Rock Island G2 in progress and a mystery

[Paul Searl]

We bought the Rock Island G2 on the Fahey auction last month and this weekend I got some pictures of the progress so far since there seemed to be some interest on what was going to happen to it. We also stumbled on a bit of a mystery on it I'll get to first, then the gruesome pics.

In the may 29 parts manual, the shift mechanism for the G2 is shown as a ball type, the same used on the earlier G and the F series. This G2 is #91 and is the earliest G2 I know of or have a picture of and it has the slide shift mechanism. One individual on here who has had parts of three G2's in his possession has also had the only three G2's I have seen so far with the ball type shifter. Only one had a tag with #326. after that, the next serial I have is #684 and it, and all the ones I've seen after it, have the slide shift as well. Obviously, this has me wondering if ours started life with a ball shifter and was later replaced with the slide. I was wondering if anyone had any info that could pin it down, whether both styles were used at at the same time or if indeed ours was replaced. the swap doesn't appear to be anything substantial from what we can see, just a drop in swap without actually having anything to compare.

slide shifter (looks a little odd because the guide is broken and is lying on top):

ball shifter

from guide:

and another shot from the rear of the slide shifter and of the tractor at the sale site:

 

[Paul Searl]

before:

loaded up and ready to go:

Thanks again to the chap with his own skidsteer who got it down the hill for us on a miserable day. He took off and I didn't get his name. We owe him a big thanks since the auction guys were slammed.

We got it home and started cataloging the obvious damage:
Mag damaged
stuck engine
cracked exhaust where it mounts to manifold
wrong carb
shift guide and steering wheel busted
missing seat, spring and guide
air cleaner smashed
belt pully is stuck
water pump issues
block over governer on manifold busted
various little issues

As it stands now:

 

[Paul Searl]

good news was, despite a lot of water having gotten into it, there seemed to be little actual weathering, perhaps the collapsed shed still prevented the worst of it. one block was free, with both cylinders being not to bad. the other block, both cylinders were stuck, but some rust remover a little soaking and once the blocks were off both and direct pressure could be applied, both came free easily (word to anyone doing this in the future, the pistons come out the bottom).

bad block before:

and after pistons:

the good block:

good bit of surface rust, but scraped off easily. Some pitting around the top and where the rings sat is a slight but noticeable ridge so we'll have to have it honed a little. the pistons look good so hopefully they won't have to bore too much.

 

[Paul Searl]

lots of grime, plenty of indication of some partial restoration work and some primer sprayed on, but it doesn't seem to have been a full restoration by any means. under the grime and surface rust though, theres virtually no wear despite welded reinforcing on the front end.

the mag we are hoping is salvageable:

It is stamped as a 46, and I don't see a T on it, while the listed mag is a 46T.

What we hope is a lucky ebay find:

the air intake attachment is something we hadn't seen before and is a little smashed so we'll probably just remove it.

and even managed to salvage some gaskets for patterns, anyone with a G2 had some made by a place that might still have templates on file?

Well, thats where things stand right now.the blocks will hopefully be going into the shop in the next few weeks. the back end is on dads schedule to tear into for this week, hoping that the transmission is just gummed up with cold, heavy oil. sent out an inquiry on having the mag looked at and the carb gone through tonight.

 

[Richard Sturdy]

It is great to hear of another GII being restored. I have one of these tractors (serial number 100026). They are not so common, particularly over this side of the Pond and thus well worth the work of restorating them. Good luck with yours.

Tricky Dickie

 

[Tony Thompson]

Paul,
I was at the auction also.
The broken off shifter guide piece was laying on a different tractor there. I recognized it and brought it over to the Rock Island an placed it on the rear end housing. I was hoping whoever bought the tractor would find it there.
I think you got a great project! Good luck with it and thank you for the progress pictures!
Tony

 

[Paul Searl]

Thank you Tony! Misplaced loose parts are always a problem at sales and all to often I think they just get thrown out. We weren't actually at the sale and were bidding on line, fretting about what pieces might be missing and what we were actually getting ourselves into. We were really happy when we got up there and saw that so many of the loose pieces were there.

Although we have the same piece on our H5 (you can just make out in the background in one of the shots) and on another G2 nearby that we could have had a cast made from, this is better. certainly had we not gotten the tractor someone else would probably have had a rough time with it without a donor tractor.

