The Fordson Tractor Pages Forum

Hello, after undertaking various jobs on our super major, it is on the road for the first time since we have owned it.

It's done about 20miles over the weekend, lots of short trips and all seems ok, other than i am a little worried about the temperature of the gearbox.
It seems to be getting pretty hot on the casing area below the steering box, as in you can only just put the back of your hand on it after about 6miles of fast driving. The bellhousing/front area of the assembly is cool enough, as is the front of the rear transmission.
It has had new oil throughout (15/30 universal oil) and is not particularly noisy (though in neuatral there is a little noise which goes when the clutch is disengaged)
There was nothing of interest in the old oil when it was drained out, which I took as a good sign.

The tractor drives fine and seems nice and free running.
I don't know what they are normally like so am I worrying about nothing? or could there be a problem

Any advice would be appreciated, thanks

Transmission hand brake dragging? We always ground the front three teeth off the ratchet on new tractors to make sure the brake was fully released.

Thanks for the reply,
It's not the handbrake, I drained it again this afternoon and removed the selector and other side plate
Everything is nice and free in the bearings and handbrake as far as I can tell
It's back together again now
I spoke to someone this evening who is familiar with them and he seems to think that it's not unusual when traveling at faster speeds, I will have to see how it goes
Thanks

I think it's pretty normal that Major gearbox temperature hot up when you drive full speed on the road or do some hard work on the field.

The gearbox on our old loader, probably weighing aroun 5t used to get very hot when worked hard, particulary if pushed hard on a soft field picking up bales.