank is rusted and it's not getting the fuel it needs. I was able to go back through the forum and see how others have solved this problem. POR 15 is on order and will be one of the next steps in getting this back in the dirt with a disc.

Cheers, Larry

Hi, Irolla.
Uh,oh! You've had it now. Done gone and caught 'yellow fever' like most of the rest of us here. But all is not lost. There IS a cure. Trouble is it's a tad permanent. It's called Death.

Another way of welding your manifold is to make a substantial mounting plate for it out of about 3/4" plate, with bolt holes in the appropriate places, to which you bolt your manifold after suitably preparing it, veeing out the crack, etc.. Ideally, this plate would be faced in a milling machine or similar to garantee an accurate flat surface. If you wanted to get REAL serious about this, you could rib the underside of the plate before surfacing to reduce the risk of warping with the heat. Then, when pre-heating, heat the plate as well as the manifold and keep both warm during welding.

I would suggest doing the peening with a smallish ball pein engineer's hammer rather than the chipping hammer as I believe this would reduce the risk of cracking.

I last anything to do with Magna electrodes a LONNGGG time ago but they did useta make some VERY good products, expensive but good. I used Magna 307's on cast iron, cast steel and high tensile materials with excellent results on all of them.

When welding, do as Andy suggested and weld only a small run at a time and spread them out. This helsp to even out the heat and keep the whole piece warm at the same time. The benefit of having the manifold bolted to a plate is that you can turn it during welding to make it easier to access the crack(s).

Hope this helps. Happy Catting.

i would not recommend that only for emergency repair as that size holes wont last long with it, i used that stuff between 2 parts as extra seal and for holes 1 or 2 mm big, better weld it with cast iron welding rods or put a other better manifold on it.
goodluck!