There are a couple of pieces that might be real issues, like the air cleaner that has us worried, but even that might be salvaged. even the gas tank and radiator so far seem to be in decent shape. Not holding our breath, but I know dad would love to have it on a plow next fall at the local show (even better if we could find a Rock Island 2 or 3 bottom plow or disk to go with the tractors).

Mr Tricky, I have looked at the photo's of your G2 a number of times. A very nice looking machine. They aren't exactly common here either; but dads place is only a few miles from Rock Island proper, so the local interest factor has concentrated them around us. We actually have a pretty good idea of who has our family's old G2 locally, so someday we'd love to bring it back to the family.

 

[ajs2744TC]

A unique little tractor they are. My neighbor got bitten by the rock island bug and is now on his 4th tractor. An F, 2 FA, and a G2.

 

[Ed Bezanson]

Dear Paul I see that your tractor has a waukashu engine in it. What size is it bore and stroke? @ years ago I restored the same basic engine in my 1930 Model 35 bates Steel Mule. I got all my gaskets from Olsen Gaskets out in Oregon. He has gaskets for just about every engine ever built or can make new ones if you have a pattern. The only problem I have had is setting the governor which controls a secondary throttle above the carburetor. I recently got the info on how to set it and will do that when I take it out of storage next summer.

 

[Paul Searl]

its a 1929 Wauk CS4 or CS4D 4 1/4 x 5 3/4. This I think has the same type of system for the governor, would you happen to have a copy of the info for setting it? I might have it in the book we have, but its at dads so I can't reference it off hand and that would be good info to have.

 

[Richard Sturdy]

Paul, I notice that your tractor has the later vaporising-type manifold with a hot box heat exchanger like that fitted on my friend's HII. Originally, mine had the earlier air pre-heat type of system which ducted induction air through a hot labyrinth attached to the exhaust manifold before it entered the carburettor. At some time in its life the air box must have become detached from the exhaust manifold and the air pipe has been re-routed straight to the carb, so it gets cold induction air and needs plenty of time for the water to get really hot before switching to TVO fuel.

Tricky Dickie

 

[Ed Bezanson]

Dear Paul I have two different sets of directions for setting the governor. Send a PM with address and I'll send them along. I won't get back to mine till spring. The manuals all say that the governor was set at the factory and never needs to be reset. But they didn't figure on a bunch of tractor nuts redoing one 80 years later. ED B

 

[Paul Searl]

interesting, I asked dad to compare it to the manual, but he hasn't got back to me, but I am pretty sure its the same as in the 29 parts guide though.

I did some hunting through my pictures and I see exactly what you are talking about on yours. I found two other G2's with it in my pictures, one with an unknown serial and the aforementioned ball shifter. the other I can't see the shifter on but the serial is 90560.

90326, 90684, 100070 and 100261 all have the same type of manifold as on ours.

Are you certain this was actually an early version/late version and not an option for some markets? I can certainly see that design as an advantage for low grade kerosene/distallate and colder areas, but probably more costly/troublesome to manufacture and probably not as reliable. Thanks for pointing it out, I hadn't noticed there were two manifold designs as well.

Out of curiousity, do you know if new rock islands were shipped to europe, or did they come over later for collectors? Reason I ask is I have noticed a very disproportionate amount of the rock islands in museums in the UK that I have seen appear to be canadian specials that were sold through waterloo in canada, though of course they may have been restored based on the special without knowing why and not actually be. I have seen exactly one pictured from N. America so its had me wondering.

---------- Post added at 08:42 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:40 PM ----------

Dear Paul I have two different sets of directions for setting the governor. Send a PM with address and I'll send them along. I won't get back to mine till spring. The manuals all say that the governor was set at the factory and never needs to be reset. But they didn't figure on a bunch of tractor nuts redoing one 80 years later. ED B

Thanks Ed, and I bet your right.

 

[Paul Searl]

little further update on the tear down. good news was, dad got into the rear end and found out why the belt pulley was stuck fast. turned out to be nothing mechanical just cold, old and very heavy oil with a consistency somewhere between corn head grease and tar. A little cleaning and it turns freely. The gears don't seem to show a great deal of wear either. That was the good news.

