2011 - Volume #35, Issue #5, Page #22
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Ford Garden Tractor Fitted With Pinto Engine
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“I use it mainly in parades and for showing off,” says Killion. “The Pinto engine is painted blue just like the tractor. I installed a pair of small aftermarket mufflers so the engine isn’t all that quiet.”
The tractor has 6-in. wide wheels on front and 15-in. wide wheels on back.
Killion bought the tractor 6 years ago from someone who had already started rebuilding the tractor. The original owner had started to convert it into a drag tractor, so Killion followed up on that idea, adding wheelie bars and a parachute on back. He bought the Pinto engine and had it overhauled, then took it to Prom.
The 4-cyl. engine was a very tight fit, says Prom. “But I didn’t have to stretch the tractor frame or raise the hood. I did have to replace the 4-gal. gas tank with a smaller 2-gal. one and move it back under the hood. I also moved the battery back behind the tractor’s rear end.
“I put the Pinto engine in backwards in order to hook up to the tractor’s original hydrostatic transaxle. I made an adapter to fit between the transaxle and the front pulley on the engine. The Ford Pinto has the oil pan drop on front of the engine so by putting the engine in backward, it fit right in the open part of the tractor frame and worked out just right.”
Prom also removed the tractor’s original steering sector and mounted the rack and pinion steering sector off a Ford Pinto on the left side of the tractor, just outside the tractor’s frame. “I managed to fit the Pinto’s original radiator in the tractor’s front grille,” notes Prom.
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Jim Killion, 1705 Sunray Ave., Mankato, Minn. 56001 (ph 507 387-5748; jimkillion@charter.net).
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