MF 1505 c/w CAT 3208 Engine

[taurus MK1]

Hi, another project in the shed. Was parked outside for along time, but she fired up no probs, bit smokey,soon clears. Have sourced the correct exhaust down pipes and new muffler box from the USA plus someother bits and bobs. Rear linkage has had a hard time, found some good link arms on ebay. Generally i have all the parts etc to get going. I will keep her orginal. Has anyone had any involvement with a 1505. The brakes or rather the brake is an issue, original fitment is a large drum brake before the rear axle. Okay in the flatlands of the US etc. I have read of and spoken to a few about various mods, a disc conversion etc.Anyone had any dealings?

Cheers John

[komatsu d475-1]

Good pics,straight looking tractor

[essexpete]

Never used one in serious anger but the farm I first worked on had one new in 1978. It was not particularly well thought of although, IIRR, it was not a bad pulling/draught tractor. It was used for all the heavy cultivations, including moling. It had a relatively short life on the farm, being replaced by a MF 2720 by the early 80s. It was not much use for non cultivation work yet at 180hp it was not particularly powerful.
I used it for silage rolling and for pulling the odd trailer when the conventional tractors were tied up. Front axle was fitted with a limited slip diff sometime in its second year to improve traction. That made it a bit scrubby on the hard. The regular driver moaned about the crude 3 point which was operated by a spool valve. I think the US tractors had a drawbar only. The CAT engine sounded good. Gearbox was quite difficult to change on the move. It was the first machine I sat on, other than MF 760 combine, to be fitted with aircon. I have a picture somewhere of it moling.

[taurus MK1]

Thanks for that essexpete I think the early 1505 had no diff, later models were fitted with a auto locking device called no spin diff, which worked well but sometimes would not disengage.
The lighting for the UK and rear linkage was fitted by Boughtons of Amersham, some rear linkage was of Dowdeswell decent? The linkage is pretty poor, the drawbar was the true pulling point.


Cheers John PS would be nice if you could post that photo