Loader Gives New Life To Garden Tractor

Loader Gives New Life To Garden Tractor TRACTORS Loaders 21-3-9 When his garden tractor turned out to be a dud for lawn-mowing, Paul List turned it into a great little front-end tractor for cleaning out cattle barns. He bought the MTD tractor equipped with a 14 hp Briggs & Stratton engine and 42-in. mower deck in 1972. "But it was so heavy, it left tire tracks in the yard even when ground was firm and dry," says the Williamsport, Ohio, farmer. "When I got some cattle, I decided there had to be a way to adapt it to cleaning out the barn." So he designed and built a front-end loader to fit the tractor. He used 2 in. sq. tubing to build the frame and arms of the loader and 1/4 in. thick sheet metal to build its 52-in. wide by 16-in. deep bucket. The loader operates on four 3-in. hydraulic cylinders with 16 in. stroke powered by a 20 gpm pump and 5-gal. oil reservoir mounted on front of the tractor. He added a power steering system by installing a valve (operated with a 3/8 in. bolt) underneath the steering column and a mounting cylinder off an old Ford car on the front axle. Out-of-pocket expense was $3,000 to $4,000, as all parts were purchased new. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Paul List, 105 Parker St., Williamsport, Ohio 43164 (ph 614 986-9125).

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