Working on the IH Duplex Planter

[customcutter]

I bought a bunch of parts for the Super A that I bought a couple of months ago. I also got an A178 or A180 belly planter when I bought the tractor. When I bought the parts I was telling the man about the planter and he gave me an IH Duplex Seed hopper and the assembly to attach it to the tractor. It was in pretty rough shape, but the price was great!

I've been spraying it with penetrating oil everyday for the last 6 weeks. Today I finally decided it was time to start tearing it down and get it working. Not a single fastener, other than 2 cotter pins came free. Every bolt either broke, had to be chiseled off, ground off, or drilled through.

Good news is there are only a few very small holes in the sheet metal. Everything is apart except for one driven gear for one of the seed plates. I was surprised to see that the gears actually rotated on cast iron. I was expecting a bolt with a shoulder, or something similar, but it was cast iron on cast iron, not even a grease fitting.

Here are some pics of the progress.

[customcutter]

Yesterday I pulled out the hot wrench to get the last gear loose and only had to heat it twice before it gave up. Then I wire brushed everything with an angle head grinder. I still didn't like the looks of it so I sand blasted everything with wet sand blasting kit that hooks up to my 3200PSI pressure washer. All the parts got a spray and brush down with Rustoleum Rust Remover a couple of times. Then I washed them off with a hose. The directions said not to let it dry on the material, and every time they would start drying off a white residue showed up. I gave up on the Rustoleum and pressure washed everything again and went and got some Ospho and Bondo glass to patch the small holes. It said to leave the Ospho on over night and brush any residue off after 24 hours.

While I was waiting for that to finish drying this AM I pulled the front lifting arms and ground out some old bad welds and rewelded them. Also welded a small piece of broken cast iron that covers where the seed dumps out of the Duplex planter.

Pics of how it looks now, and the rear wheels on the belly planter that are broke and going to weld up tomorrow.

[SamsFarm]

Never saw one of those up in my area

Could not imagine finding seed plates

[customcutter]

Never saw one of those up in my area

Could not imagine finding seed plates

I should have taken a picture before I started taking it apart. Here is one I saw on FB Marketplace.

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/it ... _code=null

Here is a YT video of the Duplex Hopper and an A 178 or A 180 belly planter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7x-6f4y2qk&t=445s

Hopefully I'll have this one ready to plant some peas with in the next week or two.

I was lucky the man that gave me the hopper had 5 sets of plates and wanted $100 for them. I gladly bought them.

[customcutter]

I tried welding the 2 broken wheels this morning. The one with the piece snapped out of it was no problem. It welded up first try. The second one with a crack through it but everything still in place had to be welded 3 times and still not 100%. I'm not a welder, and know that cast iron is difficult to weld. I watched a lot of YT videos, and ran across one that said that pieces that were broken out were not a problem. It's the cracks that are troublesome due to different thermal expansion I would think. Better than it was and I'll keep an eye on it to see if the crack starts growing again.

[tst]

cast needs to be preheated before welding I find

[SamsFarm]

That one in the youtube vid was pretty neat.

You could see it throwing the seed.
It looks like I saw a lot of doubles being thrown.
Dropping 2 or 3 seeds where you only want 1 gets expensive fast, and the outcome is usually not as good.

When heiliarcing (tig) I always preheat cast, use stainless filler wire, then made the cooling off slower than normal.

Sometimes adding a little heat after the welding as it cooled to slow the cooling.

[customcutter]

cast needs to be preheated before welding I find

Yes, that would have been the best procedure, then throw it in some hot coals afterward to cool down overnight. Unfortunately, my torch is out of gas.

The section that was broke out was no problem. The other side on the second attempt had actually cracked by the time I took my hood off and looked at the weld.

[customcutter]

That one in the youtube vid was pretty neat.

You could see it throwing the seed.
It looks like I saw a lot of doubles being thrown.
Dropping 2 or 3 seeds where you only want 1 gets expensive fast, and the outcome is usually not as good.

When heiliarcing (tig) I always preheat cast, use stainless filler wire, then made the cooling off slower than normal.

Sometimes adding a little heat after the welding as it cooled to slow the cooling.

The man in the video is a Preacher, and actually grows and sells Heritage non-GMO seeds as a business. I doubt that an extra seed here or there was a concern. There are plates for field corn, and sweet corn, also I've heard/read several comments lately that seeds aren't sized like they used to do in the past. Yes the size of the notch in the seed plate makes a huge difference in application. I actually want to try saving some of the Heritage seed (Silvermine) that we planted. I may try some of the Jimmy Red or Hastings next year.

I was out of shielding gas on my tig set-up, so I went with flux core wire in my little Lincoln Mig Pak. Yes, high nickel wire is what's recommended for cast. Then a slow cool down.

[customcutter]

I got the belly planter painted a few days ago, and managed to get it put back together this morning. It would have been easier as a 2 man job! LOL I often see videos on YT of people planting with planters and they talk about being sure to lift the planter if you have to back up for any reason as the soil will plug the back of the sword on the planter. I noticed on this model that there is a gate that swings on a pin and if backing up it will close and keep it from plugging. I added a before picture as well.

[customcutter]

I also got the IH Duplex hopper put back together today. I'm hoping to put them both to work in a few days and get some Conk, Blackeye, and maybe Purplehull peas planted. A before pic from the top of the thread also.

[customcutter]

I have posted this in the "Other tractors and Machinery" forum. I'm not sure why it keeps duplicate posting in the "Super A, 100, 130, 140" forum?

Thanks, Ken

[SamsFarm]

I have posted this in the "Other tractors and Machinery" forum. I'm not sure why it keeps duplicate posting in the "Super A, 100, 130, 140" forum?

Thanks, Ken

Sounds like your going to be using this planter with the "Super A, 100, 130, 140".

Since lots of these old IH implements might be dedicated to a specific series of tractor, then they get posted in the appropriate tractor series forum

[customcutter]

I have posted this in the "Other tractors and Machinery" forum. I'm not sure why it keeps duplicate posting in the "Super A, 100, 130, 140" forum?

Thanks, Ken

Sounds like your going to be using this planter with the "Super A, 100, 130, 140".

Since lots of these old IH implements might be dedicated to a specific series of tractor, then they get posted in the appropriate tractor series forum

That makes sense. Just thought I had possibly done it some how and my CRS had kicked in!

[Gary Dotson]

It’s just one of our moderators working behind the scene. The other tractors and equipment sub- group is generally used for other brand equipment.