The Fordson Tractor Pages Forum

Hi, im new here from uk, hope everyone is well.
I am currently restoring a new Performance major 4wd and it is dead drive. Is this correct or were they all live drive.

Thanks in advance

hi and welcome - as discovered in another post - live drive was always an option on majors it was never a standard fit to the supers - so yeh it is what it is ! just unlucky yours is not a live drive !

yeh its a shame but not as big a shame it was standard and i had to look for another box.

Are they whiney as standard too, sound a bit like an e27n?

Ha unlucky - have you found another box for it ?! Where you to in the world ?!

not going to get another box if thats what the tractor came with. Im from the sunny north of england

Yeh that's fair enough - keep it original ! - ha least your sunny ! I'm down in the wet and windy county of Cornwall !

was sunny ish today but still cold not getting much above freezing. About time summer came, costing a fortune to keep the heater on in the workshop

Ha I know the feeling !! - ha fire up the major and stand really close to the exhaust ! . Got any pictures of your major project ?! Be nice to see a few if you have

ill sort some out this week ans start a new thread on its restoration maybe. Just been on getting her mechanically right before she is painted

Beauty- should be interesting- ha yes that's the hard part ! Get it all going first ! Cost a fortune ! - don't wanna paint it then find it decide not to work !

Welcome Aboard Matey. Yes, Photos please. Dandy Dave!

will do. She isnt pretty, will sort this week.

Ive got a NP Roadless which is dead drive and a late blue/orange Roadless which is live so there are both types found in the Roadless conversions. I have to say that I have seen mainly dead drive clutches in the Roadless tractors, I imagine this was to try and offset some of the cost. These would have been mainly cultivation tractors ploughing etc with less requirement for live PTO work baling etc (the type of work normal 2wd stuff could handle).
You may find significant wear in your box, the extra grip afforded by the 4wd means the gearbox often gets a hard life, coupled with the usual oil loss into the back-end. Your dead drive NP box should have FOMOCO on the side and is quite a rarity. There are a lot of differences compared to earlier boxes, PTO ratio etc. I found all this out the hard/long way!
Good luck with it!