1981 Case 444 overheating issues

You say that you "checked the cooling fins".

What does that mean? Did you remove the cowling from the engine completely? How do you know that mice have not built a nest in the cowling or that the area under the flywheel is not choked with debris? What about the intake screen behind the clutch? Is it 100 percent clean? What point gap did you use? 20 thou ?

Yes I completely removed the cowling to look at the cooling fins, and the screen behind the clutch is 100% clear. The static timing results came out very close to the factory setting of .20.

Thanks for the help so far.

Presumably, you also noted that all of the blades on the flywheel are there because those are what create the air movement over the finned engine block. I'm not trying to treat you like a moron here but someone needs to ask these questions in order to eliminate the known issues. :sidelaugh: :sidelaugh:

What makes you so sure that the engine is actually running hotter than it should?


Tell us what you are using for an exhaust system. Is it still under the hood? Or has it been changed to the outside with something non-OEM?

The exhaust system is oem under the hood. If it only runs for a couple of seconds you could grill something on the head, in a few minutes you can't touch any of the shielding in about 5-10 minutes you can't touch the hood and then the dash gets really hot and eventually you cant touch it either, this is under no load. All of the cooling fins on the flywheel are intact.

Hydrive, thanks for the great help so far.

What spark plug is in the engine and is it blistered?

Right now it has a champion h10c before it had a j8c. Blistered?

If you remove a spark plug that has been in use for a few hours, you can "read" the end of the plug that is inside the combustion chamber.

http://www.ngksparkplugs.com/tech_suppo ... aqread.asp

H10 is the correct plug. I'm not sure what the C stands for.

Thanks slot, I will try it.

Have you messed with the carb at all? Your original post says something about swapping out the carbs. What kind of settings do you have dialed into the carb?

My guess is it's running way to lean.

I turned the carb up as much as possible without flooding it and the adjusted down 1/4.