 

[Paul Searl]

Bad news was we had noticed already the left axle didn't sit straight, so we knew we were going to have a bearing issue there. I got a call though from dad, pretty concerned last week. he'd gotten the wheel off and discovered the threading on the axle was almost completely gone and the wheel had basically been held on by a wire. His first reaction was we needed a new axle, but after sitting down and thinking on it, he's taking it to a local machine shop in the hopes it may be salvageable. Here's hoping because I expect we'd need to find a parts tractor to find another one.

 

[Paul Searl]

and a couple of more of getting in the back end.

 

[Paul Searl]

So, I was remiss in updating this thread. In some ways, not a lot has happened, in other ways a lot has happened. The engine came back; rebored and sleeved, ready to go. Magneto and carb are rebuilt and also ready to go. A lucky break brought us parts tractors, which put the project on hold until June while we got the parts tractors back to Illinois (thanks again Dale, Bill and Dale). A combination of other projects and dads new workshop put the project on hold again but things are starting to move a little, mostly in the form of the disassembly of the parts tractors into something more storable parts wise. An axle from one of the donor tractors is ready to go on solving what was probably the biggest issue.

Pictures 1 and 2 are of the blocks. picture 3 is hard to make out, but is the total destruction of the gear, and occurred in both parts tractors.

 

[Paul Searl]

One of the parts tractors had the important pieces for a PTO unit, which became an immediate priority. I have been shown pictures of one or two other rock islands with at least the gear box still intact for the PTO, but this was the only one we had gotten our hands on. it is missing part of the control mechanism, the shields, the extension and hitch extension, but all parts that can be fabricated or cribbed together from the manuals. Since the G2 is probably the most common of the Rock Islands, the decision was made to give it the PTO to make it a little more unique, although it would have fit on any of the others. Oddly enough, the donor tractor without the PTO had evidence that there had been one installed at one time on it as well. Internally, we were happy to see the mechanism was in good shape. If we could find someone with another PTO unit with some of the missing parts to copy off of it would be great, but not holding my breath.

Now all we need are extension rims and a generator for it

thats all the updates for now, the G2 is about ready to go back together, which means its almost time to worry about painting, but that probably won't happen until the new shop is finished.

 

[Brasherman]

I still think that is one clean tractor to have started with. I am glad you guys have made some progress. It should make a nice bark when you are all done.

I myself have also been overhauling my little shop to make it more usable so I can start to work on my projects at my own place instead of having to get home to dad's.

 

[Paul Searl]

No real progress updates on the tractor, but the shop is almost done. I did however find some answers to my questions above. I was able to pick up a G2 parts list last week that was produced after Case bought out Rock Island. I thought I would post the serial number breaks from the list as this should finally cover the entire production. There is actually more variance in the line then I thought.

The big serial break is at 100001, making it appear they went 90001 to whatever then started over at 100001. According to this list, although multiple varients of the Waukesha CS4 were used (CS4, CS4A, CS4C, CS4D, CS4F i have confirmation of), no parts are differentiated out in the list. The manifold also shows no serial number breaks with the standard combination manifold listed, and a straight gasoline assembly as an option.

So here are the changes I found (note: no new illustrations from previous lists appear to have been added):

Aircleaner listing shows 90340 and below used a top guard sheet on the air intake stack; and 90341+ above added an auxiliary air cleaner.

Clutch Shaft bearing cage/assembly is shown as different from 90001 to 10009, from 100010 to 100171, and from 100172+.

Belt pulley bell housing, cap, spline shaft and assembly show as different for 100001+

Differential spider, pin, rear axle nut, felt retaining plate, washer and rear axle bell housing show as different for 100001+.

Double reverse gear, bushing and shaft show as different for 100001+.

Gear shift assembly was entirely changed on the 100001+ from the ball and stick shift to the slide shift. In addition, the transfer case cover, upper transfer case cover and gaskets changed again at 100196+ (Note: again, no new illustrations, only the ball and stick illustration is shown).

On serial numbers 90001- 90418 the gas tank assembly was a one piece tank with two chambers. 90420+ the tanks were made separately and used a wider tank strap to hold both tanks in place.

I don't know that any of these are huge changes, but it might save someone a headache at some point. I would say the biggest thing is the gear shift assembly if you are looking for a serial number correct tractor since it appears some swapping did take place.