NIC - "Mr. FRISK" was My Dad.... You can just call me DENNY.
We all have our favorite tractors for different reasons, a 782 w/PS would be a nice tractor to run.
Guess I'm just used to tractors that steer hard, my Super H w/loader has NFE and NO PS... when sitting still it's two hands and arms, plus a little Body English to turn the steering wheel. But 40-50 PSI in the frt tires really helps. Once it's mowing a little it steers O-K, the faster the better. The most common Char-Lynn PS for the H/SH series requires cutting a hole in the frt top left corner of the hood for clearance for the PS reservoir, and THAT ain't happening to my tractor. The M does have Char-Lynn PS, a very early version with the pump & res. tucked up under the hood, the most common version is the later one which mounts to the governor housing. Dad put that style on his Super M-TA. The M was Dad's loader tractor plus wore the IH 2M-E mounted corn picker for 20 yrs, so always carried lots of frt end weight, so PS was a necessity and was added sometime in the 1950's.
PS on a GD would be an interesting project. Please post a few pic's when you get farther along on that project. I've thought about putting on-board hyd. on my 72 but I'm running out of places to hang stuff on it, not sure where I'd put the reservoir big enough to hold a gal. or two of oil. But tapping into the Hy-Tran in the rearend might be an option, just not sure how well the pump would stay primed. I'd still use the manual lift for the rockshaft. My goal would be to use the 72 to raise my big hyd. dump cart and other tasks. It would be a higher PSI system, 1500-2000 PSI. I use the 982 now and sometimes on BIG loads of dirt & rock, REALLY big loads it won't start raising the bed, needs more PSI. I've only had that problem 2-3 times but would still like to fix it.
But, back on the improving the manual steering issue, when I rebuilt the steering box on the 70 this spring, everything was actually in decent shape inside the box, just had terrible looking grease mixed with water in it. Disassembled & cleaned everything, re-assembled and greased everytthing up, and installed the thrust bearing kit I got from Dave Kirk several yrs ago. I was going to put that on the 72 along with the brand new gearbox I bought ten yrs ago but the design of the gearbox casting is different and the thrust bearing won't work on it. I also used a good used 3/4" frt wheel bearing for the top bearing on the steering tube, reduces turning effort a bit more. The result was a tractor that steered very easy without the half turn of steering play that it had before the rebuild. "Palming" the wheel is NO problem, in fact one finger behind a spoke in the wheel and you can spin the steering wheel when moving. Last tractor I ran that steered that easy was a 4010/4020 JD, even Dad's 4010 w/ 11Lx15 frt tires & 4-38 frt mounted cultivator on I could flick the steering wheel standing still and the tractor would turn stop-to-stop.
Both the 70 & 72 need new frt tires, will probably use tri-ribs on both. The factory installed GY ribs still have decent tread, but the casings are aged so much that I've had blow-outs where the casing just ripped and blew the tube.
